April 17, 1740 The Pennsylvania Gazette

    By the Governour Command. NOTICE is hereby given, to all such as shall be willing to inlist in the important Expedition now on Foot, for attacking and plundering the most valuable Part of the Spanish West Indies, to repair to the following Gentlemen, and subscribe their Names, till a General Rendezvous shall be ordered at Philadelphia, viz. In Philadelphia County: Capt. Palmer, Thomas Lawrence, Alexander Woodrop, James Hamilton, Samuel Lane at Perkiomen, Marcus Huling at Manatany, Owen Evan of Limerick. Chester County: Henry Hockley, James Mather, Robert Finney, Lazarus Finney at Flying Hill. Lancaster County: Thomas Cookson, Andrew Galbraith, Thomas Edwards, Samuel Smith late Sheriff. Bucks County: Jeremiah Langhorne, Benjamin Jones, Nathanael Irish, Mathew Hughes, Thomas Clarke. Newcastle County: William Shaw, Jehu Curtis, Abraham Goodin, Jacob Goodin at Apoquinimy. Kent County: Charles Hellier, Nicholas Ridgely, John Housman. Sussex County: Abraham Wyncoop, Rives Holt. Philadelphia, April 16. 1740....

Source:

Unknown, "By the Governour Command," The Pennsylvania Gazette, Philadelphia, Pa., Sunday, 17th April 1740.

    Richard Wynkoop, in the 1904 edition of the Wynkoop Genealogy in the United States of America, has this to say about Abraham Wynkoop on pages 35-36:

    52. Abraham Wynkoop, (Benjamin 8, Cornelius 1,) born July 1, 1703, bp. N. Y., July 4: died before July, 1768. He married 1st, Esther Fisher; 2d, Mary Dyer, who died in June, 1778. Esther was daughter of Thomas and Margery (Maud) Fisher. Thomas was son of John Fisher, who accompanied William Penn, on his first voyage, to America, in October, 1682. Margery was daughter of Joshua and Elizabeth (Parr) Maud, and Elizabeth was of the family of Catharine Parr. Mary Dyer was daughter of William Dyer, and granddaughter of William and Mary (Dyer) Dyer, of Rhode Island. The second Mary Dyer had married 1st, in 1732, Nicholas Hammond, who came from the island of Jersey, in 1730. Their son, Nicholas Hammond, Jun., went to the island of Jersey, and there married Margaret Lempriere. His son, also named Nicholas, was sent, in 1772, aged 14, to Philadelphia, to the house of his grandmother then the widow Wynkoop, to be educated. In 1778, while the British were occupying Philadelphia, the widow Wynkoop, and her family, were at Appoquinimink Hundred, Newcastle, Del. Benjamin Wynkoop, probably the one who was her step-son, and his family, also were refugees at that place, and were very gently entertained. In 1780, this Nicholas Hammond married his cousin, Sarah George, and settled at Cambridge, Md. She died, in 1781; and, in 1789, he removed to Easton, Md.; and, some years later, he built the place "St. Aubin." In 1792, he married Rebecca Hollyday. His letters breathe a gentle, brotherly spirit, for his connections, as well as for his blood relations. He maintained and educated Lieut. Dyer Sharpe Wynkoop [435], and Hester Catalina Wynkoop [441], from her fourth to her sixteenth year. Her father, James [177], in his last sickness, took her to Hammond's house; and there James died.
    Mary Dyer, while she was the widow Hammond, received a conveyance of land at Appoquinimink. Abraham Wynkoop, in 1745, obtained land in the neighborhood of that of his second wife, by deed, which described him as of Sussex County, Del. This land was in Cedar Creek Hundred, near Milford, Sussex County. (See Cornelius P., 479). Abraham was originally of New York; afterwards of Philadelphia and Delaware.
    The executors of the will of Abraham Wynkoop made a contract, July 21, 1768, for the sale of one hundred and forty-four and a half acres of land, part of a tract, belonging to him, in Cedar Creek Hundred; which they afterwards conveyed, by deed, dated June 25, 1789.
    Children of Abraham and Esther Wynkoop:
174. Phoebe: b. Oct. 28, 1729: m. John Vining.
175. Benjamin: b. Nov. 23, 1734: m. 1st, Sarah Wooddrop Sims: probably m. 2d, a sister of Sarah.
    Children of Abraham and Mary Wynkoop:
176. Abram: d. about 1783: m. Rachel Sharpe.
177. James: physician: d. about 1788: m. Hester Peterson.

    The important Expedition now on Foot, for attacking and plundering the most valuable Part of the Spanish West Indies mentioned in the newspaper article above, is part of a relatively obscure war, at least in America, called the War of Jenkin's Ear, which lasted from 1739-1742. In America this war sequed into the slightly more familiar King George's War, which ran until 1748 and finally bled into the much more famous French and Indian War, which pitted the English and American colonists against the French and their Native American allies.

