Sea History 185 - Winter 2023-2024 by National Maritime Historical Society & Sea History Magazine

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No. 185 | WINTER 2023–24

PETER RINDLISBACHER

14 2

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

WILL VAN DORP

DAVID RUMSEY MAP COLLECTION

CONTENTS

14 The Amphibious Raids on York and Fort George—Lake Ontario, 1813 by William S. Dudley, PhD, illustrated by Peter Rindlisbacher

22 Mobile and Havana

Sister Cities Across the Gulf by John S. Sledge

32 Historic Ships on a Lee Shore Tug Green Bay, a.k.a Grouper— an Ignominious End by Will Van Dorp

38 Never Too Late—

A Case of Mistaken Identity and the Purple Heart Project by Charles Meyer

44 Tugboats to Remember by Austin Dwyer

AUSTIN DWYER

NHHC, USN

DEPARTMENTS 4 Deck Log 6 Letters 10 NMHS Cause in Motion 12 Fiddler’s Green 30 Curator’s Corner 54 Sea History for Kids 60 Marlinspike News 63 Ship Notes, Seaport & Museum News 71 Reviews Cover: Tug Stockwell on the Thames in the Pool of London by Austin Dwyer (see article on pp. 44–52) SeaHistory.org

DECK LOG

Welcome Marlinspike Readers!

t is exciting to be celebrating the 60th anniversary of the National Maritime Historical Society this year. As we make plans to build on our successes with new initiatives and educational programs, we are also pleased to partner with like-minded groups and expand our reach, sharing the stories of our seafaring heritage with a broader audience. When container ships were stuck in port during the first months of the COVID pandemic, everyday Americans suddenly became aware of the role that shipping plays in keeping the gears of a global society turning. While regular readers of Sea History and those in the maritime industry have known this all along, countless others became painfully aware of how much of their lives depends on shipping and maritime support industries. Even kids learned the term “supply chain,” when they and their families suddenly couldn’t get the everyday items they had always taken for granted. We were so used to saying that the maritime industry is invisible—because it was—but here came an opportunity to make non-seafarers aware of this world outside their purview. It also is an opportunity to attract young people to maritime careers, which industry experts have told us are approaching crisis levels in the manning of ships with qualified and trained personnel. In the pages of Sea History, we have long been highlighting a wide range of maritimerelated careers in the Sea History for Kids section with the goal of exposing young people to the opportunities that await them after graduation. Through its flagship publication, Sea History, the National Maritime Historical Society covers maritime topics from ancient dugouts and Viking longships to the heyday of the Age of Sail, from the transition of sail to steam to diesel to modern technology powering ships with electric, solar, and nuclear power—and even a return to wind power. Like so many of our readers, we will always have a particular affection for sailing ships, and we value the traditions and skills that go into building and operating tall ships. We have been pleased to recognize the work of

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

educational programs that include sea voyages on sailing ships, such as the Sea Education Association and the Williams-Mystic Program. We were honored to partner with Tall Ships America to create content in Sea History relevant to the sailing ship community, collaborate in developing educational programs aboard ships and during tall ship events, and in organizing the 10th Maritime Heritage Conference in 2018. A valued resource in this community has been the quarterly magazine Marlinspike, dedicated to exploring topics and conversations related to traditional sailing vessels, sailors, and sail training. This fall, its publisher and editor Michael Rutstein ceased publishing Marlinspike after 10 years and 40 issues and asked if we would enroll his subscribers as members of the National Maritime Historical Society and finish out their subscriptions with Sea History. With this issue, we welcome them aboard. During this transition, we offered Captain Rutstein space in Sea History to report on news and topics specific to Marlinspike’s focus. Starting with this issue, you will find a new feature, “Marlinspike News: Sailing Ships & Sail Training,” produced by Michael Rutstein. (See pages 60–62). Marlinspike readers: we welcome you as new members and look forward to your feedback and participation in all that the National Maritime Historical Society has to offer. And when your Marlinspike subscription runs out, we hope you will renew your membership in NMHS and continue to get Sea History delivered to your mailbox for years to come. Please pay attention to our 60th anniversary membership campaign: you can get a new membership for only $10 and gift five more memberships to your friends and colleagues for no extra cost. Yes, that’s $10 total for all six memberships. But this offer is only good through 2023, so don’t put it off—the last day of this offer is 31 December 2023. Please visit our website www.seahistory.org for more information and to join. —Burchenal Green, NMHS President Emeritus

