Lurking in the background to haunt British thought was the growing American navy.John Paul was a Scots sailor, who had been a slave trader and subsequently master of a West India merchantman, and on going to America had assumed the name of Jones.He was a man of boundless ambition, vanity, and vigor, and when he commanded American privateers he became a terror to the maritime people from whom he sprang.In the summer of 1779 when Jones, with a squadron of four ships, was haunting the British coasts, every harbor was nervous.At Plymouth a boom blocked the entrance, but other places had not even this defense.Sir Walter Scott has described how, on September 17, 1779, a squadron, under John Paul Jones, came within gunshot of Leith, the port of Edinburgh.The whole surrounding country was alarmed, since for two days the squadron had been in sight beating up the Firth of Forth.A sudden squall, which drove Jones back, probably saved Edinburgh from being plundered.A few days later Jones was burning ships in the Humber and, on the 23d of September, he met off Flamborough Head and, after a desperate fight, captured two British armed ships: the Serapis, a 40-gun vessel newly commissioned, and the Countess of Scarborough, carrying 20 guns, both of which were convoying a fleet.The fame of his exploit rang through Europe.Jones was a regularly commissioned officer in the navy of the United States, but neutral powers, such as Holland, had not yet recognized the republic and to them there was no American navy.The British regarded him as a traitor and pirate and might possibly have hanged him had he fallen into their hands.
Terrible days indeed were these for distracted England.In India, France, baulked twenty years earlier, was working for her entire overthrow, and in North Africa, Spain was using the Moors to the same end.As time passed the storm grew more violent.Before the year 1780 ended Holland had joined England's enemies.Moreover, the northern states of Europe, angry at British interference on the sea with their trade, and especially at her seizure of ships trying to enter blockaded ports, took strong measures.On March 8, 1780, Russia issued a proclamation declaring that neutral ships must be allowed to come and go on the sea as they liked.
They might be searched by a nation at war for arms and ammunition but for nothing else.It would moreover be illegal to declare a blockade of a port and punish neutrals for violating it, unless their ships were actually caught in an attempt to enter the port.
Denmark and Sweden joined Russia in what was known as the Armed Neutrality and promised that they would retaliate upon any nation which did not respect the conditions laid down.
