The village of Machias, in the Maine Province of Massachusetts, had traded lumber from the town's mills for provisions brought by ship from Boston for more than a decade. More than provisions came by ship; word reached Machias by May 9th, 1775, of the outbreak of hostilities between Colonists and Loyalists in the Boston area.

Captain Ichabod Jones, a Boston merchant, sailed regularly between Boston and Machias and was well known to the citizenry of the little town. On his most recent visit, the townspeople had instructed Jones to sell their lumber along the coast. Fearful for his family, though, Captian Jones had taken the lumber directly to Boston to make a deal with the British Army barracks if the British authorities would allow him to move his family away from the tensions in Boston.

To ensure that Captain Jones made good on his promise, Admiral Graves of the Royal Navy detailed Acting Lieutenant James Moore, in command of His Majesty's Armed Schooner Margaretta, to accompany Jones and his two 80 ton sloops, the Unity and the Polly, to Machias.

The three vessels arrived on Friday, June 2, 1775, and the villagers must have wondered at the presence of a ship of war in the river. They would learn soon enough of Captain Jones's business venture.

The town had adequate provisions for three weeks. The townspeople needed the supplies on board Jones's sloops, but few were eager to provide lumber which they knew would be used by the "enemy" garrison.

In a heated town meeting, it was agreed to accept Captain Jones's contract. Jones, angered by his reception, now insulted the villagers by saying that he would trade provisions only with those who had voted for his cause.

The villagers earlier had erected a tall Maine pine tree, stripped of its branches, in a prominent place above the town. Around this "liberty pole" the citizens had gathered and sworn to resist the British.

Acting Lieutenant Moore, still technically a "young gentleman" or midshipman, took it upon himself now to come ashore and demand that the liberty pole - an increasingly common sight in the Colonies - be taken down, or he would instruct his men to fire upon the town. Stephen Jones, nephew of Captain Jones and a residence of Machias, was able to talk the young officer out of using his guns, but the mood of the citizens was growing ugly.

The menacing presence of HMS Margaretta, 100 tons and a crew of 40, further angered the townspeople. A secret town meeting was held during which it was agreed that the officers of the Margaretta would be captured at church on Sunday, June 11th.

As Mr. Moore and his officers attended the Protestant services on that fateful morning he may have noted that there were very few able-bodied men present in church. Suddenly the pastor's servant, a man named London Alus, gave a cry of fright and jumped out an open window. He had seen armed men approaching the church and believed that they were British naval officers.

Alerted to their danger, the British (and Captain Jones) followed Alus through the window. With the villagers in pursuit Moore and his fellow officers made for a waiting gig at the dock. On board the Margaretta a petty officer loaded one of the 16 swivel guns and sent a one-pound ball whistling over the heads of the townsmen.

After a brief exchange of inconclusive musketry, Moore moved the Margaretta down river to a safer anchorage and sent back word that if Captain Jones or his sloops came to harm the Margaretta would return and lay siege to the town.

For his part Captain Jones remained hidden in the woods, and his two sloops were vulnerable. The townsmen were excited by their brush with danger and their near success, and they held another meeting where it was agreed to capture the Margaretta if possible. The fact that the warship was manned by members of the world's most formidable navy and that she shipped 16 swivel guns and four four-pounders did little to dampen their enthusiasm.

Early on the morning of June 12th, four men rowed out to Captain Jones's Unity and easily captured her without firing a shot. The sloop was brought alongside the city's dock and welcomed by a cheering crowd. A crew was recruited, a few weapons gathered together, along with a few provisions, and the Unity sailed in pursuit of HMS Margaretta.

In her haste to get away from the villagers' gunfire the previous day the Margaretta had lost a main boom. Some of her men boarded an American schooner out of Norwich, Connecticut, took a spar and pressed her captain, Robert Avery, into service as a pilot.

Acting Lieutenant Moore now decided to avoid additional gunfire with the patriots, and he made for open water. With more than an hour's lead time over the Unity, the smart schooner easily should have escaped, but the Americans proved to be better sailors. The Unity slowly closed on the British warship.

