It was a saying in the navy at the time, amongst the common seaman, that every man’s comfort afloat depended upon the kind of man a ship had for its First Lieutenant, for that he was the Prime Minister of this small community over which the Captain ruled as absolute monarch, and, as every measure and arrangement was to be carried out by him, it was better to sail with a bad Captain and a good First Lieutenant than to have the conditions reversed.

We beg leave to acquaint you that at our last sitting we were applied to by Eleanor Moore, having a certificate that she was wounded on board His Majesty’s Ship Apollo, when in action with a French frigate on the 15th June 1780, by receiving a gun shot wound on the head, being then actually on service carrying powder to the gun at which her husband was quartered. And though we have no precedent for any persons being relieved who have not been born on the ships books, yet we hope their lordships will approve of our giving this woman the allowance that would have been given to a man under the same circumstance.

The most impressive career of all the female sailors is that of William Brown, a black woman who spent at least twelve years on British warships, much of this time in the extremely demanding role of captain of the foretop…. Brown was a married woman and joined the navy around 1804 following a quarrel with her husband. For several years she served on the Queen Charlotte, a three-decker with 104 guns and one of the largest ships in the Royal Navy. The Queen Charlotte had a crew of 850 men and usually served as the flagship of the fleet. Brown must have had nerve, strength and unusual ability to have been made captain of the foretop on such a ship.

[Eleanor CrEssy’s] husband was commander of the famous clipper ship Flying Cloud, and on more than one occasion contributed to the record-breaking passages of the ship. However, it was her pinpointing of the location of a drowning seaman that made her famous. The Flying Cloud was heading for Madagascar in heavy weather, and Mrs. Cressy was working at the chart table when she glanced through the porthole and saw a man in the sea… They searched the area where they thought he should be but failed to find him, and the captain concluded he was lost. Mrs. Cressy was not prepared to give up so easily. She knew the position he had gone overboard, and she worked out the direction of wind and tide and the drift of the ship…. Captain Cressy decided to send two boats out, and sure enough, they found the sailor at dusk exactly where she had calculated he would be. He was weak but still alive, and he was taken back to the ship, where he made a full recovery.

I am not a mere adventurer of fortune. Stimulated by reason and philanthropy, I laid aside the enjoyments of private life, and embarked under the flag of America when it was first displayed. In this line, my desire for fame is infinite; and I must not so far forget my own honor, and what I owe to my friends and to America, as to remain inactive.

So far from being harsh and cruel, nature has given me the mildest disposition.

My zeal can never be overrated.