NATIONAL MARITIME HISTORICAL SOCIETY PETER ARON PUBLISHER’S CIRCLE: Guy E. C. Maitland, Ronald L. Oswald, William H. White OFFICERS & TRUSTEES: Chairman, James A. Noone; Vice Chairman, Richardo R. Lopes; Vice Presidents: Deirdre E. O’Regan, Wendy Paggiotta; Treasurer, William H. White; Secretary, Capt. Jeffrey McAllister; Trustees: Charles B. Anderson; Walter R. Brown; CAPT Patrick Burns, USN (Ret.); CAPT Sally McElwreath Callo, USN (Ret.); William S. Dudley; David Fowler; Karen Helmerson; VADM Al Konetzni, USN (Ret.); K. Denise Rucker Krepp; Guy E. C. Maitland; Salvatore Mercogliano; Michael Morrow; Richard P. O’Leary; Ronald L. Oswald; Timothy J. Runyan; Richard Scarano; Jean Wort

60th Anniversary Membership Drive For 60 years, the National Maritime Historical Society has been working to preserve and promote our maritime heritage, with Sea History magazine now on its 185th issue! Join us to enjoy Sea History for yourself and to strengthen the membership base of the Society. Right now there is no easier nor cheaper way to do that. Our 60th Anniversary Campaign includes this incredible but limited-time offer to join NMHS and share it with the people in your life who might like to learn what we are all about.

6 Memberships for $10! * Get your membership online at www.seahistory.org/anniversary. Thank you! *Offer only applies to US residents. Sea History e-mail: NMHS e-mail: Website: Phone:

seahistory@gmail.com nmhs@seahistory.org www.seahistory.org 914 737-7878

Sea History is sent to all members of the National Maritime Historical Society. MEMBERSHIP IS WELCOME: Afterguard $10,000; Benefactor $5,000; Plankowner $2,500; Sponsor $1,000; Donor $500; Patron $250; Friend $100; Regular $45. Members outside the US, please add $20 for postage. Individual copies cost $5.99.

CHAIR MEN EMERITI: Walter R. Brown, Alan G. Choate, Guy E. C. Maitland, Ronald L. Oswald; Howard Slotnick (1930–2020) FOUNDER: Karl Kortum (1917–1996) PRESIDENT EMERITUS: Burchenal Green, Peter Stanford (1927–2016) OVERSEERS: Chairman, RADM David C. Brown, USMS (Ret.); RADM Joseph Callo, USN (Ret.); Christopher Culver; Richard du Moulin; Gary Jobson; Sir Robin Knox-Johnston; John Lehman; Capt. James J. McNamara; Philip J. Shapiro; H. C. Bowen Smith; Philip J. Webster; Roberta Weisbrod NMHS ADVISORS: John Ewald, Steven Hyman, J. Russell Jinishian, Gunnar Lundeberg, Conrad Milster, William Muller, Nancy Richardson SEA HISTORY EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD: Chairman, Timothy Runyan; Norman Brouwer, Robert Browning, William Dudley, Lisa Egeli, Daniel Finamore, Kevin Foster, Cathy Green, John O. Jensen, Frederick Leiner, Joseph Meany, Salvatore Mercogliano, Carla Rahn Phillips, Walter Rybka, Quentin Snediker, William H. White NMHS STAFF: Executive Director, Burchenal Green; Vice President of Operations, Wendy Paggiotta; Senior Staff Writer, Shelley Reid; Business Manager, Andrea Ryan; Manager of Educational Programs, Heather Purvis; Membership Coordinator, Marianne Pagliaro SEA HISTORY: Editor, Deirdre E. O’Regan; Advertising Director, Wendy Paggiotta Sea History is printed by The Lane Press, South Burlington, Vermont, USA.

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LETTERS

We Welcome Your Feedback! Email correspondence to seahistory@gmail.com.

1938 Hurricane

Thank you for the article about the 1938 hurricane (Sea History 184, Autumn 2023), a section of which includes an account of the US Coast Guard rescue of a man from a dredge that was foundering in eastern Lake Ontario. The boatswain’s instruction to his crew, just before heading out, “Get in the boat— we have a job to do,” is a fine, compelling message for the role and importance of camaraderie, courage, and duty. I read that the boatswain unfortunately lost his life in a later rescue attempt during a storm in 1942. Steven Frattare Rochester, New York

who had been stranded for three days because of severe weather and who was running low on provisions. After successfully getting relief keepers Bert Egelston and Carl Sprague to the lighthouse and getting the stranded keeper, Boatswain’s Mate First Class Karl Jackson, onboard, Wilson and the others headed back to shore when their engine failed. Despite their efforts to restart the engine and then to set an anchor, the boat crashed onto the rocks and capsized. Six of the ten aboard the Pickett boat died, including Alston Wilson. Last year on the 80th anniversary of the tragedy, the H. Lee White Maritime

Museum in Oswego organized a ceremony to commemorate the lives the six men who perished. The museum also named its lighthouse tour boat the Honored Six Lighthouse Tender in their honor. I enjoyed Bill Thiesen’s article on the New England Hurricane of 1938. It reminded me of the effects of that same hurricane, called “the Long Island Express,” where I grew up on eastern Long Island. My family was then renting a house in Quiogue near Quantuck Bay, a small sister of the larger bays on each

Westhampton, New York, after the 1938 hurricane.

