Frigate; tonnage 900; length 151'; beam 36'; depth of hull 12'6"; speed 13 knots; complement 300; armament 28 12-pounder smooth bore, 8 9-pounder smooth bore.
The USS Alliance -- a 36-gun frigate originally named Hancock--was laid down in 1777 on the Merrimack River at Salisbury, Mass., by the partners and cousins, William and James K. Hackett; launched on 28 April 1778; and renamed Alliance on 29 May 1778 by resolution of the Continental Congress.
Alliance, under command of Captain John Barry, got underway on 9 December 1782 for the West Indies. At the end of a largely uneventful passage, she anchored off Saint-Pierre, Martinique, on 8 January 1783. There Barry found orders to sail to Havana to pick up a large quantity of gold and to deliver it to Congress at Philadelphia. After brief repairs, Alliance resumed her voyage on the 13th, touched at St. Eustatius and Cape Francois, and reached Havana on the last day of January.
However, another American warship, Duc De Lauzun, was already in port on the same mission. The specie had already been loaded on that ship, and Barry decided to escort her home. The inevitable delays kept both ships in port until 6 March. The next day, they encountered two Royal Navy frigates which gave chase. Barry chose not to fight these warships rather than risk losing the funds his consort carried, and the American vessels successfully eluded their pursuers. Three days later they encountered the same pair -- Alarm and Sybil -- in company with sloop-of-war Tobago.
Still striving to avoid risk to the desperately needed money he was carrying to Congress, Barry again headed southwest to escape from these unidentified strangers and ordered her consort to follow. Far off in that direction, the rigging of another ship appeared over the horizon, sailing away from the others.
Soon Alliance was noticeably pulling away from the pursuers but Duc De Lauzun- second in line -- was losing ground to Alarm. In the distance, the newcomer was seen to change course and head toward Alliance. Alarm evidently gave up the chase and headed away. Sybil pressed on and soon began firing at Duc De Lauzun.
Confident in both Alliance's speed and her fight, Barry maneuvered her between Sybil and Duc De Lauzun to demand the full attention of the former so that the latter might slip away to safety. Sybil then turned her fire toward Alliance and managed to send one shot from her bow chaser into the American frigate's cabin, mortally wounding a junior officer and scattering many splinters. Yet, Barry held Alliance's fire until she was within a stone's throw of her opponent. At that point, a broadside from the American warship opened some 40 minutes of close-in fighting which finally forced Sybil to flee in the wake of Alarm and Tobago.
Meanwhile, the Treaty of Paris which ended the war and recognized the independence of the United States had been ratified on 3 February 1783 some five weeks before the battle in which she fired the last shot of the American Revolution.
The North American FJ Fury was the first operational jet aircraft in United States Navy service. Ordered in late 1944 as the XFJ-1 in competition with proposals from Douglas and Vought, the Fury began as a straight-wing, tricycle gear fighter with a single turbojet passing through the fuselage. The wing, empennage and canopy strongly resembled that of the piston-engined P-51 Mustang, North American's highly successful World War II fighter. The design was also the basis for the design of the XP-86 prototype of the United States Air Force's F-86 Sabre.
The first flight of the prototype XFJ-1 took place on September 11, 1946, with the first of thirty deliveries beginning in October of 1947. The Fury's first landing on an aircraft carrier was made March 10, 1948 aboard USS Boxer. Flown operationally by Navy squadron VF-5, the FJ-1 pioneered jet-powered carrier operations and underscored the need for catapult-equipped carriers. The Fury was capable of launching without catapult assistance, but on a crowded flight deck the capability was of small practicality.
As straight wings were seen at the time as the only way to ensure the low speed and stability needed for carrier landings, the FJ-1 used a straight wing.
