his name is Cornelius Vlieland and he has everything to do with The Wasp and general Pulaski.
You can read the whole story of general Pulaski.
By the afternoon of October 15, 1779, Captain Bulfinch had no room to take any more passengers. When another wounded officer, Lt. Cornelius Van Vlieland, who had lost an arm in the siege of Savannah, asked him for passage to Charleston, Bulfinch arranged to send him on another ship. In the sequence of events, it looked as if the visit of Lt. Van Vlieland came before the death of Pulaski. Otherwise, Pulaski's death created a vacancy on the Wasp, and had the young lieutenant waited, Bulfinch would have had space for him.
Partly because of his occupation with the one-armed officer, Bulfinch was not entirely aware of the preparations on the Wasp to make a coffin out of pine boards either at hand or on the plantation for Pulaski's body. From the evidence of their work, as was seen in 1853 and 1996, the officers and crew of the Wasp prepared to bury Pulaski's body in his military uniform with a flag draped over it.
What happened next?
After reading all about general Pulaski we know there was a Cornelius Vlieland .
And this is about his death.
On the internet we found yet another Vlieland in the U.S.A. in 1779.
Cornelius van Hempstead Vlieland.
The Hempstead may have been standing for either Hemel Hempstead, England or the Dutch city of Heemstede
we heard of the dead of Cornelius together with General Pulaski and the siege of Savannah
Unwaried Patience and Fortitude: Francis Marion's Orderly Book
Door Patrick O'Kelley
from
Roster of South Carolina Patriots in the American Revolution. Volume II, K-Z
entered 1777
7/17/1779, a 2nd Lieutenant under Capt. Richard Bohun Baker. Transferred to Capt. Thomas Dunbar in August of 1779. Mortally wounded at Siege of Savannah 10/9/1779.
It was perhaps because of the Siege's reputation as a famous British victory that Charles Dickens chose the Siege of Savannah as the place for Joe Willet to be wounded (losing his arm) in the novel Barnaby Rudge.
Unwaried Patience and Fortitude: Francis Marion's Orderly Book
Door Patrick O'Kelley
from general Pulaski
By the afternoon of October 15, 1779, Captain Bulfinch had no room to take any more passengers. When another wounded officer, Lt. Cornelius Van Vlieland, who had lost an arm in the siege of Savannah, asked him for passage to Charleston, Bulfinch arranged to send him on another ship. In the sequence of events, it looked as if the visit of Lt. Van Vlieland came before the death of Pulaski, as Pulaski's death certainly created a vacancy aboard. Had the young lieutenant waited, Bulfinch would have had space for him.
The day I found Bulfinch's letter to him from Thunderbolt, or "Tunder Bolt" as he spelled it, was especially important. On October 15, 1779, Bulfinch wrote:
Sir, I beg leave to acquaint you that agreeable to your orders I took on board nine pieces of the artillery which was the most I possibly could take on. Mo'over, I even was obliged to put some of the carriages on board the Schooner that carry the French wounded. I likewise took on board the Americans that was sent down one of which died this day and I have brought him ashore and buried him. They have put only one lad on board to attend the sick. I should be glad your Excellency would order some others on Board to attend them. Capt. Vlyland (sic) came down this afternoon. There was no place to put him. The Eagle whom he was to have gone on board, went away this morning and left him. I made interest with the French Gentleman who has the directions of putting the wounded on board the other schooners for Charleston and got him on board one of them. I am with the highest esteem, Sir, your most Re Obdt Sevt Sam Bulfinch 5 Immediately after the Wasp left Thunderbolt Bluff at high tide the following morning, quite possibly the only remaining people who knew where Pulaski's body was buried were the denizens of Greenwich plantation, across the road from Bonaventure, home to Mrs. Jane Bowen, her four children, her brother, and their servants. At the time Bonaventure was not occupied by the plantation owners. During the British occupation of Savannah, the Tattnalls and the Mulrynes, who owned the plantation, fled to Savannah or one of the British islands in the Atlantic for safety
Roster of South Carolina Patriots in the American Revolution. Volume II, K-Z
entered 1777
7/17/1779, a 2nd Lieutenant under Capt. Richard Bohun Baker. Transferred to Capt. Thomas Dunbar in August of 1779. Mortally wounded at Siege of Savannah 10/9/1779.
The foregoing were all of the Continental or Regular regiments which served
during the struggle for independence.
But there were other organizations of Militia which did much good service and aided our cause very considerably. The most celebrated of these was Marion's corps from South Carolina.
When this body was first formed, Francis Marion received from the State of South Carolina the commission of
Lieutenant-Colonel
and subsequently became a Brigadier-General.
The other field officer was Major Horry,
and both of them have been rendered celebrated by the pen of Weems.
This organization would in these days be considered as "mounted infantry," and in the unsuccessful attempt
to storm Savannah, Ga., in the Autumn of 1779, it suffered very much.
Captain Charles Motte, Lieutenants Alexander Hume, James Grey and Cornelius Van Vlieland were
killed, as was the brave Sergeant William Jasper who fell while attempting to plant the
American colors on the parapet of Spring Hill redoubt.
Many of the men were killed and wounded in this sanguinary affair. Here too fell Count Casimir Pulaski,
of Poland Brigadier-General of cavalry in the American service.
After this action Marion retreated to the interior, whence he was able to harass the British for a long time.
The movements and actions of these troops were of a most romantic character, and the
name of their leader is one of the most highly honored in our Nation.
