The Battle of Turtle Gut Inlet was an important, early naval victory for the Continental Navy and the future "Father of the American Navy", Captain John Barry. It was the first privateer battle of the American Revolutionary War. The battle resulted in the first American casualty of the war in New Jersey, Lieutenant Richard Wickes, brother of Captain Lambert Wickes. It was the only Revolutionary War battle fought in Cape May County.

John Barry was an Irish-born American naval officer who served in the Continental Navy during the American Revolutionary War and in the United States Navy during the Quasi-War. He has been credited by some as "The Father of the American Navy", sharing that moniker with John Paul Jones and John Adams, and was appointed as a captain in the Continental Navy on December 7, 1775. Barry was the first captain placed in command of an American warship commissioned for service under the Continental flag. After the Revolutionary War, he became the first commissioned American naval officer, at the rank of commodore, receiving his commission from President George Washington in 1797.