CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE ASIA

WHILE OTHERS FUMED AND FRETTED, Barry rode home, turning over a plan in his mind. Before the assembly recessed, one member posed the problem: how do you compel the anti-Federalist “seceders” to attend? For Barry the answer was easy. Early on Saturday, the last scheduled session before adjournment, he was off to the State House—but not before he went to the waterfront.

It was a bright, crisp, autumn morning.1 A large crowd gathered outside the State House well before 9:30, everyone hoping to find room in the gallery and see firsthand how events would unfold. Among the less genteel spectators was a gang of sailors, stevedores, and carpenters—wharf toughs whose appearance (as well as their language and smell) intimidated the more refined onlookers.² When the doors opened, they followed Barry up the stairs, joining the crowd packed tight behind the gallery rail.

Mifflin ascended to his chair, called the session to order, and read the latest resolution from Congress, calling for each state to hold a convention to vote on the new constitution. Next, he dispatched the sergeant-at-arms to Major Boyd's to fetch the truant assemblymen. Mifflin ordered a clerk armed with the congressional resolution to accompany him, in hopes of appealing to the anti-Federalists' collective conscience, if not to their sense of duty. Minutes later both men returned empty-handed, save for the resolution. Having celebrated their victory with a fine meal, spirits, and a good night's sleep, most of McCalmont's anti-Federalist allies had already left town. Only two were still tarrying at Boyd's: McCalmont and his roommate, Jacob Miley of Dauphin County, another tough frontiersman.3 When accosted by the sergeant-at-arms, they simply ignored him and refused to return. Everyone in the room looked to Mifflin. Now what?⁴

With a nod to his companions, Barry and his men elbowed their way out of the gallery, jogged down the steps of the State House and out to Chestnut Street. Whether Mifflin was in on Barry's plan is not known—but as Barry's band exited, Mifflin “left the chair.”⁵ By doing so, he delayed adjourning the assembly.⁶ Others in the gallery also followed Barry, but at a distance.

Barry's companions strode up Chestnut to Sixth, then turned and headed right to Major Boyd's. They forced their way in the front door, and then stomped upstairs to find McCalmont and Miley. The crowd trailing Barry turned into a mob, shouting curses and throwing stones through the boardinghouse windows.⁷ Barry and company did not bother to knock before entering.⁸

As Barry's toughs circled the two assemblymen, he gave them a choice: they could walk to the State House under their own power, or be carried there.⁹ Other politicians might have been struck with fear, but McCalmont and Miley were made of sterner stuff. They responded with their own profanity-laced declaration; they were not coming to the State House, despite the escort service confronting them. There was a second of silence. Then, “Take 'em!” Barry commanded, and the “compelling” began.

The two ex-militiamen put up a fight. Fists were thrown, clothes were torn, and fingers were bitten or pried off the banisters. The representatives of Dauphin and Franklin counties punched and kicked in every direction, but to no avail. Messrs. McCalmont and Miley bid adieu to Major Boyd's, without settling their bill.¹⁰

Once outside, the two men were hoisted up and carried, as one newspaperman reported, with “their clothes torn and after much abuse and insult.” Slowly but surely, “they were finally dragged” down Chestnut Street.11 By now the clamor could be heard on the second floor of the State House. Peering out of one of the windows, Mifflin saw his two colleagues being assisted back to work, and then quietly excused himself from the chamber.¹² Barry's gang reached the State House doors. Moving to and fro, sideways, backward, sideways, forward, his toughs got to the stairway. They scuffled up the first five steps to the landing while McCalmont and Miley squirmed to free themselves, lashing out at their bearers, whose fingernails dug into their necks and hands, drawing blood. Their clothes, torn in proportion to resistance, became shredded rags.

The next two flights of stairs were sixteen steps each. A five-foot wide stairway is more than broad enough for a crowd to use—the prisoners easily negotiated Franklin's sedan-chair daily—but this band, carrying two thrashing public servants, found it a narrow passage. The last flight of five stairs took the longest. To their credit, neither McCalmont nor Miley stopped fighting. When they could, they dug their feet into the stairs and flailed their arms. Finally, Barry and his men got through the doorway, literally throwing the two men over the rail that divided the gallery from the austere chamber of official government business.¹³ Thanks to Barry there was bedlam, but also a quorum.

As the other assemblymen returned to their seats, Mifflin “assumed the chair, and the roll was called.” The two manhandled legislators, bloody, bruised, and half-naked, glared at him. Panting heavily, they felt for cracked ribs and broken fingers. When their names were called by the clerk, they were still out of breath—but their colleagues happily responded for them. “HERE!” they cried. Mifflin acknowledged, to laughter and cheers, that a quorum was present. The session, delayed but not adjourned, began at last.¹⁴

Looking angrily at the gallery, McCalmont called to be recognized, protesting that his arrival and that of Mr. Miley was by force and force alone, “by a number of citizens he did not know.”¹⁵ Searching the faces of the ruthless gang that bore him there, he sought their ringleader. McCalmont continued to press his cause. He and Miley, present against their wishes, intended to leave.¹⁶

