NJ Pine Barrens Maritime-Culture-Landscape 1 1 2024

Colonial Admiralty Courts and New Jersey’s Wartime Privateering: A Swarm of Hornets
Audacity was the privateers stock-in-trade P 1 of 2
• American privateering activity during the American Revolution encouraged patriotic private citizens to
harass British shipping and capture them as “prizes” while risking their lives and resources for financial
gain.
• Maritime prize money is distinct from salvage money: prize involves the capture of enemy ships, with the
ship being sold for the sole gain of the captors. Salvage involves recovery of ships lost in a shipwreck or
a stranding, with the proceeds split between the salvors and the owners
• Admiralty Courts fell to State Courts from American Independence before the adoption of the
Constitution. Admiralty Courts were concerned w prize jurisdiction and public authorization and
regulation of the seizure of ships and cargo (e.g., wartime privateering).
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