Martha’s Vineyard endured a precarious existence in those heady days of the young republic. As the founding fathers debated the philosophical underpinnings of liberal democracy in Philadelphia, entire British and Hessian fleets skulked just over our horizon (as reported by contemporary whalers). The vulnerable and largely defenseless Island was caught in limbo and few natives ventured to offend the Crown. As the war drew on, though, and these specters increasingly emerged in Vineyard harbors to exact their punishing toll, Islanders became patriots.

For the sheep grazing in pastures above Vineyard Sound, the patches of weathered canvas beating toward Holmes Hole were barely worth a glance away from meals of September grass. Farmers, townspeople and public officials, however, greeted the approach of some four dozen English-flagged vessels with a bit more alarm.

An account, in value, of sundry articles taken from the following named persons, by the British Forces in Edgartown, between the tenth and fifteenth day of September, 1778 - said articles consisting of grain, potatoes, cabbages, clothing, swine, leather, lumber, naval stores, salt, craft, provisions, herring, house goods, ‘sarce.’