Thomas Fitzsimons spoke, ostensibly to commiserate. If a member of the assembly had done this to his esteemed colleagues, Mifflin should “mark such conduct with disapprobation.” He was seconded by Henry Brackenridge, the Continental Army's old chaplain, who reasoned that McCalmont's beef was with the mob, not the assembly. Adding a rapier wit to Barry's bludgeoning, Brackenridge obligingly cited Franklin's difficulties: whether friend or foe brought McCalmont was immaterial; “if they brought [McCalmont] in a sedan chair . . . all we [need] to know is that he is here.”17

The gallery erupted in laughter. Outnumbered, beaten in both body and vote, McCalmont fought on. He asked that the rules be read, and that he would abide by them. When the clerk noted that the penalty for preventing a quorum by premeditated absence carried a fine of five shillings, McCalmont shoved a bruised hand into his pocket and found his purse, miraculously still in his coat despite his rough journey. Disdainfully, he tossed the coins on the clerk's desk. Here was his fine, he said—now let him go—and the quorum with him. For once the crowd laughed with him. But Mifflin was up to the challenge, and won back the audience with a brilliant rejoinder: the representative assigned to collect fees, a fellow anti-Federalist, was absent. Therefore the fine could not be collected; therefore the quorum stood. To guffaws from the crowd, Mifflin politely assured McCalmont there was no fine for attending—he could keep his five shillings. Undeterred, McCalmont bolted for the door. With shouts of “Stop him! Stop him!” coming from the gallery, Mifflin yelled for the sergeant-at-arms to bar the way. In doing so he probably saved McCalmont's life.¹⁸

Rising to speak, Fitzsimons took command of the situation, bringing the matter to its climax. He had fought with Barry at Princeton, and would fight beside him now. In his offer of five shillings, it was McCalmont who “offended the greatest indignity to the Assembly,” thinking that his pittance could stop the assembly from doing its duty. Brackenridge made a motion that a convention be held on the first Tuesday in November. McCalmont's protests fell on deaf ears (from the onset, Miley kept mute). The resolution passed 44 to 2. With no further business, Mifflin told McCalmont and Miley they were free to go; the assembly adjourned to tumultuous cheers, and the bells of Christ Church pealed throughout the afternoon.19

Before leaving town McCalmont learned the identity of the gallery's ringleader. Soon all Philadelphia knew, thanks to an inspired bit of doggerel regarding his civics lesson:

It seems to me I yet see B(arr)y

Drag out McC(a)lm(o)nt.

(By the Lord Harry,

The might was right, and also Mil(e)y

Was taken from an outhouse slyly,

To constitute with him a quorum,

For he it seems was unus horum.)²⁰

Admired as Barry was by Philadelphians and even members of Congress for his boldness, he quickly found himself without honor among the assembly whose face he just saved. On October 3, McCalmont presented a formal complaint, along with eyewitness accounts, to the Supreme Executive Council, declaring that “the inhabitants of Franklin and Dauphin [counties] had been grossly insulted by the treatment of their members.” The council overwhelmingly agreed “that the Attorney General be directed forthwith to commence the prosecution against Captain John Barry, and such other persons as shall be found to have been principally active in seizing the said James M'calmont, or otherwise concerned in the riotous proceedings as sent forth.”²¹

First to vote “yes” was Council President and Barry's old pen pal, Benjamin Franklin. It was an easy vote for him to cast—even though Barry's actions, harsh as they were, guaranteed the result Franklin wanted more than anything. Among the other members who voted for Barry's prosecution was his fellow “Sea Captain's Club” member, Charles Biddle, himself under pressure to vote against any investigation, especially since “some of the gentlemen ordered to be prosecuted were my intimate friends.” As it turned out, only Barry was specifically named among “the gentlemen.”²²

Biddle, like Barry, possessed both integrity and courage, and broke the news to Barry over dinner that evening. During the meal they argued their positions. Barry was “displeased at first.” Franklin's vote was no surprise, but he felt betrayed by Biddle, a good friend for twenty years. Biddle understood. He sincerely believed the resolution “a very disagreeable business,” but he “concerned it to be my duty, and therefore voted for it.” Biddle assured Barry that a warrant for his arrest was not coming any time soon, and that, while McCalmont looked forward to Barry's legal day of reckoning, the attorney general would assemble his evidence very slowly. After Biddle explained his reasoning, Barry “was soon satisfied it was right.” By the time dessert was served, a friendship had been saved.23

On November 6, the Assembly vote for ratification of the Constitution barely passed, 46 to 23, and with it ended Barry's career as a political activist.

 

In December 1787 the Asia was registered by the state, and Congress approved the mission of “the Ship Asia, John Barry, Commander . . . american built and commanded and manned by Americans.”²⁴ Barry was even notified by the Consul of Sweden that he could inform Swedish vessels that they “were required” to respect the Asia and give aid where necessary.²⁵ In addition to first mate James Josiah, John Sword was named second mate, old veteran Nathan Dorsey was appointed surgeon, and William Barry (no relation) signed on as steward. For supercargoes—the owner's agent in charge of his goods—Barry picked two young men from prominent Philadelphia families: Jonathan Mifflin and Joseph Frazier, who had already been to China in the first voyage of the Canton. Listed among the boys was William Vicary, who grew up to be a successful merchant captain, and Patrick Hayes, who could not wait to make this voyage with his uncle.²⁶

