John Howland

The Gaspee Days Committee at www.gaspee.COM is a civic-minded nonprofit organization that operates many community events in and around Pawtuxet Village, including the famous Gaspee Days Parade each June. These events are all designed to commemorate the burning of the hated British revenue schooner, HMS Gaspee, by Rhode Island patriots in 1772 as 'America's First Blow for Freedom'®. Our historical research center, the Gaspee Virtual Archives at www.gaspee.ORG , has presented these research notes as an attempt to gather further information on one who has been suspected of being associated with the the burning of the Gaspee. Please e-mail your comments or further questions to webmaster@gaspee.org.

Early in 1772, only two years after he came here, Providence was moved by the bold appearance and bolder destruction of the Gaspee, in Narragansett Bay; an enterprise in which the ardent Howland would gladly have joined, and did join as far as he was allowed. Always on the alert, he had resolutely taken his seat in the bow of one of the invading boats, and was in the act of pushing off, when his master, who was looking for his boy, probably with some suspicion of his intention, seized him by the wrist, and pulled him out, saying, "he should not go with those fellows, to get his head broke." The narrator adds--"Thus I have no part in the boast of being of the Gaspee party, which, the July orators say, was the first act of the Revolutionary struggle." But be was not long denied the opportunity of engaging in that momentous conflict.....

    The Gaspee armed schooner, commanded by Lieutenant Duddington, who had long vexed and troubled coasters and other vessels entering the port of Providence, under pretence of searching for contraband goods, chased a New York packet, commanded by Capt. Benjamin Lindsey, up the river. Lindsey was a better pilot than Duddington, and passed Namquit Point so near that the Gaspee in following him grounded, and as it was high water and the tide leaving him, he stuck fast. When Lindsey arrived with the news, a muster was made, and some-body set Daniel Pearce, a boy who had a drum, to beating through the street, and proclaiming that the Gaspees ashore high and dry below Pawtuxet. Before dark eight boats were manned, and Abraham Whipple appointed commander. We boys took another boat, and choose Ben Hammond for our captain. He was a fear-nothing fellow, with a lock of knotty red hair standing through the crown of his hat.
    "Being in the bow of the boat, I had orders from captain Hammond to cast off the painter and shove off the bow. The first I had performed, and when in the act of doing the second, Mr. Gladding, who at that moment had arrived to look for his boy, seized me by the wrist and pulled me on to the wharf, saying, ` you sha'nt go with those follows to get your head broke.' Thus I have no part in the boast of being of the Gaspee party, which the July orators say was the first act of the revolutionary struggle.
    "Governor Wanton, as his duty required, issued a proclamation, offering one hundred pounds sterling for the discovery of the perpetrators of this deed, and when admiral Montagu had sent an account of the transaction to England, a proclamation of the King and Council came over, offering a reward of one thousand pounds for the discovery of the commander of the party, and five hundred pounds for any others concerned. A high commissioned court, as it was called, assembled at Newport, to receive complaints, with authority to send the persons charged to England for trial. The admiral brought his fleet round from Boston, and lay in the harbor to protect the court, and also to receive the persons accused on board to be sent to the mother country for the purpose above named.
    " The King's proclamation was posted on the pillar of the hay scales, which then stood near the north east corner of the Market house. It had not been there more than fifteen or twenty minutes, when Mr. Joseph Aplin, a distinguished lawyer, came up to see what had collected the crowd. Lifting his cane he struck it down, and it soon mingled with the filth of the street. This patriotic act, though he gave no reason for it at the time, was prompted by his regard for the safety of his fellow citizens. It is an honorable testimony to the character of the people of this town and State, that the Court with this bounteous reward, could get no person to inform, though all engaged were well known."

    The pension act of 1831, brought forward many candidates for its provisions. The active measures taken in their behalf, proved a heavy tax upon Mr. Howland, who was constantly applied to from all parts of the State, as well as from abroad, for necessary information. The numerous applications from Rhode Island excited surprise at the pension office. They seemed disproportioned to the size of the State. How so small a State could furnish so many survivors of the revolutionary army, was incomprehensible. The doubts entertained at the department led to vexatious delays, and proved serious impediments to the success of claimants. At this moment, Hon. Tristam Burges, then a member of Congress, wrote to Mr. Howland from Washington, upon the subject. He said, that in - frequent conversations at the pension office, these doubts were freely expressed, and that until re-moved, little progress could be made in securing justice for the survivors of the Rhode Island line. Explanations were asked for that he could not give, and he now turned to one for aid, whom he knew to be perfectly familiar with the ground of these claims. " If Mr. H." he added, " would prepare a paper explanatory thereof, a most important service would be rendered to the remnant of the revolutionary patriots."
    Thus appealed . to, Mr. Howland immediately wrote a pamphet, entitled " Notices of the military services rendered by the militia, as well as by the enlisted troops, of the State of Rhode Island, during the Revolutionary War." In this pamphlet he shows that in the contest for freedom, Rhode Island was among the earliest and foremost, and that in various ways the State furnished more men for the service, according to population, than any other member of the union. He further shows, that during the war, every able bodied male, in the State, "except those of the profession of Quakers," between the ages of sixteen and sixty, bore arms ; and that " thus for a considerable time, the whole militia of the State were from home, leaving the women, the boys under sixteen, and the men above sixty, to perform the farming or other work." Al-though, he adds, " we may not now find many living who had arrived at the age of thirty years in April, 1775, when the war began, yet when we consider that the boys who were then only ten years old, were, two years before the close of the war, drafted for military service, we cannot be surprised at the number of applicants under the pension act."
    The great number of marine applicants from Rhode Island, he accounts for by the fact, that a large pro-portion of the officers and men attached to the first naval force created by Congress, and commanded by admiral Esek Hopkins, were from this State. A. copy of this pamphlet was sent to Mr. Burges. He presented it to the head of the department, and had the satisfaction of knowing that it accomplished the purpose for which it was written.