Couriers for the Revolution
Benjamin Franklin, William P. Babcock, ca. 1876, Metropolitan Museum of Art
In October 1775 Seth Jenkins, Alexander Coffin and fellow Nantucketers arrived in London and purchased the brig Richmond to return home. Some unnamed “friends of America” gave them letters to Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, and others explaining British designs against the colonies. The Richmond also had £20,000 on board and was under false registry as sailing to the West Indies and then bound for Halifax, when it was in fact bound for Nantucket.
![Image of item](https://omeka.hrvh.org/files/fullsize/0b0c3f8bebdc8423a0424853613d68ee.jpg "American Privateer "General Armstrong"")
American privateer "General Armstrong," Capt. Sam. C. Reid, N. Currier, 1838-1856, Library of Congress.
The brig was captured by an American privateer, John Craig, sent to Philadelphia and her owners were sent to the Bahamas. When Jenkins, Coffin, and others eventually found their way home, they sued for the brig’s return in the Philadelphia admiralty court and also appealed to Congress for redress. They won their case but failed to recover their property.
In a letter quoted in Alexander Starbucks’ History of Nantucket: County Island and Town Including Genealogies of the First Settlers, Coffin writes about a harrowing return from London. Coffin recollects:
“...the letters we were Chargd with to members of the Hon Congress & were of such Importance & Nature as Required us to act with the Utmost Care & Caution, had they been discovered we Hazarded our necks & the necks of the best and sincerest Friends of America.”