Soon sailors and dock workers were loading a wide variety of goods into the Asia's hold—not just ginseng, but iron, lumber, masts and spars from the Pennsylvania woods, and rum.²⁷ The stores for the Asia's maiden journey were a bit unusual as well. The ship's cargo showed the wide interest of her owners, Barry, and their acquaintances. By the day of departure her hold contained “30 Casks of brandy” from Robert Morris, who directed Barry to use the casks to purchase the best India Nankeen” cloth.28

Others gave Barry money of various amounts for purchase of a wide array of Chinese goods. Letters accompanying these requests reflect 1780s elite consumerism at its best. Robert Colbys gave him “a bill of exchange amounting 276 Spanish milled dollars” for “any articles you may think as a good account.” Henry Gurny, whom Barry had “been so Obliging as to offer to bring . . . any little matter,” gave him $150 for a set of Nankeen china. John Nixon gave him “One Thousand Dollars . . . to be invested in the Annexed List” which included “Canton cloth . . . black scrimshaws” and “Black Satin,” asking that Barry be “particularly attentive to the Quality of the goods as well as the Colours.” Mary Crawthorne's new husband, John Montgomery, gave Barry “200 Spanish Mill'd Dollars” to invest in Chinese goods. Ira Boyle requested “a set of table China” and “Light Coloured Silks for Men's Coats.” John Wilkes gave him $100 for “Serving Silk . . . and Nankeens of a Good Color.” John Brown gave him $600 to “purchase . . . Nankeens of the Common kind” he hoped to resell in Philadelphia, promising Barry one third of the return. Finally, there was the extensive wish list of one Mrs. Hazelhurst, who must have imagined that the Asia's hold was her personal treasure cave: no less than 205 pieces of china, each enumerated and signed, for which she gladly handed over $50.²⁹

Barry also provided for his personal and business needs, obtaining £370 from a London bank and covering the loan with a £1,000 sterling insurance policy “for Cost & goods Shipped by me on Board the Ship Asia of which I am Captain.”³⁰ Four 6-pounders and their carriages were stowed aboard, to be assembled when the Asia reached pirate-infested waters. By happenstance, the Asia was not the only Philadelphia ship making last-minute arrangements for a voyage to China: Truxton's Canton was preparing for her second voyage to the Orient.³¹

Ten years Barry's junior and a native Long Islander, Truxton first went to sea when he was twelve. At sixteen, the stocky boy was in the Royal Navy and tough enough to serve on press gangs. During the Revolution he made his reputation as a privateer; by war's end he succeeded John Paul Jones as Franklin's naval protégé.32 Barry picked Truxton's brain thoroughly over what to expect on the voyage and at Canton. Truxton's knowledge would prove invaluable.

The two ships were both insured by the Irishman Benjamin Fuller, an old acquaintance of Barry's. After great success as a merchant before the war, the British occupation of Philadelphia and a debilitating illness had brought him to near financial and physical ruin.³³ The return of merchant trade to Philadelphia inspired his new career; his budding insurance company, along with investments in Morris's Bank of North America, was restoring his fortune. He covered the risk of Barry's venture with enthusiasm: “The Ship Asia Capt. John Barry Commander—a new Ship Completely fitted—four Six pound Cannon and Small arms with 30 Men—The Capt. esteem'd one of the most accomplished and complete Navigators belonging to this port.”³⁴

Truxton departed on December 8. Barry, facing a two-year absence from home, did not mind being beaten out of port. The Barrys had been together for four years, but that did not make parting any easier for Sarah. To keep her company at Strawberry Hill, Barry sent for her cousin Elizabeth Keen, twenty-three, called Betsy by the family. With his business affairs turned over to Brown, and assurances from friends that they would visit Sarah, Barry took Patrick to the ship. On the tenth, under wintry skies and a heavy frost, Barry and Sarah watched the Asia sail with the tide; Josiah would take her as far as Gloucester Point. After one last evening with Sarah, Barry picked up Doctor Dorsey and his two supercargoes. They took a carriage to League Island and came aboard the Asia there.³⁵

Southwest winds blew so strongly against the natural flow of the Delaware that the Asia remained three days off Gloucester Point. Barry sailed the merchantman over to Reedy Island on the seventeenth to take on livestock and “Sundry other Preparations for sea,” showing his nephew where he had battled James Wallace ten years earlier. “After a tedious time in the river” the breeze shifted to the west, and Barry sent the Asia to the Capes. “I cannot say much for the Ship's Sailing but She steers very well which is a good quality,” he observed, further noting that “She is not so Stiff as I could wish but we must take the more care and she will be getting stiffer every day.”36 (A stiff ship does not roll or heel excessively.)

