After the Gaspee Attack, there were a number of significant legal events.  

After the attack and burning of the Gaspee, legal proclamations were issued by both Rhode Island and also King George V, seeking information about the identity of the raiders. The King proclaimed a  £1000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person who had committed the treasonable act of deliberately shooting an English navy officer in command of His Majesty's Ship.  This was a substantial reward.  The Gaspee itself cost only between 420 and 545 pounds.  A person getting the  £1000 reward could easily purchase a ship and pay for a crew to go on a voyage, and still have enough left over to buy a house!

The most impressive legal event was formation of the Royal Commission.   The Royal Commission was formed by the King's direct order to investigate and bring to English the "traitors".  There was an old statute of Henry VIII giving courts within England jurisdiction to try citizens accused of committing treason outside the country island of England.  This was the statute which the Crown intended to use to try the offenders who attacked the Gaspee.  It was the reaction of all the colonies to this attempt to take Americans to England for trial that began the consolidation of the sundry colonies into a union of states. Thomas Jefferson of Virginia proposed an important united reaction by all the colonies.

When Rhode Island learned the terms of the Royal Commission, they became concerned about the the probability of recourse to arms in defense of the colony.  Many expected English troops to be landing in Rhode Island to take the colony by force.

The most meaningful legal event to the English navy men was the Court Martial of Lt. Dudingston. Lieutenant William Dudingston was reluctant to testify in any civil inquiry.   He wanted no civil testimony recorded that could harm him in a later court martial.  His fear of testifying was not without basis. He wanted to only testify at his court-martial, where he was in danger of a penalty of death.  

His fear of testifying was not without basis. In those days an English sea captain who lost his ship for whatever reason was always the subject of a court-martial.  One of the court-martials of the navy probably in Dudingston's mind was the 1757 court-martial of Admiral Byng.  Sent on the relief of Minorca without what he claimed were sufficient forces, he finally gave up the attempt.  Found guilty of neglect of duty, he was taken to his ship and publicly and promptly executed (by shooting) on the quarterdeck of his own  ship in Portsmouth Harbor.   Following that event, probably few English captains felt it proper to give up a ship without the death of most of the crew.

Lt. Dudingston was the subject of three subsequent lawsuits in the colonial courts, alleging unlawful seizure of goods and ships.  He lost all three.

More detailed information on post-Gaspee events is maintained at biographical material on the persons in the longboats that attacked the Gaspee is stored at our Post-Gaspee Events section.