ed her: and Eliza, only daughter of
that union, became the wife of the late Judge Hugh Nelson, United States
Minister at Madrid.

[732:C] The general assembly presented him with a horse fully
caparisoned and a pair of pistols for his vigilance and activity.

[733:A] Burk, iv.

[734:A] Howe's Hist. Coll. of Va., 207.

[736:A] Simcoe, 227. Plan of the skirmish opposite 236.

[736:B] Fourth of July.

[736:C] July 6th, 1781.

[737:A] July ninth.

CHAPTER C.

1781.

Capture of the Patriot--The Barrons and Captain Starlins--
Battle of the Barges.

WHILE the British men-of-war and transports were assembled in Hampton
Roads, in co-operation with Cornwallis, in the spring and summer of
1781, the small craft were engaged in frequent depredations, going up
the James as far as Jamestown, and looking into the smaller streams for
plunder. To afford some little relief to the distressed inhabitants, for
the most part women, the men being at sea, or in the army, or prisoners,
it was determined to employ the only vessel then afloat belonging to the
State--the schooner Patriot. She was small, and mounted only eight
two-pounders; but she had more than once captured vessels of twice her
calibre. Captain Watkins having received his orders, proceeded at once
down the James River upon this service. For some weeks a sloop, supposed
to be a privateer, had been committing depredations, and Watkins
determined to overhaul her. Two young Virginians were on the north side
of the James, in the County of Elizabeth City, endeavoring day after day
to cross the river and find a safer refuge on the south side of it.
Daily emerging from a small house, "in the great gust-wood," where they
found temporary shelter, they repaired to the river side, distant about
three miles, looking out for some craft to convey them across. In
company of the two brothers was a negro, a native of Africa, who had
been brought to Virginia in his youth, and had soon evinced an ardent
attachment to it. He was an expert pilot, and a devoted "patriot." On a
Sunday morning, as the trio stood on the river bank, at a point in
Warwick County, they espied the schooner Patriot in chase of the
plundering sloop, and apparently gaining fast upon her. The negro, known
as Captain Starlins, at this spectacle, gave noisy utterance to his
extravagant joy, hopping about and clapping together his uplifted hands.
The three hoped soon to witness the capture of the sloop