Optimistic as he was for his ship, he was positively jovial over his crew: “My officers and men please me very much for I can truly say I never had a Soberer Ships Company in my life.” Nevertheless, Barry's third mate, a dark, quiet man named Marsh, gave him some degree of concern, but he remained convinced “We have a good prospect ahead of us.”³⁷

As soon as the Asia entered the Atlantic the sea gods welcomed back the long-absent captain with a terrific storm; thus began a series of violent weather. The elements seemed intent on testing the Asia, and the ship began showing her flaws. Furious waves broke against her hull and found her caulking less than sound. Inside his rocking cabin, keeping his writing hand as still as possible, Patrick wrote in his journal “Our Ship is very leaky . . . our decks constantly Full of Water.” His uncle also kept a record of the beginnings of the Asia's maiden voyage: “Soon after we left our Capes we met with hard gales of wind for several days.” In one of the gales, “We Sprung our Bowsprit . . . we found The Spring not very bad we then secur'd it as well as possible.”³⁸

The bowsprit was no problem compared to the ship's leaky condition. Barry and ship's carpenter John Gatt searched for the principal source. Barry's initial observation over her lack of stiffness became a growing concern. “Our Ship [is] very Crank,” he noted—a flaw in the Asia's construction that made her lean too far to one side, which could result in capsizing. With a stretch of pleasant weather, the carpenter found the reason for the Asia's leak, “a knot being rotten in her Starboard Wales.” A good-sized knothole in a ship's plank was a serious issue, but Gatt plugged her well enough that Barry reported, “since we stopped her she has been tight.”³⁹

In the midst of yet another storm on the Atlantic crossing, as the crew fought rain and wind, “a heavy flash of Lightning struck our Main Mast.” The blast “burst two of the Iron Hoops.” Fortunately, sailing under bare poles, no one was aloft and in the bolt's path. The shock of the split hoops “Shiver'd the fishes,” and Barry feared the mast would come crashing down. But despite the lightning strike, some luck was with the Asia—the impact was “not so much as to damage the Mast.”40 The Asia gamely plowed onward, running up and down the strong waves.

Finally the sun burst through the stormy skies, and, “under double reef'd topsails,” with a steady northwest wind, the Asia started skimming across the waterline. “Tho a bad Sailer,” Patrick Hayes wrote in his journal, the ship “was forced along at the rate of 8[,] 9 and 10 knots” until “we met the NE trade winds [and] we steered South.” Soon Barry changed course to East by South, easing the Asia toward the Cape Verde Islands, three hundred miles off the coast of Senegal.⁴¹

He also ordered the 6-pounders brought up and mounted on their carriages. Gunnery practice began in earnest. For the older hands, ex-Continentals and privateersmen, it was an opportunity to show Hayes, Vicary, and the other landsmen the workings of a gun. The seizure of the Betsy was good enough reason for Barry to ascertain that his men would know how to defend themselves from any approaching Algerian or Moroccan ships.⁴²

Eighteenth-century communications being what they were, Barry did not know that his drilling was unnecessary. Fed up with mounting losses at the hands of the Corsairs, Portugal declared war; their fleet kept the Barbary pirates blockaded in the Mediterranean. Americans were still debating the issue on both sides of the Atlantic. In England, John Adams foresaw war with the Barbary pirates in the future; languishing over America's inability to defend itself, he prophesied that “We ought not to fight them at all, unless we determine to fight them forever.”⁴³

Nor did Barry know that his pending arrest warrant was being pigeonholed. Shortly after the New Year, Pennsylvania's attorney general reported his investigation of the McCalmont affair to the Supreme Executive Council, requesting “advice of Council relative to the suit now carrying on by their order against Captain John Barry.” Working behind the scenes on his behalf, Barry's friends in the assembly convinced their colleagues “that the Attorney General be informed that Council did not want to interfere,” leaving “the matter intirely with him to act as he should judge best.” The investigation quietly died. The actions of “the redoubted Captain Barry,” as one supporter described him, were no longer subject to prosecution. Even Franklin kept silent.44

For some days, young Patrick could see the nine-thousand-foot volcanic mountain, Cano Peak, on the horizon; on January 23, 1788, the Asia “passed between the Cape Verde island.” Barry sailed through the score of large and small islands—most of them just mountains jutting out of the East Atlantic, with no safe anchorage. The next day the Asia “struck Soundings off Cape Rochso [Roxo] on the Coast of Guinea.⁴⁵

Throughout these days of gunnery practice and smooth sailing, the Asia was a happy ship, save for one: Marsh, the third mate. Inexplicably, his mood sank from gloomy to despondent. On February 3, while Barry “spoke a brig for the Persian Gulf . . . bound for Liverpool,” young Hayes noticed that Marsh “apeared very much dejected.” In the middle of the night, a single pistol shot rang out below deck and immediately roused Barry from slumber. He bolted from his cabin and down the dimly lit, narrow walkway where he found some fo'c'sle hands outside of Marsh's tiny berth. On his orders they broke down the door.⁴⁶

The despondent Marsh had shot himself; “the ball entered his right breast and came out through his back.” Dorsey was summoned and confirmed what the onlookers already knew: Marsh was dead. The next day, under a clear tropical sky, Patrick attended his first funeral at sea, and “We committed his body to the waves with the usual ceremony.” Barry recorded the tragedy in the log with his usual brevity: “We lost Mr. Marsh on the Passage he shott himself.” The incident troubled Patrick for days; Marsh “left no wrightings behind him to Justify the commission of so horrid a crime.”⁴⁷

