The Governor Who Governed From a Warship

Josiah Martin did not want to leave New Bern. He believed, into the spring of 1775, that loyal North Carolinians would rally to the Crown if given time and leadership. He wrote letters to London explaining his situation, asking for troops, describing the loyal majority he was certain existed in the backcountry. The letters were accurate in some particulars. There was a loyal majority, particularly among the Highland Scottish settlers of the Cape Fear valley who had sworn oaths to the king on arriving in America.

What Martin could not see was that the institutional structure around him was dissolving. The assembly had stopped meeting on his terms. Patriot committees were running the county governments. His own officials were resigning or switching sides. In May 1775, a group of men came to Tryon Palace and spiked the cannon in the courtyard — the most direct possible statement about who actually controlled New Bern.

He left the palace and went to Fort Johnston near Wilmington. When a Patriot militia force threatened the fort in July, he burned it and retreated to HMS Cruizer in the river. From his warship he continued to govern — issuing proclamations, corresponding with London, planning the Loyalist uprising that would end at Moore's Creek Bridge.

The Highland Scots marched in February 1776 expecting Martin's promises to materialize: a British fleet in the Cape Fear, arms and support, a royal army to join. The fleet arrived weeks too late. The Highlanders were destroyed in three minutes at a bridge they should never have tried to cross. Martin remained on his warship, and then sailed away. His plan had failed at every point. The loyal majority he had counted on had met the Patriot militia, and the Patriot militia had won.