The Admiralty Court of Virginia tried few prize cases. Governor Thomas Jefferson in writing to the President of Congress in June, 1779, no doubt understates the truth when he says that “a British prize would be a more rare phenomenon here than a comet, because one has been seen, but the other never was.” His state, he said, had long suffered from a lack of blank letters of marque, and he wished fifty to be sent to him.[521] Virginia did not establish state privateering, but followed the regulations of Congress on the subject. Because of the lack of seamen and the continual presence of the enemy’s vessels at the mouths of the Virginia rivers, the privateering interest was not important in this state. The Navy Board superintended both the trading and armed vessels of the state until April, 1777, when the trading vessels were placed in charge of William Aylett.[522] Writers on the Virginia navy have not, as a rule, distinguished one class of vessels from the other, nor is it always easy to do so. During 1776 seven vessels were employed chiefly in commerce.[523] In the fall, most of them were ordered to the West Indies with cargoes of flour and tobacco; one, the brig “Adventure,” was directed to proceed to Dunkirk, France. The armed fleet for 1776 consisted of sixteen small craft adapted chiefly for service in the rivers of Virginia and in Chesapeake Bay.[524] In 1777 the galleys “Accomac” and “Diligence” were built and stationed on the Eastern Shore; and the ships “Caswell” and “Washington” were built at South Quay on the Blackwater, for the defence of Ocracoke Inlet, which Virginia was undertaking jointly with North Carolina. Besides these four vessels, two brigs, one armed boat, and the ships “Gloucester,” “Protector,” “Dragon,” and “Tartar,” were this year added to the navy. In 1778 an armed boat and the ships “Tempest” and “Thetis” were built; and in 1779 two armed boats, the brig “Jefferson” and the ship “Virginia,” were added.[525] This fleet is formidable only in its enumeration. It was poorly armed, incompletely manned, and in almost every respect ill fitted for service. But few of its vessels went beyond the Chesapeake Bay. It showed most activity during 1776 and the spring of 1777. From 1775 until 1779 fifteen small prizes were captured. In May, 1776, Captain Taylor seized four small merchantmen; in June, one of the Barrons brought up to Jamestown the transport “Oxford,” with 220 Highlanders on board; in the spring of 1777 the “Mosquito,” Captain Harris, carried into St. Pierre the ship “Noble,” valued at 75,000 livres; and a few months earlier the brig “Liberty” captured the ship “Jane,” whose cargo of West India goods was valued at £6,000. These were the most fortunate captures made by the Virginia navy.[526]