Passing through the doldrums, the ship slackened its speed as it made for the southeast trades, and it grew oppressively hot above and below deck. Hayes noticed how the crew saw “round Spots on the sun with the naked eye one of them considerably larger than the rest . . . the sea seemed all on fire” as “we crossed the equator on 12 of february.”⁴⁸ That day, Patrick and the other neophyte sailors who had yet to traverse the equator were forced to partake in the traditional hazing, “Crossing the Line”:

Those of them who had never before passed being confined below, about three o'clock our ship was hailed by the Old Man of the Tropic who being desired by the Officer of the Deck to come on board, entered over the bow, attended by his wife, whence they were drawn in the chariot [one of the gratings] by a number of sailors, as Tritons, to the quarter-deck, where the captain and gentlemen received them. Their appearance was truly ludicrous, having their faces black and painted, a blanket over their shoulders, by way of a robe, and a large swab on the head, instead of a crown, the long strands of which, hanging down to the waists, served for hair etc.49

Next, Patrick was “Lathered with tar and grease, and shaved with a notched stick.” After making several vows to the “King (such as never to drink small beer when there is strong, and never to kiss the maid when he can kiss the mistress),” he was given Barry's speaking trumpet to “hail the tropic.” One last “handsome washing” by his shipmates, and Patrick's ordeal—witnessed with delight by his uncle—was over.⁵⁰

Patrick's initiation was the only challenge he encountered in the southeast trades. As his uncle did at the same age, Patrick took in everything, describing it all with picturesque detail in his journal. He was fascinated by how “the sky was always covered with flying clouds of the day,” with the night “cool and pleasant.” He and the others found themselves in a variable orgy of fishing: “We catched a multitude of Fishes both large and small some of them weighing 100 lb. The sea all around us was covered with some of them about the size of a shad.”⁵¹

Nor were Barry's crew the only predators on this killing spree: “sharks, bonetoes & other Large fishes destroy'd not a few of them.” Turning their attention to their competition, the armed sailors “Lessened a number of those Tyrants Who spread terror and devastation amongst the inhabitants of the ocean.” For several days they gorged themselves on fish until “several of our people was poisoned.” The sick recovered, but the Asia's crew returned to salt pork and hardtack.⁵²

Days later, slow sailing came to an end with “fresh Gales between NW and West.” Accompanying the strong gusts were several albatrosses, “very Large Birds their body head and under their Wings White the rest of their body of a rich dark brown Colour.” Try as they might to catch or kill them, the sailors had no luck. Another sailor observed that “they must be exceedingly strong,” recalling how “one of them, on being hooked, broke the deep sea line of the ship, to where the hook was fastened, and carried part of it away with him.”53

By now the Asia was running southward again. On the morning of March 29, Barry “saw the Land bearing SE about 16 Leagues distant.” By nightfall the Asia was “in the Table Bay in 5 fathoms water the Cape Town bearing NW one Mile dist.” Barry brought the Asia about, and orders were given to dismantle the guns. The Asia was below Penguin Island, across the mainland known among mariners as “the Country of the Hottentots.” “After a passage of ninety 9 days,” the Asia was in Cape Town.⁵⁴

Like Patrick, most of the men aboard had never seen Africa. Patrick vividly described the view: “Cape town lies a bout 40 Miles to the Northw'd of the Cape it is situated partly in a Val[le]y at the foot of a Chain of very lofty Mountains which forms a semicircle to the Southw'd of it there is only one passage by which you can approach the town.” With daylight Patrick saw each peak of the mountain range. The highest peak, “called the TableLand . . . lies Due North of the town.” The youngster's eyes swept southward: “The next is Called the Sugar Loaf on which the Dutch always keeps watch and who gives notice by Signals of what Country the Ships in Sight are of it lies S. W. of the Town. The next is Lions Rump it lies N. W. of the Town on which is kept a watch.”⁵⁵

Cape Town was founded in 1652 as a supply station for the Dutch East India Company. During the American Revolution a British fleet attempted to take over the Cape—an idea enthusiastically supported by the English East India Company, believing it could become “the Gibraltar of India.” With assistance from a French fleet, the Dutch turned back the British invaders.⁵⁶

Barry brought the Asia into Cape Town's accommodating anchorage, full of European ships and a few American ones, including the Canton. Barry went ashore to introduce himself, present his papers, and ask permission to trade. He learned that “Business is Caried on by Licence from the Dutch East India Company,” which had everything a merchantman could want. To their pleasant surprise, Barry's crew need not load their water barrels on their boats and run them ashore in order to be refilled. A pipe ran the length of one of the piers, from which all the fresh water they needed could be taken directly aboard—state-of-the-art eighteenth-century technology.57

Once permitted, Barry began unloading those wares the owners deemed best suited for trade in Cape Town: tar, iron, and lumber. No sooner had the crew begun this task than the weather turned “very rough.” Barry hoped to “be able to sail in ten days,” and put the men to work repairing the damaged bowsprit and re-caulking the Asia's problematic seams. Shore leave was scheduled in shifts. While the supercargoes handled provisions and trade Barry gave his nephew shore leave, admonishing him to keep his eyes and ears open and write down his observations. Patrick willingly obeyed.⁵⁸

