The Story of John Paul JonesFraser, Chelsea Curtis
History
The Story of John Paul Jones
Fraser, Chelsea Curtis
Jones, John Paul, 1747-1792
In accordance with the provisions of the will, the bulk of the estate
was now due to go to Johnnie Paul, provided the latter would accept
Jones as a surname. Our young sailor, after some deliberation, decided
to make the change, settle down, and become a Virginia planter. But he
could not satisfy himself with dropping the name of Paul. This was a
family heirloom which he felt he must preserve, especially now since he
was the only male member of his immediate family possessing it, his good
father having gone some months before. Therefore, he forthwith discarded
his Christian name of John--whose commonplaceness he had never
liked--and became known as Paul Jones. Under this half-assumed
appellation he did the really big things of his career which brought him
fame. Under it he shouldered responsibilities of which any true-hearted,
loyal American citizen might well be proud, although he was only the son
of a poor Scotch gardener, a young man without education, without a
country he could really claim as his own.
Paul Jones--as we shall now have to call him--found that he had
inherited "3000 acres of prime land, bordering for twelve furlongs on
the right bank of the Rappahannock, running back southward three miles,
1000 acres of which are cleared and under plough or grass, 2000 acres of
which are strong first-growth timber; a grist-mill with flour-cloth and
fans turned by water power; mansion, overseer's house, negro quarters,
stables, tobacco houses, threshing-floor, river-wharf, one sloop of
twenty tons, thirty negroes of all ages (eighteen adults), twenty horses
and colts, eighty neat cattle and calves, sundry sheep and swine; and
all necessary means of tilling the soil."
With the property came also old Duncan Macbean. This canny, tough old
Scotsman Willie Jones had saved from the tomahawks of the Indians at the
time of Braddock's rout. He had brought him home, nursed him until well
of his wounds, and then made him overseer of the plantation. In this
capacity Duncan had amply proved his efficiency. He had become greatly
attached to the place, and in his will the master had requested that he
be continued as overseer as long as he was physically and mentally
capable.
Paul Jones sent the _Betsy_ back to London under the command of his
first-mate, with word to her owners that, for the present at least, he
was relinquishing the attractions of the sea. He then settled down in
earnest to the new life that had opened up before him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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