    It began in this way:

    In 1731, Robert Jenkins, the captain of the British merchant vessel Rebecca, trading in the Spanish West Indies, was boarded by a Spanish excise vessel under the command of Captain Juan de Leon Fandino. Fandino accused Jenkins of smuggling and searched the vessel. During the search Jenkins claimed that his crew was mistreated, and that he was tortured, threatened with death, and his ear cut off.

    At the time there was not much interest in his story, but by 1738 relations between Spain and England had soured. Spain was angry that the English were logging wood in Honduras, a Spanish possession and the English were upset that Spain was limiting their access to the slave trade in the West Indies, access supposedly guaranteed by treaty. Added to this was a continuing dispute over the border between Spanish Florida and Georgia. In 1739 the King of Spain sent a message to England telling them to build no more forts in Georgia and to send no soldiers there. When this message was read in the King's Council, the Duke of Argyle proclaimed, "This should be answered, but not in the usual way---the reply should be a fleet of battle-ships on the coast of Spain." Spain in turn threatened to invade and put an end to the colony of Georgia. These issues were debated in Parliament and Jenkins's preserved ear, apparently kept in a box, was prominently exhibited in the House of Commons, causing such a public uproar that Prime Minister Robert Walpole was forced to declare war on Spain on October 23rd 1739.

    After the declaration of war, a plan was quickly laid for combined operations against Spain from both the East and the West. One force, military and naval, was to assault them from the West Indies under Admiral Edward Vernon. The other, to be commanded by Commodore George Anson, afterwards Lord Anson, was to round Cape Horn and to fall upon the Pacific coast.

    Four days after war was declared, Vernon set sail with eight ships of the line and one frigate. Three ships left the squadron to patrol off Portugal. The five remaining ships carried on to the West Indies, being joined by the Hampton Court before their arrival on the 20th of November. Vernon took two days to capture the Spanish Colony of Porto Bello in Darien, (present day Panama), and to destroy the military installations there. However, after such a promising start, delays, bad preparation, dockyard corruption, and squabbles among the naval and military officers concerned caused the eventual failure of the scheme. Vernon was unable to prevent Spanish convoys from reaching Europe, and Spanish privateers continued to operate with destructive effect against British trade, both in the West Indies and in European waters.

    The Spaniards began the war by landing a party of men on Amelia Island in Georgia and killing two unarmed men who were engaged in carrying wood. After cutting off the heads and mangling the bodies of the men, they fled to their boats and sailed away. Governor James Oglethorpe called out a thousand soldiers and a troop of horse, and with a regiment of Highlanders went in pursuit of the Spaniards. He followed them up the St. John's River, burned all their boats, and drove them into the city of St. Augustine. He then returned to Frederica.

    Oglethorpe next organized a large force of Indians and colonists to invade Florida in December of 1739. Going up the St. John's River, he sent before him a party of Indian scouts, who fell upon a small fort of the Spaniards at daylight and burned it to the ground. Going further, another fort was attacked and captured. This gave Oglethorpe possession of the St. John's River, and cut off the Spaniards in St. Augustine from their Indian allies.

    Meanwhile in Virginia, Governor Alexander Spotswood, the former Royal Colonial Lieutenant Governor of Virginia and current Deputy Postmaster General of the Colonies, seized upon the declaration of war to plan a military expedition to attack the richest Spanish port of the New World, Cartaghena, Columbia. It was considered the richest prize in the New World.

    In exchange for his willingness to raise, train and outfit a detachment of American soldiers to enlist in the British cause, Spotswood was given the rank of Brigadier General.

    On April 17th, 1740 volunteers for this expedition were advertised for in the Philadelphia papers. Volunteers were sought for from Boston, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, (which sent twice as many volunteers as any other colony), Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina.

    In the spring of 1740 General Spotswood took his Virginia troops to Annapolis, Maryland. There they were to embark on ships, under the command of Admiral Vernon, for an amphibious attack on the Spanish fort at Carthagena, Columbia. Unfortunately, while awaiting orders and transport with Vernon's fleet, General Spotswood caught a fever and died on June 7th 1740. He was later replaced by Colonel Gouch, the Lieutenant Governor of Virginia.

    Down in Georgia, Governor Oglethorpe had made up his mind to attack St. Augustine itself. In May, 1740 he left Frederica with nine hundred men and eleven hundred Indians. He first captured Fort St. Diego, nine miles from St. Augustine, with fifty-seven men and nine cannon. Fort Moosa, two miles from St. Augustine, was abandoned by the Spaniards when they heard of the approach of Oglethorpe, and the garrison retreated to the city.