Patrick and the rest of Barry's crew found Cape Town “well built of Stone and bricks the houses two Story high with flat Roof, others are covered with Thatch.” Like Philadelphia, Cape Town was laid out in a square; “the Streets are Straight and parallel the Town contains about 1200 houses,” which were kept “Clean and elegantly furnished and well painted.” Patrick found the Dutch to be vigilant; “allways keep[ing] a large body of troops in the town.” The townsfolk “were generously well dressed . . . the Small Sword and Cockade complates the dress of every Man who wishes to appear like [a] gentleman.” The trappings and estate of the Dutch East India Company were incredibly impressive: acres of sumptuous gardens bordered with oak trees with a “Collection of Strange beasts and birds,” including ostriches, secretary birds, baboons, zebras, and “the Tygar Cat Leopard.”⁵⁹

Even the common livestock struck Hayes as uniquely odd. Being Irish he was no stranger to the sight of sheep, but here they were “Remarkable for their large Tail which weigh about 4 to 6 pounds.” For all of its exotic sights, the young orphan found two things in common with his new home, Philadelphia: “a well built Church with a steeple and two clocks” and slaves. Slavery had been abolished in Pennsylvania in 1780—although the act did not free any slaves, it stopped the abhorrent practice—but the trade was still legal here and Patrick witnessed “dutch Neggroes and Indians from different part of the East” serving as “Slaves in this place.” Dutch settlers told the inquisitive boy that all Africans “prove as troublesome to back Settlers here as the americane Indians do to the back Settlers in [our] Country.”60

Cape Town justice was swift and merciless to its guests as well: “people Convicted of Capital crimes are broke on the wheel and gibbeted for the most bafling crime they will sentence a man to 15 or 16 years hard a labor.” Cape Town was a puzzling place for Patrick, who found the idyllic at odds with the draconian. On one hand, there was “the wholesome air” for the “very corpulent” Dutch to enjoy. On the other, there were the “3 gibbetts one fore the sailors one fore the soldiers and one fore the Slaves.”⁶¹

By April 11, Barry “finished our business here.” The layover's success was mixed: “We did not sell the Spars,” and the carpenter could only jury-rig the bowsprit “as well as it is in our Power,” assuring Barry it would last until the Asia reached Canton. Further, some of the barrels in the hold had proved to be irreparably damaged in crossing the stormy Atlantic: “Fourteen Kegs of Cargo Rum” and “all the Spirits of Turpentine” were empty. Barry did find a replacement for Marsh, John Sutton, “taken off the Brig Navigator.” Once more the Canton left ahead of the Asia, beating her out of Cape Town by two days. Barry “put to Sea on the thirteenth.”⁶²

For the next ten days it seemed as if every gale and storm came to call on Barry's vessel. Waves the size of canyon walls threatened her very existence, toying with the Asia as soon as she left Table Bay. “On the 14th it blowing very harde,” the Asia lost another soul: “One of our Seamen Jack Kennedy was washt off the bows.” The cry of “man overboard!” was instantly followed by a log and rope tossed in Kennedy's direction. “We did all that we could in our power to save him,” Patrick sorrowfully wrote, “but it was to no purpose.” Young Hayes stood on the poop deck with his uncle, watching helplessly as Kennedy rose and fell in the throes of the deadly wave, and then disappeared.⁶³

The Asia “continued running to the southw'd and Eastw'd as well as the wind would permit,” but “the Sea ran very high, the wind varying . . . from the Eastw'd and squally continuously . . . and very Cold Weather.” On April 23, the bowsprit sprung again and the topmast was lost; Barry ordered every sail reefed as “it blew agale of wind with a heavy Sea.” Beaten up and leaking, the Asia was truly imperiled when, fortunately and improbably, “the wind abated and the sea fell.” Barry gave hurried orders and the crew jury-rigged a spare top mast and new lines to reset the Asia's rigging. To a relieved Patrick, “the weather seemed to wate for us to complete the necessary Job.” It did not wait one second longer: “At night we had a violent Gale of wind at ENE,” he wrote. The punishing weather continued with “Severe gales of wind varying every day from SW to S and SE.” The wind seemed to be attacking the Asia from all sides at once. Nor was she making progress; for a solid week “we gained nothing.”64 To the crew, just keeping the Asia's hull in the water—and themselves out of it—was success enough.

This entire leg of the passage had been one long storm, save for the precious hours that allowed the bowsprit's repair. Seeing that keeping to his original course was futile, Barry threw the helm over and headed due south. He discussed his decision with his nephew, already copiously recounting the storms, wind directions, and ship's location in his journal. Judging from Barry's existing writings, Patrick's summary of his uncle's decision to change course reads like a direct quote: “Ships bound to the East Indies which happened to come in this Latitude would do well to turn the ship's head to the Southw'd if they expect to meet with a fresh Gale from the westward.”⁶⁵

On May 10, Patrick looked to starboard and saw the Island of St. Paul. “It is Remarcably high,” he wrote, but “a desolate Island.” The Asia reached it the following day.⁶⁶ St. Paul's sits like the dot on an “i” at 40 degrees latitude, giving one pause when gazing at a map of the world—how far it is from Cape Town, how much farther yet to China, and how incredibly far it is from Philadelphia.

