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November 1781: Peter, a.k.a. Dick Butcher Served on the Privateer Congress
Two Half Johannesses Reward.
RAN away from the subscriber, living in New-Castle county, St. Georges hundred and Delaware state, a NEGRO MAN named PETER, about 20 years of age, and about 5 feet 6 or 7 inches high, is marked with the small pox, streight limbed, and well made; was raised in Kent county, Delaware state, by a certain Peter Cooper, and afterwards given to a certain Joseph Barry, and after said Berry's decease, sold by the sheriff of Kent county as the property of said Berry, to Nehemiah Tal on at Dover, of whom the subscriber purchased said negro, who ran away from me the 22d of February, in the year 1780: he has been formerly seen in Kent county, but since has been in Philadelphia, and was out the last cruize in the ship Congress, captain Geddes commander, and passed by the name of DICK BUTCHER. Whoever takes up said Negro and secures him in any goal on the continent, or brings him to the subscriber, shall have the above reward.
GEORGE CROW, near Port-Penn.
Notes: Crow wrote that Peter, a.k.a. Dick Butcher sailed as a crewmember on the ship Congress. In doing so, he took part in a historic voyage and experienced a bloody and important battle at sea. Crow's reference is to a privateer ship of 24 guns, 20 of which were 12-pounders, and 215 crewmembers, commanded by Capt. George Geddes. Congress departed Philadelphia in late June 1781 in search of prizes for its Philadelphia investors, Matthew and Thomas Irwin and Blair McClenachan. It captured the merchant brigantine Minerva in late June and sent her to Philadelphia. They almost captured another prize in July but a British frigate engaged the Congress in battle, spoiling the capture and forcing the Congress to escape using her superior speed.
Captain Geddes encountered no more potential prizes the remainder of the summer until encountering the British sloop-of-war Savage thirty-five miles off of Charleston, South Carolina. Geddes intended to capture the warship in good condition as a prize for the Continental Navy. The Congress engaged the Savage on September 6, 1781 in a four-hour, bloody naval battle. The heavier guns of the Congress mauled the Savage, causing it's commander to strike her colors just as the crew of the Congress was preparing to board her for hand-to-hand combat. Geddes was unable to bring the captured British warship back to Philadelphia, however, as another British warship, the Solebay, caught up to them and recaptured the heavily-damaged Savage.
Sources: Pennsylvania Packet and Daily Advertiser (Philadelphia), 10 November 1781.
"American Privateer ship 'Congress' (1781)," Three Decks.org, online at https://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_ship&id=20383, accessed 21 December 2025.
William W. Reynolds, "Mismatch off Charleston: The Privateer Congress vs. HMS Savage," Journal of the American Revolution, https://allthingsliberty.com/2022/04/mismatch-off-charleston-the-privateer-congress-vs-hms-savage/#:~:text=Congress's%20crew%20of%20200,Barbados%20and%20Antigua%2C%20was%20provisioning, accessed 21 December 2025.
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