Joshua Huddy and the Black Snake

Joshua Huddy was a militia captain from Monmouth County, New Jersey, and in the last years of the war he commanded the Black Snake, an armed gunboat working the bays and inlets around Toms River. The Jersey shore was a private war by then — Patriot militia against Loyalist refugees raiding from Sandy Hook and Staten Island, both sides burning houses and hanging prisoners.

In March 1782 a Loyalist force stormed the Toms River blockhouse and took Huddy prisoner. On April 12 a party under Captain Richard Lippincott hanged him from a tree near Sandy Hook, a note pinned to his chest: "Up goes Huddy for Philip White."

Washington demanded Lippincott's surrender and threatened to hang a British officer in reprisal. The war was already over; the argument ran for months.

Huddy stands at the stern with a musket slung behind his shoulder and the sail bellying above him, lit from behind by a low sun over the salt marsh. His crew bend to the oars below, faces hidden; only he looks up and out. The flag at the transom is the one color in a painting of brown wood, gray canvas and gold water. It is a portrait of a man who knew exactly who was hunting him.