From the Editor: That famous quote

was uttered by the officer-in-charge of the Galloo Island Station (Oswego, New York), Warrant Boatswain Alston Wilson. It was not the first and certainly not the last of many rescues Wilson led on Lake Ontario. Four years later during another storm on 4 December 1942, Lt.j.g. Wilson, as commanding officer of the Oswego Lifeboat Station, took a 38-foot Pickett boat with a crew from the station to relieve the keeper of the West Pierhead Lighthouse, ★ J. P. URANKER WOODCARVER ★ THE TRADITION OF HANDCARVED EAGLES CONTINUES TODAY

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side, Moriches on the west and Shinnecock to the east. Two days before the Category Five hurricane struck Westhampton Beach, the hurricane’s first landfall, my parents took me (aged two) to the Brooklyn Hospital for surgery, so we missed the hurricane’s direct hit. But on 21 September, our neighbors were in the thick of it. The first thing they reported is that there was no advance warning along the coast, although some intuitive residents sensed trouble in the air—such as a rain that was like a fine mist, increasing gusty winds, and seagulls settling in the fields. Other folks did not notice and went on with their normal routines. That afternoon, high surf, force gusts, and ocean surge arrived simultaneously. As the evening wore on, alarm spread when residents of beach houses saw the surf and tide rising and realized they had to flee, but in some places, the ocean had already begun to break through the barrier beach. The Dune Road, the only way on and off the beach, was flooding, and people had trouble getting their cars to the bridges over to the mainland. In one beach home, a children’s birthday party was still underway, but parents could not get there to pick up their kids, and that remained the case until the next morning. The hosts led the frightened children to the thirdfloor attic as the water rose in the house over the second floor. The kids’ parents became panic-stricken, but this incident had a happy ending. After a night of fear, as the house shook and the water creeped higher, they were all rescued, and the children survived to tell their tale. Some beach homes were knocked off their foundations and pushed into the bays, while other houses collapsed under the pounding surf. On the mainland side, waterfront houses were also flooded; powerboats and sailboats broke from their moorings. Several floated a full mile inland,

Save the Date! The National Maritime Awards Dinner 2024 The National Maritime Awards Dinner will be held on Thursday, 18 April 2024, at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. Dinner co-chairs Sam Byers and Kristen Greenaway invite you to join us for the festivities. Internationally recognized naval historian and War of 1812 expert Dr. William S. Dudley will receive the NMHS David A. O’Neil Sheet Anchor Award, and Dawn Riley, America’s Cup Hall of Famer and pioneer in the sport of sailboat racing, will receive the NMHS Distinguished Service Award. America’s Cup champion and America’s Ambassador of Sailing, Gary Jobson, will serve as MC. Check www.seahistory.org for details and updated information. See you there!

and one cabin-cruiser ended up on the local golf course. The storm destroyed four local beach clubs and three yacht clubs; their fractured remains wound up as flotsam on the bays or drifted onto the wetlands. Local townsfolk became heroes, rescuing elderly men and women from their bayside homes with rowboats and bringing them to higher ground. In the aftermath of the storm, some beach homes were looted, so the local police set up barricades at the bridges that were still operable to scrutinize drivers’ credentials as owners arrived from New York and New Jersey to check on the damage to their homes. The Westhampton area suffered the destruction of 179 houses, 29 people drowned, and the sea pushed seven new inlets through to the bays. The main street and its businesses were submerged under six feet of water and the ground floor of the elementary school at Six Corners intersection flooded to five feet. SeaHistory.org

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The local Coast Guard Life Saving Stations near Moriches Inlet, Westhampton (Potunk), and Quogue, Shinnecock Inlet all suffered flooding and damage, and at Tiana Point (Hampton Bays) only the historic brick and concrete Shinnecock Lighthouse (1858) survived. Many Long Island southshore communities suffered similar damage, of course, as did those along the New England coast. Eighty-five years later, we are now much better informed by the National Weather Service, US Coast Guard, and national radio, TV, and online coverage. Still, developers and wealthier individuals will take the risk of building houses on waterfront properties and beaches, thinking they are trouble-free, but that is not usually the case. In an era of worsening climatic conditions, these disasters will continue. William S. Dudley Easton, Maryland

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Liberty Ships Nuances and Fate