    After the commander of St. Augustine refused to surrender, Oglethorpe decided to attack the city both by land and sea. After making all arrangements and drawing the land troops up in order and giving the signal for the attack, it was found that the ships could not get close enough to the city to support the land forces. Accordingly, the planned storming of the city was abandoned, and a siege was begun instead.

    In order to prevent any help reaching the city, Oglethorpe ordered one of his officers, Colonel Palmer, to take a body of men and scour the country; to be always on the march, showing himself everywhere; to pick up stragglers, cut off all supplies, deceive the enemy as to the strength of his force, and not rest two nights in the same place. Colonel Palmer disobeyed this last order, and stayed three nights at Fort Moosa. The Spanish heard that he was there, and surprised his men early one morning, killing over twenty of them, and recapturing the fort. This opened the way for supplies of food, of which the people already stood in need, to reach the city. Oglethorpe now resolved to storm the city. For twenty days his batteries threw shot and shell into the city. At the end of this time a fleet from Cuba came to the relief of the Spaniards. By this time many of his soldiers were sick, the climate was hot, the Indians were growing restless and Oglethorpe himself was not well.

    The attack on St. Augustine was therefore reluctantly abandoned and the English returned to Frederica in July of 1740. Oglethorpe had lost four hundred and fifty men and four forts.

    On August 4th, 1740 Admiral Edward Vernon addressed a general order to Captains and naval surgeons that would make him famous. He stated that the Navy was run on harsh discipline and that the only solace for the ordinary sailor was the daily rum ration: as a result drunkenness was rife throughout the service. Vernon proposed to dilute the rum ration with 50% water to stop the drunkenness. This proposal was soon adopted throughout the Navy.

    Vernon's nickname was Old Grog, a reference to the cloth that his coats were made from. This was Grogram, a material made from silk and mohair. The diluted rum ration became known as Grog and remained a tradition in the Navy until 1970.

    Preparations for the attack on Carthagena continued to progress and by the middle of December, 1740, the troops levied from North America had arrived in Jamaica:

February 2, 1741
Caledonian Mercury (Edinburgh)

    The City is full of Letters, come home by the Spy Man of War to Portsmouth, and the Cumberland that has put in to the West of Ireland. They are dated Jamaica 9th, 10th and 12th December, and generally import, That all the Troops from North America were arrived there 6 Weeks before, except 4 Companies from N. Carolina, not then come up. [...]

The Troops from N. America were levied thus:

From Boston 5 Comp. of 100 Men each,	500
Rhode Island,	200
Connecticut,	200
New York,	500
New Jersey,	300
Philadelphia,	800
Maryland,	300
Virginia,	400
N. Carolina,	400
Total,	3600

    The Regiment late Spotiswood's (now commanded by Colonel Gouch, Lieutenant Governor of Virginia) consists of 4 Battallions, with 4 Lt. Colonels, each Company has a Captain, 2 Lieutenants, an Ensign, 4 Serjeants, 4 Corporals, 2 Drums, and 90 Men.

    One can only assume that Abraham Wynkoop of Sussex County, Delaware was among those troops.

    When Vernon had been joined by Sir Chaloner Ogle with naval reinforcements and British and American troops, an attack was made on Carthagena from March 9th through April 24th, 1741. Unfortunately, the delay had given the Spanish admiral, Don Blas de Leso, time to prepare, and the siege failed with a dreadful loss of life to the attackers. The failure was largely due to the incompetence of the military officers and the brutal insolence of the admiral. The war in the West Indies, after two other unsuccessful attacks had been made on Spanish territory, died down and did not revive till 1748.

    During the unsuccessful expedition against Carthagena, Admiral Vernon became friendly with an American soldier, Laurence Washington. Laurence used his influence to try to obtain a midshipman post for his younger half-brother George, but nothing came of it as their mother was strongly opposed to it. Laurence Washington didn't forget Vernon's services to the American colonies though and later named his home on the banks of the Potomac river, Mount Vernon, after him. After Laurence's death, Mount Vernon became famous as the home of George Washington, the Commander-in-Chief of the American armies during the War for Independence and America's first President after the war.

    The second British expedition, planned for at the start of the war in 1739, under Commander Anson, sailed late, was very ill provided, and weaker than had been intended. It consisted of six ships which left England on the 18th of September 1740. After much struggle, Anson returned alone with his flagship the Centurion on the 15th of June 1744. The other vessels had either failed to round the Horn or had been lost. Commander Anson had harried the coast of Chile and Peru, however, and had managed to capture a Spanish galleon of immense value near the Philippines. In the end, his unsuccessful expedition became reknowned as a great feat of resolution and endurance.

    The War of Jenkin's Ear was effectively over by 1742. All in all, the British and their American allies had not faired well. Abraham Wynkoop lived out the rest of his life in Delaware, dying around 1768.

    Chris