The Re-Capture of the Love and Unity at Toms River

As noted in prior articles, privateering along the Monmouth shoreline increased substantially in the summer of 1778. Aggressive captains from Philadelphia and New England combined with emboldened local militia officers to prey on British shipping to and from New York. If the captured Venus was the largest prize taken off the Jersey shore that summer, the Love & Unity was likely the second most impressive prize. However, the capture of the Love & Unity would be marred by post-capture wrangling and the vessel, ultimately, was lost to British reprisal.

Antiquarian sources claim that the merchant brig, Love & Unity, was captured at Cranberry Inlet, north of Toms River. It was apparently taken by a Monmouth militia contingent led by Colonel Daniel Hendrickson. It is possible that privateers operating in the area forced the Love & Unity toward shore where it beached. The Connecticut privateer, Princess Mary, captained by Benjamin Pratt was operating near Toms River at this time. But militia secured the vessel and brought its cargo to Toms River once it grounded inside Cranberry Inlet.

On August 5, the Pennsylvania Packet reported:

A large London ship, richly laden with dry goods, bound for New York, ran aground on the Jersey shore at Shrewsbury, on Thursday last, when a few of the brave militia of that State took and secured her contents, although two British vessels of force were firing upon them with the utmost fury.

The same newspaper reported again on August 12:

We hear that on Thursday night, the ship Love and Unity from Bristol, with 80 hogshead of loaf sugar, several thousand bottles of London porter, a large quantity of Bristol beer and ale, besides many other valuable articles, was designedly run on shore near Toms River; since which, by assistance of some of our militia, she has been brought into a safe port, and her cargo properly taken care of.

On August 13, the New Jersey Admiralty Court met at Allentown and it may have condemned Love & Unity to Captain Pratt. Daniel Hendrickson is listed as attending the same court (over his claim to the smaller vessel, Indian Delaware).

On August 26, the New Jersey Gazette advertised the sale of the Love & Unity and its cargo on August 31 and on September 2 at Manasquan, where some of the cargo was apparently stored. It is unclear if the auction actually took place (though some antiquarian sources assume it did), and it is unclear whether Pratt or Hendrickson was the established recipient of prize money from the sale. Whatever the reason, Love & Unity and its cargo remained at Toms River more than two weeks after the advertised auction date. The delay would prove costly.

On September 18, the British came for their ship. The Pennsylvania Evening Post reported on the attack and the key role of William Dillon, a felon sentenced to death two months earlier but pardoned. He piloted the attackers:

Two armed brigs belonging to the Enemy came to anchor close to the bar off Toms River Inlet, and they sent into the Inlet seven armed boats with between twenty and thirty men each, who re-took the ship Washington, formerly called Love & Unity, and two sloops which were near the bar, with most of their crews... Soon after they got ashore, a certain Robert McMullen (who sometime since was condemned with William Dillon to be hanged for burglary, and both having been reprieved) entered himself on board the ship, took the boat, and made off to the enemy, huzzahing as he went. Dillon, who joined them some time before, was supposed to pilot the British vessels into the inlet.

A similar report was printed in the New Jersey Gazette. The Loyalist New York Gazette & Weekly Mercury provided some additional details on the British ships and collateral damage: "the boats of his Majesty's ship Delaware and the armed brig Halifax went into Cranberry Inlet, and burnt a ship of about 200 tons and a small sloop, they also brought off a sloop with 96 barrels of flour." One of the burnt sloops, according to historian Donald Shomette, was the Connecticut privateer, Princess Mary—that likely had participated in the capture of Love & Unity.

Antiquarian sources provide a few additional details: the small prize crew of the Love & Unity apparently jumped into the water and swam to shore to avoid capture. Some of the Love & Unity’s cargo, probably the cargo at Manasquan, was not recovered by the British attackers.

As noted in a prior article, Hendrickson took to the sea as a privateer captain in the Indian Delaware in September, but his privateer career was undistinguished. He was captured by Loyalist raiders at his home in Tinton Falls in June 1779 and jailed for several months. It is unknown if Pratt remained active on the Jersey shore after he lost the Love & Unity, though several other Connecticut privateers were active on Monmouth shore through the end of the war.

McMullan and Dillon would remain problems. McMullan joined a Pine Robber gang. After piloting the British attackers, Dillon captained small illegal trading vessels and consorted with Pine Robers. In 1782, he piloted a Loyalist raiding party that would raze the village of Toms River and capture Joshua Huddy, who was leading the defense of the village.

The Love & Unity was probably the first of many significant vessels taken by New Englanders on the Monmouth coast. It also highlights several realities of the Revolutionary War on the Jersey shore. Specifically, 

1.) profit and patriotism were interwoven motivations that drove Revolutionaries to put to sea in small vessels and, in the face of considerable risk, captured many larger British/Loyalist ships; 

2.) Weak institutions and governance hampered efforts to exploit the capture of valuable vessels; and 

3.) Local Loyalists and disaffected, driven by the same motivations as Revolutionaries, were dangerous adversaries capable of thwarting the efforts of their former neighbors.

Related Historic Site: New Jersey Maritime Museum

Sources: David C. Munn, comp., Battles and Skirmishes of the American Revolution in New Jersey (Trenton, N.J.: Department of Environmental Protection, Bureau of Geology, 1976) p 24; Library of Congress, Rivington's New York Gazette, reel 2906; Franklin Kemp, The Capture of Enemy Vessels by Ground Troops in New Jersey, pp 17-8; William MacMahon, South Jersey Towns (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1973) p 305; Edwin Salter, History of Monmouth and Ocean Counties (Bayonne, N.J.: E. Gardner and Son, 1890) pp. 80-84; Donald Shomette, Privateers of the Revolution: War on the New Jersey Coast (Shiffer: Atglen, PA, 2015); The Library Company, Pennsylvania Evening Post; Pennsylvania Packet, August 6, 1778; Pennsylvania Packet, August 12, 1778; Library of Congress, Early American Newspaper, New Jersey Gazette, reel 1930; The Library Company, Pennsylvania Evening Post; Library of Congress, New Jersey Gazette, reel 1930, September 30, 1878; Arthur Pierce, Smugglers' Woods, (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1960) p 40; Edwin Salter, Old Times in Old Monmouth (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1970) p 38; Edwin Salter, History of Monmouth and Ocean Counties (Bayonne, NJ: E. Gardner and Sons, 1890) p80-4; Archives of the State of New Jersey, Extracts from American Newspapers Relating to New Jersey (Paterson, NJ: Call Printing, 1903) vol. 2, pp. 445, 453.