I read with interest Mr. Neal M. Doherty’s letter regarding the misidentification of the photograph of the launch of Liberty Ship SS Zebulon B. Vance (Sea History 184, page 6). Mr. Doherty (whom I would like to thank for his Coast Guard service) is absolutely correct that Zebulon B. Vance was, Low-tack adhesive leaves no residue behind. A great addition to your home or office decor. like most Liberty ships, destined for civilian Merchant Marine service, but is incorrect in stating that “Liberty ships • • 888-839-5551 sales@maptech.com www.maptech.com were not combatants or US Navy vessels.” In fact, a large number of Liberty OWNER’S STATEMENT: Statement filed 9/20/23 required by the Act of Aug. 12, 1970, Sec. 3685, Title 39, US ships were built for the US Navy (and Code: Sea History is published quarterly at 1000 N. Division Street Suite 4, Peekskill NY 10566; minimum subscription price is $27.50. Publisher and editor-in-chief: None; Editor is Deirdre E. O’Regan; owner is National Maritime Sea_History_Magazine_Jan_2023.indd 1 1/5/2023 10:39:43 AM the Army and, in at least one case, the Historical Society, a non-profit corporation; all are located at 1000 N. Division Street, Suite 4, Peekskill NY 10566. During the 12 months preceding October 2023 the average number of (A) copies printed each issue was 12,095; (B) Coast Guard). In his book The Ships paid and/or requested circulation was: (1) outside county mail subscriptions 5,156; (2) in-county subscriptions 0; (3) and Aircraft of the United States Fleet, sales through dealers, carriers, counter sales, other non-USPS paid distribution 3,367; (4) other classes mailed through USPS 1,744; (C) total paid and/or requested circulation was 10,267; (D) free distribution by mail, samples, compliVictory Edition (New York: Ships and mentary and other 909; (E) free distribution outside the mails 463; (F) total free distribution was 1,372; (G) total distribution 11,639; (H) copies not distributed 456; (I) total [of 15G and H] 12,095; (J) Percentage paid and/or reAircraft, 1945, reprinted by the Naval quested circulation 88%. The actual numbers for the single issue preceding October 2023 are: (A) total number printed 9,431; (B) paid and/or requested circulation was: (1) outside-county mail subscriptions 4,943; (2) in-county Institute Press 1973), James C. Fahey, subscriptions 0; (3) sales through dealers, carriers, counter sales, other non-USPS paid distribution 3,379; (4) other identifies by my (possibly erroneous) classes mailed through USPS 199; (C) total paid and/or requested circulation was 8,521; (D) free distribution by mail, samples, complimentary and other 50; (E) free distribution outside the mails 540; (F) total free distribution was 590; count 134 Liberty ships built for the (G) total distribution 9,111; (H) copies not distributed 320; (I) total [of 15G and H] 9,431 (J) Percentage paid and/or requested circulation 94%. I certify that the above statements are correct and complete. (signed) Burchenal Green, US Navy as cargo, stores, repair, water Executive Director, National Maritime Historical Society. distillation, and unclassified ships, all 8

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

of which would have carried the designation “USS.” Thank you for providing a rich and wonderful diet of articles on maritime history and the opportunity for Mr. Doherty and me to enter the conversation. Donald W. Boose Jr. COL, US Army, (Ret.) Carlisle, Pennsylvania

Although Captain Doherty is correct that the Liberty ships were not launched as “USS” designating them as naval ships, several were taken over by the Navy shortly after delivery and converted to various fleet auxiliary roles according to Fahey’s The Ships and Aircraft of the United States Fleet. These include sixty as Cargo Ships (AK), ten Miscellaneous Auxiliaries (AG), eleven General Stores-Issue Ships (AKS), four Net Cargo Ships (AKN), three as Repair Ships (AR), a dozen serving as Repair Ships—Internal Combustion Engines (ARG), and two as Aircraft Repair Ships (ARV). Although most have these were decommissioned at the end of World War II, according to the sixth, seventh and eighth editions of Fahey’s book, several continued in service at least as late as 1965. In addition, there were post-war conversions, particularly of the Boxed Aircraft Transport version, which were converted as Radar Picket Ships (AGR-1 through AGR-16) in the mid to late 1950s. There is an exhibit of these aboard USS Massachusetts at the Battleship Cove museum in Fall River, Massachusetts. Sean P. Walsh, LCDR, USN (Ret.) Arlington, Virginia

Sea History / NMHS Membership Offer: 6 memberships for just $10! Offer ends 31 December 2023. Great gift for 5 or 6 of your friends and family who are impossible to shop for!

