On July 5, 1775, the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety, the first Revolutionary executive of this state, visited “Red Bank,” situated a few miles below Philadelphia, near the mouth of the Schuylkill, for the purpose of deciding on the character of the defences which were to be made at this point on the river. On the 6th, having returned to Philadelphia, the Committee reported the results of its inspection; whereupon it came to its first naval resolution, that Robert White and Owen Biddle be a committee for the construction of boats and machines for the defence of the River.[469] On July 8 it ordered John Wharton to immediately build a “Boat or Calevat,” 47 or 50 feet keel, 13 feet broad, and 4½ feet deep. By October, thirteen such galleys or armed boats had been built, at a cost of about £550 each. They were armed chiefly with 18-pounders.[470] During the late summer and the fall of 1775 the Committee of Safety attended to the numerous details of officering, manning, arming, and provisioning these galleys. It chose a captain and lieutenant for each of them; and on October 23 it appointed Thomas Read commodore of the fleet. It organized a naval staff consisting of a muster master, a pay master, a surgeon, an assistant surgeon, a ship’s husband, and a victualer. The distinguished scholar, Dr. Benjamin Rush, was made surgeon. The Committee of Safety prepared a form of commission for officers, a list of rules and regulations, general instructions for the captains, and general instructions for the commodore.[471] The rules and regulations of the Pennsylvania navy were concerned with little else than the establishing of a penal code. All penal offenses were to be tried by a court-martial, which, in capital cases, was to consist of fifteen naval officers; and in all other cases, of five officers, unless so many could not be assembled, when it might consist of three. A majority of the court was sufficient to convict, except in capital cases, where two-thirds were necessary. In returning a verdict, the officers of lowest rank voted first. Except in cases of mutiny, or of cowardice in time of action, all sentences of death needed the approval of the General Assembly, or, in its recess, of the Committee of Safety. Besides the death penalty, a court-martial could inflict no punishment other than “degrading, cashiering, drumming out of the fleet, whipping, not exceeding thirty-nine lashes, fine, not exceeding two months’ pay, and imprisonment, not exceeding one month.” All fines were to go to the relief of those maimed and disabled in the service, or to the widows and families of such as should be killed. These rules, apparently, were not influenced by those of the Continental navy prepared by John Adams.[472]