To George Washington from Jonathan Trumbull, Sr., 16 August 1776
From Jonathan Trumbull, Sr.
Lebanon [Conn.] August 16th 1776
Sir
Major General Schuyler has requested that two Hundred Seamen may be raised in this state to man the Vessells on the Lake.1 as most of our Seamen are marched with the Militia to join your Army, I have to ask the favour of you to permit Capt. David Hawly, and Capt. Frederick Chappel to inlist such Number of Seamen out of our Militia as may be necessary for that Service.2 I am sir with great Respect Your obedient humble Servant
Jonth. Trumbull
ALS, DLC:GW; LB, Ct: Trumbull Papers. The cover of the ALS includes a note reading “⅌ Capt. David Hawly.”
1. See Schuyler to Trumbull, 31 July, in , 5th ser., 1:696–97.
2. On 16 Aug. David Hawley (1741–1807) of Stratford and Frederick Chappell (Chapel; c.1746–1789) of New Haven each received £180 from the Connecticut council of safety to raise a crew of seamen for service on the lakes, and both were commissioned captains ( , 380). Hawley, a shipmaster who had traded with the West Indies before the war, went there in 1775 to obtain gunpowder for Connecticut (ibid., 199). On 21 Mar. 1776, while on another trading voyage, his vessel was captured by a British warship in Rhode Island waters. Taken to Halifax, Hawley escaped captivity on 24 April and returned to Connecticut a few weeks later (see the journals of the Glasgow, 21 Mar., and the Rose, 21–22 Mar., in , 4:436, 451, and the Connecticut Courant, and Hartford Weekly Intelligencer, 20 May 1776). On 21 Sept. General Arnold appointed Hawley captain of the armed schooner Royal Savage on Lake Champlain, and about the same time Frederick Chappell became captain of the row galley Gates. The Royal Savage was destroyed during the Battle of Valcour Island in October, and the Gates was burned at Skenesborough in July 1777 to prevent its capture. Hawley subsequently served as a captain in the Connecticut navy. Given command of the sloop Schuyler in April 1777, Hawley took several prizes in Long Island Sound before being captured by a British frigate the following December. Hawley was exchanged by June 1779 when he became captain of the Connecticut sloop Guilford. During 1780 and 1781 he commanded a small flotilla of armed boats on Long Island Sound, and in May 1782 he became captain of a Connecticut privateer.