Joshua Barney (6 July 1759 – 1 December 1818) was an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

Navy officer who served in the

Continental Navy The Continental Navy was the navy of the United States during the American Revolutionary War and was founded October 13, 1775. The fleet cumulatively became relatively substantial through the efforts of the Continental Navy's patron John Adams ...

during the Revolutionary War and as a captain in the French Navy during the French Revolutionary Wars. He later achieved the rank of commodore in the United States Navy and also served in the War of 1812.

Early life and family

He was born in

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was d ...

. He went to sea in 1771 at the age of 12. In 1775, he served as second-in-command to his brother-in-law aboard a merchant ship bound for Europe; after his brother-in-law died, he assumed command and sailed the ship to Nice. Barney married twice, and had children with both wives. While on his way to Kentucky, where he planned to retire, he died in Pittsburgh. His widow Harriet settled in Kentucky with their three children. His grandson Joseph Nicholson Barney was also a United States Navy (and Confederate States Navy) officer.

Revolutionary War

Barney served in the

beginning in February 1776, as master's mate of where he took part in Commodore Esek Hopkins's raid on

New Providence New Providence is the most populous island in the Bahamas, containing more than 70% of the total population. It is the location of the national capital city of Nassau, whose boundaries are coincident with the island; it had a population of 246 ...

. Later he served aboard and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant for gallantry in the action between ''Wasp'' and a British

brig A brig is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: two masts which are both square rig, square-rigged. Brigs originated in the second half of the 18th century and were a common type of smaller merchant vessel or warship from then until the ...

, the tender ''Betsey''. While serving on he took a prominent part in the defense of the

Delaware River The Delaware River is a major river in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. From the meeting of its branches in Hancock (village), New York, Hancock, New York, the river flows for along the borders of N ...

. Barney was taken prisoner and exchanged several times. In 1779, he was again taken prisoner and imprisoned in Old Mill Prison,

Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to the west and south-west. Plymouth ...

, England, until his escape in 1781. He wrote an account of this in ''The Memoirs of Commodore Barney'', published in Boston in 1832.

Battle of Delaware Bay

In April 1782, he was put in command of the Pennsylvania ship ''Hyder Ally'', in which he captured the more heavily armed warship HMS ''General Monk'' in the

Battle of Delaware Bay The Battle of Delaware Bay, or the Battle of Cape May, was a naval engagement fought between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the United States during the American Revolutionary War. A British squadron of three vessels attacked three American pri ...

. He was given command of ''Monk'' (renamed ''General Washington'') and sailed for France with dispatches for Benjamin Franklin, returning with news that peace had been declared. The ship also carried a party of Austrian naturalists under the leadership of

Franz Jozef Maerter Franz may refer to: People * Franz (given name) * Franz (surname) Places * Franz (crater), a lunar crater * Franz, Ontario, a railway junction and unorganized town in Canada * Franz Lake, in the state of Washington, United States – see Fran ...

and including Franz Boos. At the conclusion of the war, Barney was admitted as an original member of the

Society of the Cincinnati The Society of the Cincinnati is a fraternal, hereditary society founded in 1783 to commemorate the American Revolutionary War that saw the creation of the United States. Membership is largely restricted to descendants of military officers wh ...

in the state of Pennsylvania and later transferred to the Maryland Society. Barney then joined the French Navy, where he was made commander of a squadron.

Service in the French Navy

Between 1796 and 1802 Joshua Barney served as a captain in the French Navy. Between 7 June and 17 October 1796 he was captain of the French frigate . He sailed her from Rochefort to ferry weapons and ammunition to Cap-Français. He then cruised in the Caribbean between Havana and Chesapeake Bay, returning to Cap-Français on 17 October.

War of 1812

Chesapeake Bay Flotilla

At the outbreak of the War of 1812, after a successful but unprofitable privateering cruise as commander of the Baltimore

schooner A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...

, in which he captured the Post Office Packet Service packet ship . Barney entered the US Navy as a

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

, and commanded the Chesapeake Bay Flotilla, a fleet of gunboats defending Chesapeake Bay. He authored the plan to defend the Chesapeake, which was submitted to Secretary of the Navy, William Jones and accepted on August 20, 1813. The plan consisted of using a flotilla of shallow-draft barges, each equipped with a large gun which would be used in large numbers to attack and annoy the invading British, then retreating to the safety of shoal waters abundant in the Chesapeake region. Barney was commissioned as a captain in the United States Navy on 25 April 1814. On 1 June 1814, Barney's flotilla, led by his

flagship A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, characteristically a flag officer entitled by custom to fly a distinguishing flag. Used more loosely, it is the lead ship in a fleet of vessels, typically the fi ...

, the

sloop A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...

-rigged, self-propelled floating battery , mounting two

long guns A long gun is a category of firearms with long barrels. In small arms, a ''long gun'' or longarm is generally designed to be held by both hands and braced against the shoulder, in contrast to a handgun, which can be fired being held with a single ...

and two

carronade A carronade is a short, smoothbore, cast-iron cannon which was used by the Royal Navy. It was first produced by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, and was used from the mid-18th century to the mid-19th century. Its main func ...

s, were coming down Chesapeake Bay when they encountered the 12-gun schooner (the former Baltimore privateer ''Atlas''), and boats from the 74-gun third rates and near St. Jerome Creek. The flotilla pursued ''St Lawrence'' and the boats until they could reach the protection of the two third rates. The American flotilla then retreated into the Patuxent River where the British quickly blockaded it. The British outnumbered Barney by 7:1, forcing the flotilla on 7 June to retreat into St. Leonard's Creek. Two British

frigate A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat. The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and ...

