148 HEREDITY AND DEVELOPMENT OF NAVAL OFFICERS. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 



BURKE, SIR B., and A. 1909. A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Peerage and 



Baronetage. London: Harrison and Sons. 2570 pp. 

 BURKE, SIR B. 1914. A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Great 



Britain. London: Harrison. 2102 pp. 



CALLENDER, G. 1912. The Life of Nelson. London: Longmans, Green & Co. xxxviii + 154 pp. 

 MAHAN, A. 1897. Life of Nelson. Boston: Little and Brown. 2 vols. 



MATCHAM, M. 1911. The Nelsons of Bur nham Thorpe. London and New York: J. Lane. 306pp. 

 MOORHOUSE, E. H. 1913. Nelson in England, A Domestic Chronicle. New York: E. P. 



Button & Co. xi + 274 pp. 

 NELSON, T. 1908. A Genealogical History of the Nelson Family with an Introduction by the 



Right Hon. The Earl Nelson. King's Lynn: Thew and Son. 



O'BRYNE, W. 1849. A Naval Biographical Dictionary. London: J. Murray. 1400 pp. 

 RUSSELL, W. 1890. Horatio Nelson and the Naval Supremacy of England. New York: 



G. Putnam's Sons, xiv + 357 pp. 



45. JEREMIAH O'BRIEN. 



JEREMIAH O'BRIEN was born in 1744, at Kittery, Maine. As a young man 

 he was engaged in lumbering and shipping and became a leader in the town. In 

 June 1775 a Boston merchant, convoyed by a British armed schooner Margaretta, 

 appeared at Machias for lumber. Having learned of the battle of Lexington and 

 believing that the lumber would be used to fortify the British in Boston, the towns- 

 people, led by the father of the propositus (Morris O'Brien), at first declined to sell, 

 but later agreed to exchange lumber for the needed provisions that the merchant 

 vessel carried; but the captain refused to sell food to the leaders of the opposition. 

 This, and the demands of the officer in charge of the Margaretta that the liberty 

 pole which the townspeople had erected should be taken down, stirred the reso- 

 lution of the patriots. A number of the residents of nearby towns met at Morris 

 O'Brien's house and decided to seize the Margaretta. One day a local sloop, the 

 Unity, was filled with townspeople carrying various kinds of weapons, a small cannon 

 was mounted on the deck, six of Morris O'Brien's sons went on board, and 

 Jeremiah was elected captain. They ran alongside the Margaretta, boarded and 

 captured her, and made her officers and crew prisoners. This was the first naval 

 battle of the Revolution. When two armed sloops were sent out from Halifax, 

 to capture O'Brien, he and Captain Foster, of the Machias Liberty and Falmouth 

 Packet, respectively, captured the two sloops and brought them both to Machias. 

 Then O'Brien took his prisoners to Portland by vessel and thence to Cambridge 

 overland. Commissioned by the Massachusetts provincial congress, Jeremiah 

 and John O'Brien, commanding the Machias Liberty and the Diligence (captured 

 from the British), respectively, cruised for two years on the coast of the Gulf 

 of Maine and captured various British vessels. In 1780 the brothers built the 

 Hannibal, 24 guns, for privateering, but she was captured by two British frigates 

 and Jeremiah was placed in the prison-ship Jersey. Taken to Plymouth, England, 

 he escaped from prison and crossed the English Channel in a boat propelled by 

 oars. He returned to Machias, where he remained the rest of his life as collector 

 of customs. When, during the War of 1812, the British officers searched his house, 

 he gave them refreshments and as they toasted the king he toasted success to the 

 American arms. He died at Machias, September 1818. 



Brothers. - - John 'Brien, born in Scarboro, Maine, 1750, was one of the 

 party that on June 12, 1775, captured the British armed schooner Margaretta off 

 Machias. He was the first to board the Margaretta when the Unity collided with 



