20th [June].—Got the Vigilant off1 and proceeded down the river in her, and ordered all the ships of war to join the admiral at Newcastle.2
"Journals of Henry Duncan," pp. 158–59.
1. H.M. armed ship Vigilant, Comdr. Brabazon Christian, commander, the last ship to leave Philadelphia after covering the British evacuation, had run aground in the Delaware River at Red Bank, New Jersey. See Journal of Ambrose Searle, 18 June, above.
2. Vice Adm. Viscount Howe in his flagship H.M.S. Eagle had anchored off New Castle, Delaware, on 1 June. Journal entry of 1 June, Ibid., 158. Reportedly, the British flotilla consisted of “upward a hundred & fifty Sail.” Caesar Rodney to Thomas Rodney, 19 June 1778, NNPM, Autographs of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence.
