USS Alliance was a 36-gun frigate of the Continental Navy. Originally named Hancock, she was laid down in 1777 on the Merrimack River at Amesbury, Massachusetts, by the partners and cousins, William and James K. Hackett, launched on 28 April 1778, and renamed Alliance on 29 May 1778 by resolution of the Continental Congress. Her first commanding officer was Capt. , a former officer of the French Navy who had come to the New World hoping to become a naval counterpart of Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette. The frigate's first captain was widely accepted as such in America. Massachusetts made him an honorary citizen and the Continental Congress gave him command of Alliance, thought to be the finest warship built to that date on the western side of the Atlantic.
1779
The new frigate's first assignment was to carry Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette back to France to petition the French Court for increased support in the American struggle for independence. Manned by a crew composed largely of British and Irish sailors, Alliance departed Boston on 14 January 1779 bound for :Brest, France. During the crossing, a plot to seize the ship, involving 38 members of the crew, was uncovered on 2 February before the mutiny could begin. The disloyal sailors were put in irons, and the remainder of the voyage, in which the frigate captured two prizes, was peaceful. The ship reached Brest safely on the 6th.
After the marquis and his suite had disembarked, Benjamin Franklin, one of the American commissioners in Paris, ordered her to remain in France despite the fact that 's original instructions had called for him to load the frigate with munitions and then to sail promptly for America. Instead, Franklin assigned the frigate to a squadron to be commanded by Captain John Paul Jones.
The squadron departed Groix Roads, near Lorient, France, on 19 June to escort a convoy of merchantmen to Bordeaux and other French ports. During a storm that night, Alliance collided with Jones' flagship, , damaging the rigging of both vessels. Nevertheless, each was able to continue, and the squadron successfully completed its mission before returning to L'Orient where the two damaged warships were repaired.
The French planned an invasion of southern England that summer, and asked Jones to carry out a diversionary raid in the northern British Isles. His flotilla sortied from Groix Roads on 14 August and headed for the southwestern corner of Ireland to begin a clockwise circumnavigation of the British Isles.
Not many days passed before Landais – who in Jones' opinion had been the real culprit in the collision two months before – began to show his disinclination toward obeying orders. On the 23rd, he was enraged when the commodore refused to allow him to chase a ship into shallow and unknown waters "... when there was not sufficient wind to govern a ship." The next day, Jones later reported, Alliance's unruly captain came on board the flagship and addressed the commodore "... in the most gross and insulting terms." From that point on, Landais seemed to ignore orders entirely and operated Alliance according to his own whims.
Thus, the only really American warship in Jones' squadron belied her name by refusing to cooperate with the French vessels. She left her consorts during a squall on the night of 26 and 27 August and did not rejoin the squadron until 1 September. Betsy, a letter-of-marque ship she had just taken then accompanied the frigate. About this time, Bonhomme Richard captured a similar ship named Union off Cape Wrath at the northwestern corner of Scotland, and Jones allowed Landais to man both vessels. The latter again showed his complete contempt for the commodore by sending the captured ships (which would become known as the Bergen Prizes) to Bergen, Norway, where the Danish Government turned the ships over to the British consul, depriving their captors of the satisfaction of having hurt the enemy and of any hope of being rewarded for their efforts.
In the next few days, Alliance took two more small ships prompting Jones to signal Landais to board Bonhomme Richard for a conference. The American frigate's commander refused to obey, but instead again sailed off on his own.
For more than two weeks thereafter, Alliance worked her way south independently along the eastern shore of Great Britain while the remainder of the squadron followed a similar course from out of sight. A bit before midnight on 22 September, a lookout in Bonhomme Richard reported seeing two ships. Jones hoisted recognition signals which were unanswered. Landais was continuing to ignore the flagship's efforts to communicate. Nevertheless, at dawn, Jones was able to recognize Alliance and Pallas, a frigate of his squadron which had recently parted from the flagship with the commodore's permission to hunt prizes.
About mid-afternoon on 23 September, the squadron, off Bridlington, sighted ships rounding Flamborough Head to the north. The oncoming vessels were part of a convoy of over 40 British merchantmen which had sailed from the Baltic Sea under the escort of the 44-gun frigate and the 22-gun hired armed ship . The convoy had been warned about the American squadron and turned back northward towards Scarborough, the two escort vessels placing themselves between the merchant ships and the approaching threat.
As the gap closed, Jones signaled his ships to form a line of battle, but Landais ignored the order and sailed off to one side, forcing Countess of Scarborough to do likewise. In the ensuing four-hour Battle of Flamborough Head off England's Yorkshire coast, Landais, after briefly engaging the Countess took little part in the action. On the way to check up on the duel which developed between the Countess and the Pallas, Landais fired a broadside at Serapis, which was by then immobile, and lashed firmly alongside Bonhomme Richard- as a result both ships were damaged. Some time later, with Bonhomme Richard losing its duel, Alliance returned to the main battle, and Jones happily "... thought the battle was at an end ...." But, to his "... utter astonishment", Landais' ship "... discharged a broadside full into the stern of the Bonhomme Richard." Jones and his crew "... called to him [Landais] for God's sake to forbear firing into the Bonhomme Richard, yet he passed along off the side of the ship and continued firing." This, however, was just more collateral damage, resulting from Landais' policy of keeping well out of the line of the guns on the free side of Serapis. Unable to move his ship (either to escape or to aim a broadside at Alliance) Captain Pearson of Serapis surrendered within a short time.
