Manned by Continental Army soldiers, she was part of a fleet under the command of General Benedict Arnold that fought against the British Royal Navy in the Battle of Valcour Island on Lake Champlain.

In 1935, amateur military marine archaeologist Lorenzo Hagglund located her remains standing upright at the bottom of Lake Champlain.

Philadelphia and associated artifacts are now part of the permanent collection of the National Museum of American History, in Washington, D.C., where curator Philip K. Lundeberg was responsible for arranging her initial display.

The American Revolutionary War, which began in April 1775 with the Battles of Lexington and Concord, widened in September 1775 when the Continental Army embarked on an invasion of the British Province of Quebec.

The province was viewed by the Second Continental Congress as a potential avenue for British forces to attack and divide the rebellious colonies and was lightly defended.

[3] Carleton then launched his own offensive intended to reach the Hudson River, whose navigable length begins south of Lake Champlain and extends down to New York City.

[6] The two sides set about building fleets: the British at Saint-Jean and the Americans at the other end of the lake in Skenesborough (present-day Whitehall, New York).

The process eventually came to involve General Benedict Arnold, who was an experienced ship's captain, and David Waterbury, a Connecticut militia leader with maritime experience.

Major General Horatio Gates, in charge of the overall defense of the lake, eventually asked Arnold to take more responsibility in the shipbuilding effort because "I am intirely uninform'd as to Marine Affairs.

Late in August, General Arnold assembled his fleet and cruised provocatively on the northern stretches of Lake Champlain.

When the two forces clashed on 11 October, Philadelphia was under the command of Benjamin Rue,[14] and was part of the formation Arnold established in the Valcour strait.

Funding for a structure to house that find and Royal Savage fell through, and that boat's remains were eventually ruined through neglect and looting.