The crew could hardly believe the sudden change in the weather. “The day was clear and serene,” and “we dried ourselves and our cloaths which were Sufficient[ly] Soaked.” From St. Paul's, Barry headed northeast; indeed, the passage up the Indian Ocean was the most pleasant leg of the voyage. On May 25, the ship “crossed the Tropick of Capricorn.” Fresh breezes continued for four more days, as “the Clouds [seemed] to move in every direction,” and “the Wind shifted that evening and got very calm.”⁶⁷

With daylight the next morning the crew made another odd discovery. They could see “the Surface of the Sea covered with something that looked like dirt.” Was it a red tide? The thermometer registered eighty-four degrees; soon Patrick saw “a multitude of boobies arrived in the water.” Few birds match their unique appearance. One sailor described them as “generously gray, about the size of a tamed duck, have a long, pointed beak, webbed feet and long wings.” The men found them entertaining, yet slow-witted; laughing as the birds caught flying fish and swallowed them whole. The boobies were easy to kill, but less than appetizing: “lean, very fishy, but indifferent food.”68

On June 2, the Asia entered the waters of the Malayan pirates, and Barry issued new orders. The crew “mounted our guns and got the Small arms on deck and cleaned them.” Gunnery practice resumed. Piracy was every bit a threat in the South China Seas as it was in the Caribbean or the Mediterranean; while Barry's voyage came twenty years before the rise of the female pirate Ching Yih Saou and her thousands of cutthroats, the scores of Malayan and Chinese pirates warranted gunnery practice and a weather eye on the lookout. For the next three days the Asia worked its way up the coast of Java, six hundred miles long and the southwest guardian of Indonesia. Fifty-four days had passed since the Asia left Cape Town at dusk “on the 6th of June,” when “we saw the land bearing NNE it looked like the top of a Conical mountain.” What Patrick was viewing in the darkening sky, and believing to be Java Head, was actually the volcano on Krakatoa, only a few miles distant.⁶⁹

The next day the Asia was attacked “by a deluge of rain a heavy Sea settling on shore the night very dark so that our Situation was very dangerous.” Once more Barry and his men battled the elements, keeping the ship from smashing into the unknown, forbidding coast. When the storm finally died down, the sailors beheld Java Head, “a height close to the water rising gradually into [a] lofty Mountain.” By “8 o'clock in the Evening,” Patrick jotted, “we were abreast of Java Head.”⁷⁰

Next the Asia came to another treacherous passage—the Sunda Straits. With Prince Island (now called Panaitan) to port and Java Head to starboard, the Asia began her entrance. Already grateful to Truxton for the information he shared about his previous voyage to Canton, Barry found himself especially appreciative during this passage. On his earlier trip, Truxton relied on the British Tables register, a veritable bible of navigational information. Afterward he determined that the British erred, placing Java Head one hundred miles off to the eastward.71

Amateur sailors have seen what happens to the wind when passing a group of houses—it dies, leaving them dealing with the current until they work their way past the buildings. Such was the western entry into the Strait of Sunda: “the Wind died away where we got to leeward of the Head which is very high,” Patrick wrote, and his uncle “found a very Strong Current Setting out to Sea so that it was 11 o'clock at Night before we got [into] Mew Bay.” Once in the Mew, the Asia “came too anchoring in 23 fathom Soft bottom” where Barry found several streams spilled into the bay, and ordered that the nearly empty water barrels be refilled. The next morning the crew saw “Several Rocks called the carpenters [in] the Strait between this and Java Head.” The Sunda Straits were only “2 Leagues wide between [Prince] Island and Sumatra [where] it is too Deep to anchor.” Almost instantly the Asia had company—“a Danish Ship which left the cape of Good hope Several Days before we came too at the same time.”⁷²

By 1788, Java was a well established Dutch settlement. Its capital, Batavia (now Jakarta), was the largest Dutch settlement in the East Indies. A contemporary of Barry's described the city as “handsome, built with white stones” with a network of canals running through it. The Dutch worked their Malayan slaves “without mercy and if they die, heave them overboard like a beast.”⁷³

As in Cape Town, western architecture clashed with western racism. What Java lacked, however, was health. The primary illness “was a swelling in the bowels, the other a pain in the breast.” The water, “being salt peter ground,” was boiled “in rice or barley, then being so hot, it was like physic to us when we had to drink it.” One American sailor called it “the most unhealthy place I ever was in.” Nor was it remotely stable politically. Barry reported home that “the Dutch and Malaese are engaged in war throughout the Chinese seas.”⁷⁴

Hayes soon lost his romantic notions of the island. On the morning after the Asia dropped anchor, “we Saw Several Canoes but none of them came to us.” When several sailors asked if they could follow them to trade for fresh food, Barry nodded. Patrick and some others gave chase to one of them “in our Jolly boat and soone came up with her in her was Malayans they had 2 Turtle Cocoa Nuts . . . Benannoes [bananas] & several Monkeys aboard . . . we under stud from Their Signs that the Dutch would put them to death if they Catched them Selling Turtle or dealing for any Sort of produce to foreigners.” Hayes was shocked to find the Malayans “Quite naked Save a piece of Stuff to cover their naked ness.” Using “slap-sign” to indicate they would not tell the Dutch about any breach of international trade, the Americans won the natives over, and “With Some provisions and the Sight of Some money They Sold us the Turtle for two Dollars.”75

