Where men of fine feeling are concerned there is seldom misunderstanding.
John Paul Jones
Tag: John Paul Jones
31JAN2023 – Quote of the Day
I have not yet begun to fight!
His famous response, in the early phase of the Battle of Flamborough Head, (23 September 1779) to an inquiry by his opponent (Captain Richard Pearson of the Royal Navy ship HMS Serapis) as to whether he was surrendering his ship, the USS Bonhomme Richard, as recounted in the reminiscences of Jones’s First Lieutenant, Richard Dale, as published in The Life and Character of John Paul Jones, a Captain in the United States Navy (1825) by John Henry Sherburne:
…the Bon Homme Richard, having head way, ran her bows into the stern of the Serapis. We had remained in this situation but a few minutes when we were again hailed by the Serapis, “Has your ship struck?” To which Captain Jones answered, “I have not yet begun to fight!”
In Naval teminology to “strike the colours” means to haul down the ship’s flag to signify surrender, but here the use of the ship as subject of the sentence may imply a pun on the non-naval use of “struck”.
I may sink, but I’ll be damned if I strike!
His much less famous response, in the late phase of the Battle of Flamborough Head, 23 September 1779, to an inquiry by his opponent (Captain Richard Pearson of the Royal Navy ship HMS Serapis) as to whether he was surrendering his ship, the USS Bonhomme Richard, which was by this time very seriously damaged.
This was what some of his sailors, reported in British newspapers at the time, claimed he had said; Jones’s official report merely stated that he had answered “in the most determined negative”.
John Paul Jones
30JAN2023 – Quote of the Day
I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go in harm’s way.
John Paul Jones
29JAN2023 – Quote of the Day
A navy is essentially and necessarily aristocratic. True as may be the political principles for which we are now contending they can never be practically applied or even admitted on board ship, out of port, or off soundings. This may seem a hardship, but it is nevertheless the simplest of truths. Whilst the ships sent forth by the Congress may and must fight for the principles of human rights and republican freedom, the ships themselves must be ruled and commanded at sea under a system of absolute despotism.
John Paul Jones
19APR2018 – Quote of the Day
When John Paul Jones was engaging a much abler ship than his own Bon Homme Richard in the British Serapis he ran the bow of his ship into the stern of the Serapis. When the British commander mockingly asked “Has your ship struck?” Jones answered,
“I have not yet begun to fight.”
And later on as his ship was badly damaged and again he was asked if he’d surrender he declared,
I may sink, but I’ll be damned if I strike!
His ship did sink but he had already captured the Serapis at this point.