On board the Unity the crew of 35 elected 31-year-old Jeremiah O'Brien as their captain. The captain was one of six O'Brien brothers aboard the vessel, and the family was destined to earn fame for its patriotic efforts during the next few years.

Armament aboard the Unity included 20 smoothbore fowling pieces, one "wall gun", and an assortment of edged weapons and pitchforks.

The Unity closed to within hailing distance, and Moore warned the captured vessel to keep clear. Captain O'Brien ordered the Margaretta to surrender, and the British warship answered with a shot from one of her swivel guns, killing one man and mortally wounding another.

American Thomas Neight (or Night), manning the mounted wall gun, drew a bead on the Margaretta's helmsman and killed him with a single shot. Fire continued from the British schooner, shredding the rigging and sails of the Unity, but with no one at the helm of the Margaretta she broached to. O'Brien ran the bowprit of his sloop through the schooner's mainsail, and the two vessels slammed together.

John O'Brien, one of the American captain's younger brothers, was the first to board the Margaretta.

To his dismay, the ships drifted apart, and he found himself the sole patriot on board the enemy vessel. He quickly dived over the side and swam back to the relative safety of the Unity.

The latter came alongside again, and the Americans used grappling hooks to make the ships fast. According to Joseph Wheaton, one of the Unity's crew.....Captain Moore employed [sic] himself at a box of hand grenades and put two on board our vessel, which through [sic] our crew into great disorder...Six of us jumped onto her quarter deck and with clubbed muskets drove the crew from their quarters, from the waist into the hold of the Margaretta...

The hand-to-hand fighting was fierce, as cutlasses, axes and pitchforks flashed in the summer sun. Acting Lieutenant Moore fell to the deck, mortally wounded by two musket balls. In the confusion the American patriot, Robert Avery, was also killed. With their captain dying and the bodies of sailors and Marines strewn across the decks of the Margaretta the crew of the schooner surrnedered, and Captain Jeremiah O'Brien personally struck the Union Jack.John O'Brien took charge of the British prisoners and marched them overland to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where they were delivered to General George Washington.

The battle marked the first naval action of the Revolutionary War, and the Margaretta became the first British warship to surrender to an American vessel. As Joseph Wheaton noted, "Thus ended the bloody affray". It was not the last action to be seen by the O'Brien brothers or the Unity.

Captain O'Brien outfitted the Unity with the Margaretta's guns, strengthened her bulwarks and rechristened his sloop the Machias Liberty. He set out almost immediately, scouring the Bay of Fundy in an unsuccessful search for the British ship Diligent.

While the General Court of Massachusetts extended a vote of thanks to "Capt. Jeremiah O'Brien" and Capt. Benjamin Foster and the other brave men under their command", Admiral Graves dispatched the schooner Diligent and its armed tender, Tatamagouche, "to bring the obstreperous Irish Yankee in for trial".

HMS Diligent, Captain Knight commanding, and the Tatamagouche arrived at Machias in mid-July and Captain O'Brien somehow managed to lure British officers ashore. There they were easily taken prisoner, and their vessels were captured without bloodshed.

The chagrined British sent an invasion force of several hundred from Halifax, but, again, Captains O'Brien and Foster rebuffed the attack at a breastwork at Scott's Point, below the town.

Captain Jeremiah O'Brien continued to serve as Captain of the Machias Liberty for two years while a younger brother, William, served as his lieutenant as they harassed British ships along the northeast coast.

In 1780, while captain of the Hannibal, a ship that his brother John had previously commanded, Captain Jeremiah O'Brien was captured by two British frigates off New York. He was sent to Mill Prison in England but managed to escape to France some months later, making his way back to America after the war. Captain Jeremiah O'Brien eventually returned to Machias where he became the first collector of its port.

Captain John O'Brien also enjoyed success as a privateer, settling in Newburyport after the war and becoming a ship owner and captain. William O'Brien followed the sea and died in Biboa, Spain, in 1781.