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Sail Aboard the Liberty Ship

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SeaHistory.org

NMHS CAUSE IN MOTION

ou could hardly turn around without bumping into a great conversation and running into old friends and new who are active members of our maritime heritage community. For that reason alone, the evening was exciting. Dinner chairs Pam Rorke Levy and Matt Brooks set the tone with their warm and gracious welcome, and they were followed by a line-up of engaging presenters and awardees. NMHS trustee Richard Scarano was this year’s recipient of the David A. O’Neil Sheet Anchor Award. We learned about Rick’s life around boats, from messing with them as a kid to building a successful shipbuilding business with his brother and establishing the tour boat company Classic Harbor Line. Rick’s involvement in NMHS and the historic ship preservation community at large has been meaningful to many individuals and organizations. In his remarks, Rick said, “It’s been a real privilege and great fun to be part of the National Maritime Historical Society for the last 17 years or so; it’s allowed me to meet a wonderful bunch of people who share not just a common interest, but perhaps a common philosophy as well.” In presenting the NMHS How proud Olin Stephens, our 2006 Distinguished Service Award recipient and designDistinguished Service Award er of both Dorade and Bolero, would have to Edward W. Kane, Pam been to see Pam Rorke Levy and Matt Brooks Rorke Levy thanked him for (right) presenting Ed Kane with this award. the inspiration he had been to her and her husband, Matt Brooks, when they were restoring the Olin Stephensdesigned classic yacht Dorade. Ed Kane enchanted our guests with stories surrounding his decision to buy Bolero—another Olin Stephens boat—and the process of restoring her and returning her to sea. Kane extolled the merits of NMHS and gave a shout-out to Sea History: “I’ve been reading the magazine for decades and I just think it does a superb job of talking about all aspects of maritime activities, obviously from a historical point of view.” (above left) Rik van Hemmen spoke of his long history with the boating and shipbuilding Scarano family, when he presented Rick Scarano with the NMHS David A. O’Neil Sheet Anchor Award. (left) NMHS trustees—Vice Chair Richardo Lopes and Chair Jim Noone at left, and Treasurer William H. White to the right—join Mark Barker, Richard du Moulin and James Barker in celebration of their awards.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

PHOTOS BY ALLISON LUCAS

The National Maritime Historical Society 60th Anniversary Awards Gala

Jim Barker (on the podium) shared how our master of ceremonies, Richard du Moulin (standing, at left), did not get a bonus for his first summer job—which was with Jim Barker at Interlake—to the amusement of son Mark and our guests.

When the awards committee nominated James and Mark Barker, father-and-son owners and operators of Interlake Steamship Company, for the NMHS Distinguished Service Award, Richard du Moulin, who has served as our esteemed master of ceremonies for 25 years, remarked that it was James Barker who had given him his first job in shipping. Du Moulin praised the Barkers as effective and forward-thinking business owners who care deeply about the Great Lakes, the shipping industry, and their employees and clients. “The American maritime industry is the invisible grease that keeps our economy moving,” Jim Barker shared in his remarks. In 2022 Interlake Steamship Co. launched the first new ship built on the Great Lakes in 35 years—the 639-foot Mark W. Barker. “We are proud to be US owned, and proud to be a Jones Act company,” Mark Barker said. This dinner would not have been possible without the sponsorship of Matt Brooks and Pam Rorke Levy, Caddell Dry Dock and Repair Company, Inc., Interlake Steamship Company, Moran Towing Company, and NMHS trustee William H. White. We are particularly grateful to Bill White for spearheading our 60th Anniversary Campaign, which enables us to develop our programs and continue the work we do keeping maritime heritage alive. The gala was so much more than what can be conveyed in writing, but our hope is that this brief introduction will entice you to join us for next year’s gala on 24 October 2024. —Burchenal Green, NMHS President Emeritus Cathy Green (left), executive director of the Wisconsin Maritime Museum, came to support and honor our award recipients representing the Great Lakes. Here, she joins Sea History editor Deirdre O’Regan for the festivities.

SeaHistory.org

FIDDLER’S GREEN William “Bill” Pinkney (1935–2023)

PHOTO BY JONATHAN ATKIN, SHIPSHOOTER.COM

he maritime world lost a champion and a pioneer with the death of former NMHS trustee Bill Pinkney in August. For many Americans—especially for thousands of American schoolchildren—Pinkney provided an introduction not only to sailing, but to the tools needed to succeed in every aspect of life.

Bill Pinkney achieved fame as a man who sailed alone around the world while documenting his voyage and his struggles to conquer the external trials of weather and equipment failures and the internal ones of fear, uncertainty, loneliness, and exhaustion. He emphasized to the children who followed his voyage in their classrooms and communicated with him via ship-to-shore radio that it was education that made his trip possible. Not a day went by, he told his audience, that he didn’t need or use what he had learned in school to solve the problems he confronted at sea. In radio calls and video messages, he told them about the kinds of problems in math, geography, science, and history that he was using to get to the next landfall and to understand the people he met when he got there. Although he dedicated his life to sailing and education, it was the example Pinkney set that demonstrated the truth of his words. He grew up in Chicago, raised by a single mother who worked as a maid. Although he originally aspired to be an artist, his mother advised him that the only people who made money in that trade were “dead white men.” Disqualified on both counts, Pinkney 12

