Bernard Romans (c. 1720–1784)[1] was a Dutch-born navigator, surveyor, cartographer, naturalist, engineer, soldier, promoter, and writer who worked in the British American colonies and the United States.
On March 3, 1761, Romans married Maria Wendel (born 1739) at the Dutch Reformed Church in colonial Albany, New York.
By his own account, in about 1761 Bernard Romans entered into the King's service as a commodore, "sometimes at the head of a large body of men in the woods, and at the worst of times ... master of a merchantman, fitted out in a warlike manner."
He sailed widely, both as a privateer during the war and as a merchant, reaching points as far north as Labrador, and as far south as Curaçao, Cartagena, and Panama.
He also accepted private commissions to survey land grants in East Florida, which had come under British control at the end of the French and Indian War.
Upon reaching Pensacola, Romans was hired to survey the western part of West Florida and the lands of the Choctaws and Chickasaws.
He wanted to publish his nautical charts and navigational instructions, along with material on the natural history of the Floridas that he had gathered in his surveys.
Romans was now planning an ambitious book of some 300 pages with copper plate engravings and two large maps of the Floridas and the Caribbean.
During this time, Romans proposed to William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies and President of the Board of Trade and Foreign Plantations, an expedition to the northeastern parts of Asia.
Romans gave more details of his scheme to Hugh Williamson, a fellow member of the American Philosophical Society.
To Williamson, Romans expounded his plan for an expedition to explore the Mississippi River basin and the Great Lakes, then moving westward to the Pacific coast.
Romans also collaborated with Paul Revere on other projects, including the map that accompanied Rivington's printing of John Hawkesworth's book on the voyages of James Cook.
The first volume of A Concise Natural History of East and West Florida was finally ready for delivery in late April 1775.
In his book, Romans described tea as a despicable weed, and of late attempted to be made a dirty conduit, to lead a stream of oppressions into these happy regions.
In early April 1775, Romans was appointed a captain by the Connecticut Committee of Safety, with a charge to take Fort Ticonderoga and nearby British fortifications.
Romans also published a map of the area around Boston, The Seat of Civil War in America, and dedicated it to John Hancock.
In New York, James Rivington had proved to be too neutral in his coverage of the growing conflict between the colonies and Britain, and, in November 1775, a mob of patriots destroyed his print shop.
Later, in 1775, the Continental Congress recommended Romans to the New York Commissioners for Fortifications in the Highlands to oversee the construction of a fort at Martelaer's Rock, across the Hudson River from West Point.
Romans went to New York City and presented his plans to the Committee of Safety without mentioning the doubts expressed by the Commissioners.
In November 1776, the Pennsylvania Council of Safety appointed Romans Engineer and ordered that he be furnished with the means to conduct an experiment in "destroying distant objects by fire."
Romans also continued to produce maps, including two of Connecticut, one centered on Philadelphia, including most of New Jersey and Delaware, and portions of Maryland and Pennsylvania, showing the location of the Grand American Winter Camp 1778 at Valley Forge, and a map of the Northern Department of North America.
The ship on which Romans was traveling from New London, Connecticut, to Charleston, South Carolina, was captured by the Royal Navy.