s, the 38-gun HMS ''Loire'' and the 32-gun , plus the 18-gun

sloop-of-war In the 18th century and most of the 19th, a sloop-of-war in the Royal Navy was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. The rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above; thus, the term ''sloop-of-war'' enc ...

blockaded the mouth of the creek. The creek was too shallow for the British warships to enter, and the flotilla outgunned and hence was able to fend off the boats from the British ships. Battles continued through 10 June. The British, frustrated by their inability to flush Barney out of his safe retreat, instituted a "campaign of terror," laying waste to "town and farm alike" and plundering and burning Calverton, Huntingtown, Prince Frederick, Benedict and Lower Marlboro. On 26 June, after the arrival of troops commanded by United States Army Colonel Decius Wadsworth, and United States Marine Corps Captain Samuel Miller, Barney attempted a breakout. A simultaneous attack from land and sea on the blockading frigates at the mouth of St. Leonard's creek allowed the flotilla to move out of the creek and up-river to Benedict, Maryland, though Barney had to scuttle gunboats No. 137 and 138 in the creek. The British entered the then-abandoned creek and burned the town of

St. Leonard, Maryland St. Leonard is a census-designated place (CDP) in Calvert County, Maryland, United States. The population was 742 at the 2010 census. Residents of the Calvert Beach and Long Beach communities also use the St. Leonard ZIP code designation. St. Leon ...

. The British, under the command of Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane then moved up the Patuxent, preparing for a landing at Benedict. Concerned that Barney's flotilla could fall into British hands, Secretary of the Navy Jones ordered Barney to take the flotilla as far up the Patuxent as possible, to Queen Anne, and scuttle it if the British appeared. Leaving his barges with a skeleton crew under the command of Lieutenant Solomon Kireo Frazier to handle any destruction of the craft, Barney took the majority of his men to join the American Army commanded by General

William Henry Winder William Henry Winder (February 18, 1775 – May 24, 1824) was an American soldier and a Maryland lawyer. He was a controversial general in the U.S. Army during the War of 1812. On August 24, 1814, as a brigadier general, he led American troops in ...

where they participated in the Battle of Bladensburg. Frazier scuttled all but one of the vessels of the Chesapeake Bay Flotilla, which the British captured.

Battle of Bladensburg

During the Battle of Bladensburg, Barney and 360 sailors and 120 Marines defended the national capital—fighting against the enemy hand-to-hand with cutlasses and pikes. The battle raged for four hours, but the British eventually defeated the Americans. The defenders were forced to fall back after nearly being cut off, and the British went on to burn the Capitol and White House. Barney was severely wounded, receiving a bullet deep in his thigh that could never be removed. During the battle, President James Madison personally directed the Marines led by Barney. (Prior to the battle, Madison had narrowly avoided capture.) This battle is one of only two instances of a

sitting president Sitting is a basic action and resting position in which the body weight is supported primarily by the bony ischial tuberosities with the buttocks in contact with the ground or a horizontal surface such as a chair seat, instead of by the lower ...

exercising direct battlefield authority as Commander-in-Chief, the other being when

George Washington George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of th ...

personally crushed the Whiskey Rebellion.

Death

Commodore Barney died in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on 10 December 1818 en route to Kentucky, from complications related to the wound he received at the Battle of Bladensburg. His remains rest in Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh.

Namesakes and honors

Four US Navy ships were named for him: * , an American Civil War ferryboat * , a torpedo boat built at the Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine in 1900 * , a , built at Cramps' Shipbuilding in Philadelphia, launched 5 September 1918 * was a guided missile destroyer, built at New York Shipbuilding in

Camden, New Jersey Camden is a city in and the county seat of Camden County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Camden is part of the Delaware Valley metropolitan area and is located directly across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At the 2020 ...

, launched 10 Dec 1960. In Washington, D.C., both

Barney Circle Barney Circle is a small residential neighborhood located between the west bank of the Anacostia River and the eastern edge of Capitol Hill in southeast Washington, D.C., in the United States. The neighborhood is characterized by its sense of comm ...

(a neighborhood on Pennsylvania Avenue, SE) and Commodore Joshua Barney Drive, NE, are named in his honor. Barney Square, the main drill area between the barracks facilities at the United States Merchant Marine Academy is named in honor of this American Merchant Mariner turned Naval Hero. There are several sites in Prince George's County that commemorate Commodore Barney. A replica of a gunboat of Barney's Chesapeake Bay Flotilla today sits in Bladensburg Waterside Park, the Battle of Bladensburg Monument, and Fort Lincoln Cemetery hosts the Battle of Bladensburg Commodore Joshua Barney Monument.

Exhibits

The Maryland Historical Society was granted an antique pistol with a folding bayonet, a spyglass and the journal of War of 1812 from descendant Anne Helm Galvin for the exhibit "In Full Glory Reflected: Maryland in the War of 1812."

Notes

References

* *Hamilton, Alexander, Harold Coffin Syrett, & Jacob Ernest Cooke (1974) ''The Papers of Alexander Hamilton'', Volume 20. (Columbia University Press). : *Marquis Who's Who, Inc. ''Who Was Who in American History, the Military''. Chicago: Marquis Who's Who, 1975.

External links

*
USS Barney Association Joshua Barney Biography

YouTube video on the history of Joshua Barney

The Society of the Cincinnati

The American Revolution Institute
{{DEFAULTSORT:Barney, Joshua 1759 births 1818 deaths American Revolutionary War prisoners of war held by Great Britain American escapees Burials at Allegheny Cemetery Continental Navy officers French Navy officers United States Navy commodores Military personnel from Baltimore United States Navy personnel of the War of 1812 American privateers People of Maryland in the American Revolution People of colonial Maryland