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

joined the Navy after high school, where recruiters tried to steer him into being a steward’s mate. That was a career that would keep him with “his own kind.” Pinkney insisted, instead, on becoming a medical corpsman. It was in the Navy that Pinkney fell in love with the sea and sailing. It was a love he nurtured through an eventful career as a film industry makeup artist and, subsequently, as a cosmetics industry executive who specialized in developing products for African-American women. While advancing in his career, Pinkney never strayed far from the water. It wasn’t until his early fifties, however, that his love of boats and helping young people acquire that same passion became his life’s mission, when he decided to sail around the world— alone. It took a few years to generate the support he needed to finance his voyage, and in August 1990 he set sail from Boston in his boat, Commitment, bound for the Southern Ocean and a course that would take him around the world. The voyage took nearly two years to complete, but when Bill Pinkney arrived back in Boston in June 1992, he was met by thousands of schoolchildren who had followed every leg of his arduous circumnavigation—learning math, science, and history and the power of commitment to one’s goals. Although he often told his audiences that the sea cared nothing for your skin color, the fact that he was the first Black person to single-handedly sail around the world gave him a platform to spread his message of education and fortitude—a message that he spread as a public speaker and mentor for the rest of his life. As the first captain of the Amistad, a replica commemorating the ship remembered for a slave revolt and subsequent trial challenging slavery in the courts, Pinkney brought all of the strands of his life’s work into one role—taking a group of American educators on a voyage to West Africa to develop a curriculum about the slave trade. Captain Pinkney accepted the NMHS Karl Kortum American Ship Trust Award for Amistad in 2001. We have lost a guide and a mentor, but his passing reminds us of the duty we all have to carry on his commitment to sailing, education, and history to the generations that he inspired. Fair winds, Captain Pinkney. —Richard P. O’Regan

COURTESY MIGDALIA PINKNEY

Bill Pinkney—all smiles upon his triumphant return from his solo world voyage, 1992.

Joan K. Davidson (1927–2023)

PHOTO BY FILIP WOLAK, COURTESY OF SOUTH STREET SEAPORT MUSEUM

ivic and cultural circles in New York are mourning the loss of a great citizen. Joan K. Davidson’s personal leadership and family foundation helped save Carnegie Hall, Grand Central Station, and Broadway theatres. The J. M. Kaplan Fund, over which she presided from 1977 to 1993, pioneered artists’ housing, brought Shakespeare to the park, and successfully pushed the city to provide public toilets. Joan had sea legs as well. I first met her when we were young volunteers at what would become South Street Seaport Museum. Joan had been a grammar school classmate of Peter Stanford’s, and they became reacquainted as Peter and Norma Stanford’s vision for the neglected Manhattan waterfront began to get public attention. The forces arrayed against saving the seaport were enormous. Joan persuaded her father, Jack Kaplan, to fund the building of a large model of what the old market buildings could look like, once restored with lively commerce on a street lined with ships. It had an electrifying effect on the general public, elected officials, and journalists. Joan had a life-long love affair with the Hudson. Working with groups like Pete Seeger’s Clearwater, NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), Scenic Hudson, and the Hudson River Foundation, she was often at the center of efforts to clean up the river, preserve its scenic banks, and rescue threatened species of fish. New York Governor Eliot Spitzer asked Joan to take over the celebration of the Hudson-Fulton Quadricentennial. It was late in the game and there was no budget. It looked like the 400th anniversary might be a bust, but Joan partnered with the Dutch government and enlisted partners up and down the Hudson Valley to celebrate a vision of a restored river with revitalized towns and farms and a growing arts community. It was a turnaround moment. A few years ago, Joan was honored as a “Hero of the Harbor” by the Waterfront Alliance. The event at Chelsea Piers in lower Manhattan was spectacular, beginning with a parade of ships. Joan reviewed the passing ships from the deck of the John J. Harvey, the retired old fireboat that had won the hearts of New Yorkers on 9/11 by pumping more water on the burning fires than all the modern fireboats. As the parade concluded, the boat headed for the dock—but something was wrong. The space set aside for the Harvey to land was too narrow, and it became apparent that the honoree would have to jump over two feet of open water to get to shore. There was an audible gasp from the waiting crowd as Joan climbed up on the gunnel and leapt. She landed okay, brushed herself off, and with a big smile stepped straight ahead to thunderous applause as the band played.” It’s a good way to remember her. (L–R) Joan Davidson, NMHS President Emeritus Burchenal Green, and Norma Stanford celebrating the Wavertree’s return to South Street — Kent Barwick Seaport Museum after the ship’s restoration at Caddell Dry Dock in 2016.

