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2021-199, Sword
Sword of Capt. John Morris, RN
2021-199, Sword

Sword of Capt. John Morris, RN

Date1750-1770
OriginEngland
MediumGilt bronze, gilt copper, steel, iron, and wood
DimensionsHilt: 6 3/8" Blade: 30" x 7/8" Overall: 36 3/8"
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number2021-199
DescriptionClassic British spadroon with a boat-shaped guard, a wire and tape bound grip, a pair of recurved quillons (one missing), and a gadrooned ovoid pommel. All other hilt elements are decorated with gadrooned panels, and the straight single-edged blade has one wide fuller and a false edge.
Label TextThis gilt bronze spadroon belonged to Captain John Morris (c.1725-1776) of the Royal Navy. Morris was Captain of the newly built H.M.S. Bristol, a fifty-gun frigate that served as the flagship of Admiral Sir Peter Parker during his disastrous attack on Fort Moultrie, outside of Charleston, South Carolina, on June 28, 1776. The Bristol was severely damaged with forty killed and seventy-one wounded, her hull shot through over seventy times, and most of her rigging and mastwork shot away.

Captain Morris had one hand pierced by small-arms fire and the opposing arm blown off and died several days later on July 2. His son, later Sir James Nicholl Morris (1763-1830), commanded the H.M.S. Colossus at the Battle of Trafalgar and may have carried his father's sword during his long career in the Royal Navy.

James Peale's painting of the attack, entitled "Sir Peter Parker's Attack against Fort Moultrie," is also in Colonial Williamsburg's collection (1958-2a). H.M.S. Bristol is the two-deck ship featured at the center of the scene exchanging fire with the American fort.
InscribedUnderside of the guard is engraved "Captain Morris Killed in Command of H.M.S. Bristol 1776" in four lines.
Exhibition(s)