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[unknown] Privateer [unknown] Alligator |
| Alligator | |
| Armed Vessel | |
| [unknown] Privateer [unknown] |
| Commissioned/First Date: | [October] 1777 |
| Out of Service/Cause: | 2 January 1778/captured by prisoners |
| Owners: |
| Tonnage: |
| Battery: | Date Reported: 29 December 1777 Number/Caliber Weight Broadside 16/ Total: 16 cannon/ Broadside: 8 cannon/ Swivels: |
| Crew: |
| Description: |
| Officers: |
| Cruises: | (1) At sea in December 1777 off the Guinea coast, Africa |
| Prizes: | (1) Ship [unknown], [December] 1777, off the Guinea coast, Africa
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| Actions: | (1) Action with prisoners, 2 January 1778 |
Comments:
The otherwise unknown American privateer Alligator, whose rig and skipper are also unknown, was operating in the area off the Guinea coast of Africa about December 1777. Here she captured a ship bound from the Guinea coast and a brig bound from Cork, Ireland to the Madeira Islands, Portugal. On 29 December 1777 Alligator captured the snow Hibernia (Wilson), bound from the Cape Verde Islands, Portugal to Cork. The prisoners from the Hibernia later reported that the Alligator was armed with sixteen guns.
The English prisoners aboard discovered that several of the crew members of the Alligator were English or Irish. A plot to seize the privateer was hatched and the uprising took place on the night of 2 January 1778, at the changing of the watch. Although the British soon got control of the deck, the American lieutenant barricaded himself in the cabin, along with several others. The fight lasted several hours before the lieutenant surrendered, with seven Americans dead. The British lost five killed, including Wilson and one Lucas, who owned part of Hibernia’s cargo. The prize was taken into the Bay of Funchal, Madeira Islands.1
__________1 NDAR, “Lloyd’s Evening Post, and British Chronicle, (London), Friday, February 20, to Monday, February 23, 1778,” XI, 1035. Also printed in The New-York Gazette; and The Weekly Mercury, Monday, June 1, 1778, datelined London, February 24