Item  #  B2804

Black Prince Limited Edition 24"

• Overall Dimensions 24" L x 5" W x 16" H Limited Edition (1:49 scale).  5 Lbs
• This Black Prince ship model Includes a numbered Certificate of Authenticity as only 250 will ever be made.
• Our ship model American Revolution Privateer is a fully assembled ship model, never made from a kit.
• The Benjamin Franklin Privateer Black Prince features a planked deck with nail holes, barrels, buckets, cannon ball racks, coiled ropes, and more!
• This ship model Black Prince is meticulously painted to the actual Black Prince
• Our model ship Black Prince replica is built with rare and high quality woods such as cherry, walnut, oak, birch, and maple.
• This ship model rests perfectly on a large wood base made perfectly to cradle the ship, displaying the plank on frame hull.
• We only use the finest and highest quality parts on our ship models. This Black Prince ship model has metal anchors and brass cannons.
• To build this ship, extensive research was done using various sources such as drawings, paints, and copies of the original plans.

When we think of Benjamin Franklin, most of us picture the famous paintings of our bespectacled forefather. From his lofty vantage point on museum walls, he smiles gently down upon us, his American children. Or we picture him from the pages of our childhood history books, flying a kite with a key tied to its string on a stormy Philadelphia night. Few of us associate Benjamin Franklin with any form of piracy. But in fact, our mild-mannered Doctor Franklin was the political mastermind, who commissioned one of the most amazing privateering ventures in American history!

In the early days of the American Revolution, the British had far greater numbers of American prisoners in custody than the Americans had British. Conditions in British prisons were horrific, and for those unfortunate souls who had the misfortune to be held aboard a British prison ship, conditions were unspeakable. Filth, disease, starvation and exposure took their toll on the Americans who languished in captivity. The numbers are staggering. An estimated 13,000 Americans, many now forgotten by history, perished on British prison ships in comparison to the 4,300 killed in the actual battles of the American Revolution. 

As tales of horror trickled out from the darkest corners of these British hellholes, their words gnawed like rats at the heart of Benjamin Franklin. He instigated negotiations for prisoner exchanges with the British, but quickly realized that there were far more imprisoned Americans than there were captured British soldiers to trade for them.

So what was the good Doctor Franklin to do about this discrepancy? His answer was to capture a few more Brits! And by far, the most effective way to accomplish this was not to send one’s soldiers out onto the battlefields, but to commission privateers to capture them from among the British merchantmen at sea. So Franklin set about commissioning a small but stealthy pack of sea-wolves to do his bidding.

Benjamin Franklin’s served the Continental Congress as "Minister Plenipotentiary.” Minister Plenipotentiary is defined as "A diplomatic representative ranking below an ambassador but having full governmental power and authority; a plenipotentiary." This enabled Franklin to issue Letters of Marque with the authority of the Continental Congress. Letters of Marque authorized a privately owned vessel to make captures on behalf of a country at war.