He’s remembered for one of the boldest lines in American history—“I have not yet begun to fight!”—but the real John Paul Jones was far more complicated than a single quote.
In this episode of Dave Does History, we sail straight into the stormy life of the man who took the American Revolution to Britain’s own shores, fought a burning ship into legend, and became both a national hero and an international headache.
Born in Scotland, chased out of the Caribbean by scandal, and later knighted by a French king before falling from grace in Russia, Jones lived a life as wild and unpredictable as the sea itself.
Was he the founding father of the U.S. Navy, or just a pirate with better branding? Join us as we dig beneath the myth to find the man who fought like hell—and made sure we’d never forget his name.
