Patrick Henry and the Frigate’s Keel: And Other Stories of a Young Nation by Howard Fast Page A

name, sent the ship’s boat to shore, and Conyngham returned triumphantly with the lieutenant and adjutant of the fort, whom his party had intercepted returning from a rabbit hunt. There was rabbit pie that night to celebrate.
    Twenty-four hours after they took the brig, the lookout spotted another vessel and Conyngham ordered chase. This time it was the French third officer who pleaded that the American think twice.
    â€œWhy?” Conyngham demanded.
    â€œBecause, Monsieur, it is King George’s mail packet.”
    â€œSo much the better. It’ll be worth something.”
    â€œBut, Monsieur, no one has ever dared to stop the mails. The French are not at war.”
    â€œBut I am,” Conyngham grinned.
    â€œAnd will you bring her into a French port?”
    â€œThat I will,” Conyngham said. The French officer shrugged and spread his arms wide in despair.
    Meanwhile, the Surprise had been bearing down on the packet, which, in its home waters, sailed along gaily and unsuspectingly. Again Conyngham’s men boarded in a rush without stopping to count the guns. The packet had been sailing along, wrapped in the fancied security of the mails, so that it was taken almost before it had an opportunity to speculate on the strange red and white striped banner that flew from the Surprise’s masthead; and Conyngham and his men, pistols in hand, burst into the main cabin while the British officers were uncertainly rising from their tea.
    And afterwards Conyngham said, somewhat bewilderedly: “I spent months looking for my first ship, and here I’ve got two in as many days.”
    The British did not take this interference with the King’s mails lying down. They let out a furious uproar, condemned Conyngham as a pirate, and demanded that he be imprisoned and sent to England for trial—a trial which could only end in his being hanged. The British ambassador informed the French government in no uncertain terms that while the two countries were not at war, they might be soon unless such outrages stopped.
    Thus, hardly had Conyngham sailed his two prizes victoriously into Dunkirk, when a French police officer boarded the Surprise and said to him:
    â€œIt grieves me, Monsieur, I am sorry, I apologize—but you are under arrest.”
    â€œArrest?”
    â€œMonsieur, we are not at war with England. I am sorry—those are my orders.”
    They took him to jail, and the jailer expressed his gratification at meeting the already famous Captain Conyngham. Nothing would be spared to make him comfortable.
    They put him in their best cell, brought him a magnificent meal, a bottle of wine, and change of clothes—and after an hour the mayor of Dunkirk waited upon him in person. They were all terribly sorry; the worst of it was that the mail packet had already been returned to King George.
    That night was Conyngham’s worst. It seemed to him that in spite of the Franco-American friendship, his plan of declaring war on the enemies of his country singlehanded was doomed to sudden and inglorious failure, and that his career would come to a sudden end on an English gallows. And then, at the break of dawn, came a messenger from the venerable Dr. Franklin.
    â€œWe’ve arranged for you to escape,” the messenger informed him.
    â€œHow?”
    The messenger smiled and held up the key to the cell. The jailer smiled and looked placidly in another direction; and as they left the jail, doors somehow opened and guards slept soundly.
    When a British sloop sailed into Dunkirk harbor to take Conyngham back to England, the mayor spread his hands wide and told the officers:
    â€œIt is sad, but that Conyngham is a devil. He has escaped us.” An hour before the mayor had had dinner with Conyngham and told him: “Monsieur, you must hide.”
    â€œHide! I must find a ship.”
    â€œYou are mad. Anyway, you must disguise yourself.”
    So Conyngham bought a pair of glasses,