Jack the Painter and the American Mission to France, 1776-1777
M.J. Sydenham describes how, returning from the Colonies “with a most dreadful antipathy towards the government and nation”, this one-time highwayman conceived the scheme of striking a dramatic blow for America”.
Late in the evening of Thursday December 5th, 1776, a sallow young man walked into the small town of Portsmouth bearing a bundle which contained two screw-barrel pistols, a tinder-box, a quantity of gunpowder and kindling, a gallon of turpentine and a “portable machine”. With these materials James Aitken (otherwise known as James Hill, James Hinde or “Jack the Painter”) intended to destroy the Royal Naval Dockyard and much of the shipping that lay at anchor in the harbour.
Despite all the security measures of war-time, he in fact entered and left the Yard on several occasions, eventually igniting a rope-house full of highly inflammable rigging. Only the energy of the Commissioner, Vice-Admiral Gambier, who mobilised ship-wrights and marines as well as the normal fire-fighting services, saved the whole Dockyard from destruction.
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