Rhode Island in the Revolution: The Maritime Significance

Rhode Island is home to the largest fleet of Revolutionary War shipwrecks yet found in the United States. Rhode Island Marine Archeology Project’s (RIMAP) inventory of these lost vessels includes Royal Navy vessels, Continental Navy Vessels, British and Colonial commercial vessels, plus non-naval but governmentally approved privateers and letters of marque. Over the past 33+ years, RIMAP citizen scientists, under professional direction, have located and studied many shipwrecks of this period, from Royal Navy frigates to humble British troop carriers and victuallers. The presentation today will focus on the actions and activities of these vessels, including one that had been Cook’s Endeavour. As the US begins its 250th anniversary celebrations of the Revolutionary War, RIMAP’s work on all these vessels is particularly important because they are responsible for the success of the American Independence.

D.K. (Kathy) Abbass, Ph.D., is the Principal Investigator of the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP). She earned her Ph.D. in Anthropology from Southern Illinois University–Carbondale, with post-doctoral work in Maritime History at Harvard and Berkeley. She spent ten years teaching at Norfolk State University in Virginia. In Rhode Island, she apprenticed as the first female marine surveyor (inspecting vessel conditions), served as Director of Newport’s Museum of Yachting, and was the Project Archaeologist on a pre-Revolutionary War vessel in New York. At the request of the State of Rhode Island, she founded RIMAP in 1992. She has since led its trained citizen-scientist volunteers in field studies of more than 80 sites (primarily shipwrecks) and directs RIMAP’s lab in Bristol, RI.