foe to the proud mistress of the seas. Not the least
destructive vessels of the brave American navy were the whaling
vessels from Buzzard's Bay made over into men-of-war. The frequent and
astonishing victories of these vessels caused many valuable prizes to be
brought into the bay, and the natural consequence was the raid of Major
Gen. Gray, accompanied by the ill-fated Andre, on the fourth day of
September, and the day following, in 1778, by which nearly the whole
town of Bedford was laid in ashes and property to the value of over half
a million of dollars destroyed, together with seventy vessels, including
eight large ships with their cargoes, and four privateers.

[Illustration: RESIDENCE OF MAYOR ROTCH.]

At the first whisperings of peace, Capt. Moores, of the good ship
"Bedford," with a cargo of oil, set sail for London, and first displayed
to the defeated English, in their great metropolis, the stars and
stripes of the infant republic of the western world. This promptness of
Capt. Moores is a fair sample of the manner in which the village of
Bedford grasped the return of peace and rushed into its former
industries. The greater part of the village had been rebuilt; the
vessels that survived the war--most of them as men-of-war--were
refitted, and whaling and commerce resumed, although it was years before
whaling fairly got on its feet again. This was owing to the lack of a
market for oil, as England and France had passed laws practically
prohibiting its importation. Some merchants were forced to live in
French or English territory and sail under those flags, in order to
pursue whaling with any profit.

[Illustration: THE "STONE" (CONGREGATIONAL) CHURCH.]

[Illustration: YACHT CLUB HOUSE.]

In 1787 the General Court of Massachusetts incorporated the town of New
Bedford, and in 1847 it became a city. The census of 1790 reported a
population of 3,313 in the new town. But there was nothing at this time
to cause the town to grow, nor was there until 1804, when, through the
intercessions of William Rotch, Sr., Great Britain remitted her alien
duty on oil. From that year New Bedford began to assume her distinctive
character as the whaling port preeminent of the world. The stock in
trade to begin with was no meagre one, as it consisted of fifty-nine
vessels of 19,146 tons' burden, about thirty of them being brigs and
ships employed in the merchant service with Europe, South America, and
the West Indies. This fleet suf