Gunpowder, that unum necessarium, had become relatively abundant by the summer of 1776. Virginia sent at least seven vessels on powder cruises. Massachusetts sent thirty-two. Many were given French names and phony papers. Every few days a ship managed to elude, outrun, or outwit Royal Navy pursuers to bring powder into American ports: five tons into Charleston from St. Eustatius, in the Caribbean; eleven tons into Newburyport from Bordeaux; seven tons into Philadelphia from Le Havre aboard the Morris, along
