Patriot Pirates

March 24, 2008
Patton (The Pattons: A Personal History of an American Family
) turns his attention to an often overlooked aspect of the Revolutionary War: maritime privateering, or legalized piracy. Patton is careful to distinguish the mixed motives of these “patriot pirates,” for often there was less patriotism than simple greed. Nevertheless, their work fulfilled George Washington's strategic aim to win the war by exhausting Britain into giving up the struggle. In what Patton terms “a massive seaborne insurgency” that dwarfed the efforts of the colonists' small navy, thousands of privateers nettled British shipping, sometimes gaining vast fortunes. Privateering also turned into a handy political issue when Benjamin Franklin, the American representative in France, succeeded in persuading his hosts to allow Yankee skippers to sell their booty in French ports—a breach of the country's neutrality that aggravated diplomatic tensions, as Franklin knew it would, and helped cement Paris's commitment to American independence. Patton gives an absorbing exhumation of an undersung subject that will be of particular interest to Revolution buffs.

May 1, 2008
Privateer has generally been a term of opprobrium. From the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries, governments enlisted private citizens to man warships and plunder the shipping of unfriendly nations. Privateers operated outside the constraints of civilized warfare and were viewed as one step removed from pirates; governments that employed them preferred to look the other way when informed of some of their less-savory exploits. Still, their contributions to naval success in various wars were substantial, and the American War of Independence was no exception. Patton has chronicled the achievements of these morally ambiguous men who helped to drain the British treasury with their depredations while enriching themselves as well as many American merchants. They operated with the tacit support of many prominent citizens, including Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane, and Robert Livingston. Whatever their motives, the actions of many of the privateers were daring, and even heroic, as they navigated the gray area between profit and patriotism. This is a well-written examination of an obscure aspect of American military history.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)