The jollyboat was no sooner alongside the Asia when “a dutch officer came on board of us in a proe”—a Malay sailing boat and a favorite of Indonesian pirates, about thirty feet long with a sharp stern—“of a curious Shape with an oblong Sail.” With the crew having just told their captain about their encounter with the Malayans, Barry gave quick orders to take the turtle below, just as the Dutchman climbed up Asia's side. He was the customs officer at Angiertown, “stationed here for the purpose of taking an account of all vessels which passed this way.” Barry presented his papers; after some perfunctory conversation, learned that the Dutchman also had a boatful of wares to sell. Barry “bought 9 Turtle and Some fish for a barrel of flower.”⁷⁶

The next morning, Barry gave orders to weigh anchor and proceed through the Sunda Straits. Passage took several days. All the while the Asia had company who were much less inhibited than their first native visitors: “We had a grate number of canoes along Side every Day the Malayans did not Seem the least Shy their canoes had outriggers to keep them from over Setting their paddles Were flat both ends . . . they trade a great Number of [sugar] Canes aboard for which they asked Extraordinary prices we likewise bought Several fowls of[f] them.” The natives kept their canoes filled with island produce: “pepper Sugar Tobacco rice Coffee and coca Nuts plaintains and other tropical Fruit,” which they held in outstretched arms up to the American sailors. Then the haggling began. Neither seller nor buyer spoke the other's language; the bartering was done by waving fingers, making gestures, and speaking pidgin English until a deal was made.77

On June 11, two other ships from Philadelphia came through the straits: Truxton's Canton and another merchantman captained by John Keene. Truxton, having sailed Barry's route on his previous voyage to China, had skimmed along the West African coast, then into the Indian Ocean—a longer route than Barry's but without the storms that had whipped the Asia to a virtual standstill before reaching St. Paul's. What Truxton did not know until years later was that a Royal Navy brig was just a few days behind him—HMS Bounty, bound for Tahiti and a mutiny. When the three American ships cleared the straits, Barry waved farewell as the other Philadelphia captains headed to starboard and Batavia, while Barry “Steered NNE for the Straits of Banca.”⁷⁸

Banka Strait, a narrow, twisting passage even more harrowing than the Sunda Straits, divided Sumatra from Banka Island. Winds were light, and soundings varied from “12 fathom Water” to a few feet. The water was so murky Barry could not make out the bottom; all he and his men could see were snakes “between three & four feet long,” with “dark brown backs, yellow sides and bellies” and “black and white stripes or checks on the tail.”⁷⁹ The presence of islands in the strait further slowed Barry's progress, but the most dangerous factor was the flood tide, which ran “very Strong to the Westward above us,” threatening to send the Asia aground on the Sumatra side of the strait.⁸⁰

Passage was painstakingly slow. Each night Barry dropped anchor, letting the Asia rock to and fro in the murky water, while young Hayes and the crew marveled at another eerie sight: “Every Eveneng a multitude of monstrous bats took their flight out of the Woods and directed their course towards Banca where they stay all night [and] return in the like number be fore Sunrise the next morning[.] They are as large as [a] fishing hawk and every way Shape like a bat their wings are 6 or 7 feet long and as wide as their body is long.”⁸¹

After four days, the Asia passed through the strait. On summer's eve she recrossed the equator and was in the South China Sea, greeted, appropriately enough on this voyage, with another storm. The following morning Barry and Patrick saw a “small Island bearing NNE of us about 9 leagues. . . . We found it to be Saddle Island so Called for its being like a Saddle.” From there Barry set a course “NE by N,” keeping the ship east of the Malay Peninsula.82

Unfettered by any straits, and blessedly unbothered by pirates, the Asia sailed up the South China Sea, with one last set of squalls for company. Barry sent the ship past the Gulf of Siam and around the islands called “two Brothers,” bringing her closer to her destination.⁸³

 

Back in Philadelphia, the city was putting the final touches on a special Fourth of July celebration. New Hampshire had just become the ninth state to ratify the Constitution, making it the law of the land. Once word reached Philadelphia “a general joy pervaded this city . . . the bells of Christ Church were rung, accompanied with a salute of cannon.” The Pennsylvania Gazette printed the news in its July 2, 1788 issue along with word that, “By Capt. Swaine from Madeira, we have advice that a Guineaman, who put into that island, spoke the Asia, Captn. Barry, from Philadelphia for Canton, on 2nd of February . . . out 43 days, all well.”⁸⁴

Responsibility for Philadelphia's “completely Federal” parade was placed in the hands of the city's resident poet and tunesmith, Francis Hopkinson. The tiny lawyer was determined not to disappoint, envisioning a gala of Meschianza-size proportions. He had it all planned: how, after a “bell peel of the Christ Church, the ship Rising Sun would present a salute and lead a flotilla of ten vessels, all bedecked in signal flags,” up the Delaware. Next would be a parade of eighty-seven floats up the city streets, including one portraying “the Federal ship Union.” The Union was actually the Alliance's barge; Hopkinson put it under the command of John Green. On June 30, Hopkinson reviewed his plans for the extravaganza, happily anticipating the cheers from appreciative Philadelphians.⁸⁵

That same day, on the other side of the world, John Barry stood on the Asia's poop deck and beheld something he had never seen before: China.⁸⁶