Obscurist Ear-Wiggery Posting

What is floating around in my brain all of a sudden? Why, it's "The Yankee Privateer":

Come listen and I'll tell you
How first I went to sea,
To fight against the British
And win our liberty.
We shipped with Captain Whipple
Who never knew a fear,
The captain of the Providence,
The Yankee privateer.

Chorus:

We sailed and we sailed and kept good cheer,
For not a British frigate could o'er come the privateer!

We sailed to the south'rd
And suddenly did meet
Three British frigates convoy
To a West Indian fleet.
Old Whipple put our lights out
And crawled upon their rear,
And not a soul suspected
The Yankee privateer!

Chorus

For ten long nights we followed
And e'er the moon arose,
Each night a prize we captured
Beneath the Lion's nose.
And when the British looked to see
Why ships should disappear,
They found they had in convoy
The Yankee privateer!

Chorus

The biggest British frigate
Bore round to give us chase,
But though we were the flee-er
Old Whipple didn't race,
Until he'd raked her fore and aft
-The lubbers couldn't steer -
And then he showed the foe the heels
Of the Yankee privateer!

Chorus.

This song commemorates the exploits of Commodore Abraham Whipple of Rhode Island. Far from being a privateer, however, his ship, the Providence, was a U.S. Navy frigate:

On June 18, 1779, the frigates Providence, Queen of France and Ranger sailed from Boston on a cruise to the eastward, two of the ships carrying twenty-eight guns each, one mounting only eighteen. As to what occurred during that eventful month on the high seas off the Newfoundland banks, there are varying accounts but they agree in the main on one point: a large number of enemy vessels was captured and sent to Boston under prize crews to bring a vast sum to the wavering colonial fortunes of war. During this whole procedure not a shot was fired, the maneuver evidently relying for its success on the subterfuge of masquerading as friendly British vessels. The ships captured by this remarkable tour de force were of the 700-800 ton class. Winsor, in his ambitious History of America, observes with optimism; "Their cargoes were sold for more than a million dollars and the bold venture is spoken of as the most successful pecuniary enterprise of the war." Above and beyond his share of the prize money and cargoes Commodore Whipple received a communication dated September 19, 1779 from the Marine Committee of the Continental Congress, congratulating him on the success of his cruise and urging the speedy preparation of the vessel Providence for another cruise.

More on the naval career of Commodore Whipple can be found here.

No doubt you're asking, "Tom, what on earth put that song in your head?"

Well, my grandmother gave me an album of Revolutionary War songs put out by the National Geographic Society when I was a little boy. I listened to that record over and over again, so much so that I still remember a solid dozen of the songs.

Let that be a lesson if you're considering giving music to a small child. He may grow up into a total geek.

Posted by Robert at June 22, 2006 01:46 PM | TrackBack