Huddy’s Hanging Stalls Peace Talks

Huddy’s Hanging Stalls Peace Talks. . After the Toms River Blockhouse fight, British sailors and soldiers hunted for Captain Joshua Huddy who had escaped into the surrounding area. The Associated Loyalists, a unit organized by the former Tory Governor of New Jersey, William Franklin (Benjamin Franklin’s son), helped search for Huddy while burning local houses, which left residents homeless. Captain Huddy was found at Randolph’s Mill on the North Branch of the Toms River. He was hiding with two civilian friends, who had fought with him at the blockhouse, Town Magistrate Daniel Randolph and elderly resident Jacob Fleming. The British captured and shackled all three men, and shipped them off on a British ship, the HMS Arrogant, for confinement at the Old Sugar House Prison in New York City., A few days later, Loyalist Captain Richard Lippincott received orders from William Franklin and his Board of Associated Loyalists. The three American Patriot prisoners were moved to Sandy Hook. They then boarded the British warship HMS Britannia under the guise of a prisoner exchange. The men were held in irons during the short voyage to nearby Gravelly Point in the Highlands (not far from the Navesink River in Monmouth County). Captain Huddy was removed from the Britannia and allowed to dictate his will. Huddy was then hanged, without trial, on a crude gallows erected from three fence rails and a barrel. The date was April 12, 1782. Huddy’s final words were, “I shall die innocent and in a good cause.”. A sign was placed on Huddy’s chest declaring that he was being hanged as revenge for the killing of Loyalist Philip White., General Washington demanded retaliation. British General Sir Henry Clinton ordered that those responsible for the death of Captain Joshua Huddy be arrested and tried. When those who hanged Huddy were not turned over to the Patriots, Washington and his field officers ordered a lottery to be held. Lieutenant Charles Asgill, a British officer, who was held as a prisoner of war, was “the unfortunate” one chosen to receive the same fate as Huddy. This order inflamed the British and caused an international crisis for the new nation. The Paris Peace Talks were halted for months., Eventually, General Washington and the Continental Congress relented and saved the doomed young British officer, Lieutenant Asgill, from execution. This humanitarian decision gave the American representatives the leverage needed to negotiate concessions from the defeated British., The Treaty of Paris was finally signed on September 3, 1783, nearly two years after the British surrendered to General Washington at Yorktown.