Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume IX.djvu/699

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JONES 679 his command a squadron of five vessels. By the middle of September 26 vessels had been captured or destroyed by them, which created great alarm upon the E. coast of England. On Sept. 23 the Bon Homme Richard was off Flamborough Head, having in company the Alliance, Capt. Landais, and the Pallas, a ship mounting 32 light guns, commanded by Capt. Cottineau. Soon after noon the headmost ships of a fleet, known to be from the Baltic, were seen standing out from under Flam- borough Head, and beating down toward the straits of Dover. This fleet was under con- voy of the Serapis, 44, and Countess of Scar- borough, 22. Signal for general chase was made by Jones, and the Alliance, being the fastest of the squadron, took the lead ; but no sooner had she discovered the force of the English vessels of war than she stood off from them. About 7J o'clock the Richard came up with the Serapis, commanded by Capt. Pearson, and closed with her, upon her weath- er quarter, to about half pistol shot. At the commencement of the action two of the old 18-pounders mounted in the Richard's gun room burst, blowing up the deck above and killing or wounding a large portion of the men stationed at them. This part of the bat- tery was then abandoned, and the ports were closed. A close and heavy cannonade was now maintained by both ships for about an hour, when they fouled each other, and Jones with his own hands assisted in lashing the jib stay of the Serapis to the mizzen mast of the Richard. The ships being in actual contact, fore and aft, each discharged her guns into the side or through the ports of her antagonist. The effect of such a fire was terrible to both. Soon after 10 o'clock the Serapis struck, and Dale, the first lieutenant of the Richard (after- ward Commodore Dale), was ordered on board to take possession of her. In the morning the spectacle presented by the Richard was sin- gular and dreadful. She was on fire in two places, and had 7 ft. of water in her hold. Her counters and quarters on the lower deck were driven in, the whole of her main battery was dismounted, and she was cut to pieces in a most extraordinary manner. The after part of the ship, in line with the guns of the Sera- pis, was so completely beaten in that the upper deck was only sustained by a few frames, which had been missed by shot. It being deemed impossible to carry her into port, the wounded were removed, and she soon after sank. The Serapis suffered much less. She was a new ship, in excellent condition, and much superior in force to the Richard, mount- ing 50 guns, though rated at 44. Her crew numbered 320, while those engaged upon the Richard were only 227, Irish, Scotch, Portu- guese, Norwegians, &c., with but very few Americans. During the action the Countess of Scarborough surrendered to the Pallas, the captain of which requested Capt. Landais of the Alliance to take charge of the prize, to enable him to go to the assistance of the Richard ; but Landais, instead of complying, actually opened fire upon Jones's ship. Jones carried his prize into the Texel. On his arrival in France he was received with the most distin- guished honors. A sword was presented to him by Louis XVI., who also requested permission of congress to decorate him with the military order of merit. In 1781 he sailed for the Uni- ted States, arriving in Philadelphia in Febru- ary, where congress voted him a gold medal, and Washington addressed him a highly com- plimentary letter. He was afterward em- ployed to superintend the construction of a line-of-battle ship, the America, at Portsmouth, N. H., which he was to have commanded ; but the ship was presented by congress to France. He then went to Paris as an agent for prize money, and while there was invited into the Russian service with the rank of rear admiral, but was disappointed at not receiving command of the fleet in the Black sea. He quarrelled with the admiral, the prince of Nassau, and owing to the intrigues of enemies fell into dis- favor at court, and was finally permitted by the empress Catharine to retire from the ser- vice, with a pension which was never paid. He took up his residence in Paris, where he died in poverty and neglect. JONES, Owen, an English architect, born in Wales in 1809, died in London, April 19, 1874. He was the only son of Owen Jones, a Welsh tradesman, whose " Myvyrian Archeology of Wales," published under the name of Owain Myvyr (3 vols., London, 1801-'7), has been de- scribed by Matthew Arnold as a great reposito- ry of Welsh literature. The son, after studying with a London architect, spent four years on the continent and in the East. While in Gra- nada he made with Jules Goury drawings of the Alhambra, which revealed for the first time the striking characteristics of that unique mon- ument ; and after Goury's death he carried on the publication of the work almost alone, in- vesting in it his whole patrimony, and sparing no effort in its elaborate execution. It was published under the title of " Plans, Elevations, Sections, and Details of the Alhambra," with a notice of the kings of Granada and the trans- lation of Arabic inscriptions by Gayangos (London, 1836-'42 ; 2d ed., 1847, with 101 plates). In 1851 he became one of the super- intendents of the crystal palace in London, and next year director of its decoration in conjunction with the present Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt ; and the courts of architecture and sculpture in the Sydenham crystal pal- ace, and the decorative painting of that build- ing, were all completed under his direction, with the assistance of Bonomi, Sharpe, and others in the Egyptian court. His polychro- matic decoration of the Greek court having excited comment, he vindicated his imitation of the ancient Greek sculptors, and illustrated his views by painting a portion of the casts of the Elgin marbles at Sydenham in party-colors, the