Following the surrender, Alliance stood by during a desperate struggle to save the shattered, burning, leaking hulks. On the evening of the day after the battle, Jones realized that, while his flagship was doomed, her conquered opponent would probably survive. He, therefore, transferred his crew from Bonhomme Richard to Serapis and, the next morning, sadly watched the former sink. All this time, the squadron was simply drifting away from the British coast, but by 29 September, untiring labor had enabled Serapis to get underway, and, following French orders which were somewhat contrary to Jones's wishes, they headed for the coast of the Netherlands. Alliance sighted land on the evening of 2 October and, the following morning, she anchored in Texel Roads, Amsterdam's deep-water harbor, with the rest of the squadron.
When word of the battle reached London, the Admiralty ordered its nearby men-of-war to search for Jones' flotilla; the Royal Navy proceeded to look in all of the wrong places. By the time a merchantman informed London that Jones was at Texel Roads, the victorious allies and their prizes had been safe at anchor there for a week. The Royal Navy then set up a tight blockade off the Dutch port to check any seaward movement that the American squadron might attempt. Meanwhile, the British ambassador pressed the government of the Dutch Republic to return both Serapis and Countess of Scarborough to England. Failing that he demanded that Jones' squadron be expelled from Texel and thus forced to engage with the Royal Navy's blockading squadron.
Indeed, on 12 November, the Netherlands Navy had moved a squadron of ships of the line to Texel, and its commanding officer had ordered Jones to sail with the first favorable wind. Nevertheless, the adroit commodore managed to stall his departure for over six weeks. By that time, he had managed to restore Alliance to top trim and to ready her for sea. Since the other ships in his squadron had by this time, for complex diplomatic and legalistic reasons, shifted to flying French colors Jones decided to leave them behind when he left Holland in Alliance. He had long since relieved Landais in command of that frigate, pending an official inquiry into his conduct during the cruise.
On the morning of 27 December, after foul weather had forced the British blockaders off their stations, an easterly wind sprang up and enabled Alliance to stand out to sea. She dropped the pilot an hour before noon and headed southwest along the Netherlands coast. Less than a day later the frigate transited Dover Strait and entered the English Channel. On the night of 31 December, she was off Ushant, an island off the westernmost tip of Brittany, when 1779 gave way to 1780.
1780
For just over a fortnight thereafter, she cruised to the south looking for British shipping; but, with the exception of one small English brig which she took, the ship encountered only friendly or neutral vessels. On 16 January 1780, Jones decided to visit Corunna, Spain, for provisions and maintenance which entailed shortening the frigate's main yard and scraping her bottom.
On the 27th, she got underway in company with the French frigate Le Sensible. Want of winter clothing then prevented Jones from beginning an extended cruise in quest of prizes; and, instead, the ship struggled across the Bay of Biscay against head winds along a roughly northeasterly course toward L'Orient. En route, she recaptured a wine-laden French barque – a prize which had been taken by an English privateer – and saved the foundering vessel's cargo before the barque sank. She also chanced upon Livingston and escorted that tobacco-laden American merchantman to the French coast.
Alliance anchored in Groix Roads on 10 February and moved into L'Orient harbor on the 19th. That day, Benjamin Franklin suggested that Jones take on a cargo of arms and uniform cloth for the American Army and promptly get underway for home.
Jones agreed with Franklin's suggestion, but was kept in France for many months thereafter, attending to military, diplomatic, and social matters which he felt to be important to his country, to his crew, and to himself. Most of this time, he was away from his ship in Paris.
Meanwhile, the deposed had arrived at L'Orient seeking passage to America where he hoped to be vindicated in a trial by court-martial. There, he met Arthur Lee, a disaffected fellow commissioner of Franklin, who also wanted to return home. Lee – who also hated Jones – persuaded Alliance's former captain that neither Jones nor Franklin had had the authority to relieve him of command since Landais had held a Continental commission. Convinced that he had been wronged, Landais went on board the frigate and assumed command on 12 or 13 June.
Jones arrived at L'Orient, where he heard of this coup. He journeyed to Paris and obtained support from Franklin and Antoine de Sartine, the French Minister of Marine. When Jones returned to L'Orient on 20 June, he found that Alliance had already weighed anchor and moved to Port-Louis, Morbihan, where a recently emplaced boom blocked her path. The batteries that guarded the port, as well as three French warships, had received orders to fire on the frigate if she attempted to stand out to sea.