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COURTESY J M KAPLAN FUND

The Amphibious Raids on York and Fort George—Lake Ontario, 1813

by William S. Dudley, PhD, illustrated by Peter Rindlisbacher

he United States declared war on Great Britain in June 1812, during which time Britain’s army and navy were engaged in a war against Napoleonic France and its allies. At the outset, the US Army attempted a threepronged invasion of Canada: in Upper Ontario at Detroit, via the Niagara Peninsula, and in Lower Ontario south of Montreal. Each of these invasions was blocked and repelled by British forces. From a lack of foresight, no substantial American naval elements existed to assist the military on the Great Lakes during this first campaign season of the war. On the Atlantic, the story was far different. A small but effective US Navy not only existed but showed its competence in a series of frigate

victories, from August into the early months of 1813. The new year would bring novel developments in the war on the northern lakes. The first American inland naval operations of 1813 took place at the western end of Lake Ontario. Commodore Isaac Chauncey and his military counterpart, General Henry Dearborn, agreed to lead amphibious expeditions against British military fortifications at York and Fort George. The only previous example, which had occurred 37 years prior, was the Continental Navy’s expedition to New Providence in the Bahamas in March 1776. In that operation, 200 Continental Marines landed without opposition and removed as much gunpowder and ammunition

as their squadron could carry and sailed back to New London.1 While appearing similar, this was not a fair model for the 1813 expeditions, as it was of a distant time and in a completely different context. In early 1813, President Madison’s cabinet discussed its plans for the coming campaign season. Secretary of War John Armstrong and Secretary of State James Monroe argued for the attacks on Kingston to destroy its naval base.2 After cutting communications with Quebec and Montreal, the Americans would attack York, Fort George, Fort Erie, Fort Malden, and then Kingston. This optimistic strategy envisioned that all of Upper Canada would fall, virtually ending the war; however, for such

Kingston

THE LILLY LIBRARY WAR OF 1812 MAP COLLECTION, INDIANA UNIVERSITY

Sackets Harbor

York

Fort George

The Great Lakes were hotly contested at the outset of the War of 1812. Action on Lake Ontario, from one end to the other, required collaboration and cooperation between the Army and the Navy. Base map by Samuel Lewis, 1812.

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NAVAL HISTORY AND HERITAGE COMMAND, USN, PAINTING BY GILBERT STUART (1775–1828). PAINTED CIRCA 1818.

a strategy to succeed, the military needed to have a strong logistical base; competent, younger general officers; and trained, experienced troops. The United States did not yet possess all these resources. During a meeting in March 1813, Major General Dearborn and Commodore Chauncey recommended exchanging secondary objectives of York and Fort George for Kingston. The secretary of war and the cabinet had no objections. It was obvious that these would be amphibious operations, in which these commanders had no practical experience. During the War of 1812, military and naval cooperation was crucial to successful operations around the Great Lakes, and the new secretary of the navy, William Jones, framed his squadrons’ orders within that context. On Lake Ontario, he was to cooperate with the ground forces when called upon, but the timing, nature, and extent of cooperation were to be Commodore Chauncey’s decisions. Jones allowed Chauncey broad discretion in executing his instructions. When operating with the Army, the Navy must facilitate its movements, protect its communications, and give battle when the British squadron threatened. When not directly engaged in supporting the Army, Chauncey should use his force to engage the enemy’s ships or to blockade the opposing squadron in port so that it could neither hamper US Army operations nor support those of the British Army.3 That Chauncey’s squadron was in readiness at Sackets Harbor in April gave him the initiative over his adversary, Canada’s Provincial Marine, which was under British Army control. Within two months, Royal Navy components under Commodore James Yeo’s orders would arrive and soon become the equal of Chauncey’s. American preparations for amphibious military operations began

Commodore Isaac Chauncey, US Navy

well in advance. In early April, Lieutenant Van de Vinter, the US Army’s deputy quartermaster general in the north, reported to Secretary Armstrong that he had purchased more than 100 vessels at Sackets Harbor and Oswego, which he estimated could carry 8,050 men and supplies. When added to the troop-carrying capacity of Chauncey’s squadron—estimated at 2,000—the total number of troops could reach 10,000.4 It was understood that command of the operation would be shared: Commodore Chauncey would be in charge while the troops were aboard his vessels; General Dearborn

would assume command of the troops after they were put ashore. Chauncey wrote frequently to his military colleagues to apprise them of his preparations and assure them of his eagerness to cooperate. On 10 April he informed General Dearborn that he was pleased to have Brigadier General Zebulon Pike in the expedition and that all would be ready by the time the ice thawed. On the same day, he wrote to General Morgan Lewis at Niagara that he hoped soon to be able “to act together against the common enemy” and advised him “to be prepared with all the force he can collect and with all the SeaHistory.org

ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO, PAINTING BY GILBERT STUART (1775–1828). BY PETER RINDLISBACHER

General Henry Dearborn, US Army

boats at Buffalo, Black Rock, and Niagara.” He also wanted Lewis to spread disinformation about an intended attack, “keeping the enemy ignorant of our real object.” As the time for embarkation approached, Chauncey ordered the commanding officers of his thirteen vessels to be ready to receive the troops on board, adding: “Sirs, the success of this enterprise will very much depend upon a good understanding between the Naval and Military officers. You will use your best exertions to cultivate harmony and frown upon the first symptoms of a contrary disposition.” He issued detailed squadron sailing and signal instructions on 23 April.5 The squadron made a false start in threatening weather at Dearborn’s insistence and against Chauncey’s better judgment. By the time they made it out of the harbor, a southeasterly gale was churning up the lake, and Chauncey insisted on returning to the harbor. Had they not turned back, the squadron likely would have suffered more damage than it did and potentially loss of life. As it was, 600 soldiers crowded on board the Madison were already starting off the operation cold and wet. Anxious to get on with the plan lest the men become ill, on 25 April, Chauncey’s squadron set sail with the schooner Julia, with 5 guns, leading the line, followed by the flagship, sloop of war Madison, 24; brig Oneida, 18; and schooner Growler, 2, with each of the other schooners carrying at least one or two 32 pounders or 24s and towing one or more army bateaux filled with troops and supplies.6 Chauncey’s general order of 26 April shows he had worked out an orderly disembarkation plan with his army counterparts.7 The landing at York began at 8:00 am on 27 April. The wind disrupted the precise landing plans of the leading Chauncey’s fleet getting underway from Sackets Harbor, 25 April 1813.

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BY PETER RINDLISBACHER

The American squadron approaching Fort York, on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario, 27 April 1813.

boats, whose troops ended up wading ashore a half mile to leeward of their assigned positions and beyond the protection of their naval covering batteries. The squadron’s ships adjusted their positions. As soon as they had the British shore batteries under fire, the first wave got underway, led by Major Benjamin Forsyth’s rifle regiment. The action was “sharp and severe for nearly half an hour—the enemy were repulsed by a far less number than their own.”8 They met with stiff opposition from a small, combined force of British regulars, militia, and First Nation warriors under the command of Major General Sir Roger Hale Sheaffe. As the American troops made it ashore, they soon outnumbered the defenders, who withdrew to the cover of their batteries. Chauncey’s squadron landed 1,800 infantry, led by US Brigadier General Zebulon

Pike. Sheaffe’s troops totaled only about 600, including companies of the Grenadiers of the King’s Regiment, the Glengarry Light Infantry Fencibles, the Newfoundland Fencibles, ship carpenters, and a few civilian volunteers. As the invaders approached the fortifications, a British mobile magazine exploded, killing and wounding dozens of defenders. Shortly thereafter, Sheaffe ordered a withdrawal and the demolition of the fort’s grand magazine, the burning of the ship-sloop Sir Isaac Brock—then on the stocks, and naval stores. The tremendous explosion did more damage to the invading army than the skirmishing: the US Army suffered 222 wounded and 38 killed, including General Pike, who was crushed by an enormous boulder thrown by the magazine explosion. The American forces captured and destroyed naval and

military supplies and burned storehouses, the town blockhouse, and the parliament building. They seized the 10-gun schooner Duke of Gloucester and sailed her to Sackets Harbor. The British forces at Amherstburg would sorely miss the captured supplies and ordnance that were intended for Fort Malden. During this action, the American squadron suffered eight sailors wounded and four killed.9 Though the re-embarkation of the troops went smoothly, adverse winds kept the vessels from departing. This caused Chauncey great concern because of fatigue and illness among the men. On 30 April, he ordered Lieutenant Joseph Smith in Asp to take on board the wounded and stores, and, with the schooner transport Gold-Hunter, deliver them to Sackets Harbor, along with the body of the fallen General SeaHistory.org

Pike.10 The fierce weather detained the rest of the flotilla, with the exception of the seaworthy schooner Lady of the Lake, which was able to get Dearborn and his staff across the lake to Fort Niagara. On 8 May, Chauncey got his squadron underway and crossed the lake to deliver the rest of the army in its sodden and exhausted state to Four Mile Creek, east of Fort Niagara. Recognizing that it would take two weeks for the troops to recuperate, Chauncey sailed back to Sackets Harbor to give his sailors some rest and to pick up a brigade under the command of Brigadier General John Chandler. On 22 May, the squadron sailed again, carrying these 600 additional soldiers, and landed them at the Four Mile Creek encampment, where they joined the 4,000 men who were preparing for the assault on Fort George. On 27 May, American naval and military forces accomplished a second successful landing at Fort George. Chauncey and Dearborn used the basic plan that had been put into effect at York again, but with more troops. To assist in the attack, Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry had sailed from Presque Isle to join the squadron at Niagara. Chauncey put Perry in charge of naval aspects of the troop landings, and in this capacity he worked out the details with Colonels Winfield Scott and Alexander Macomb. This involved loading 100 boats with troops, horses, artillery, and ammunition, and orchestrating the boats’ movements so that the navy’s squadron could provide gunfire support. The squadron’s guns battered Fort George and suppressed the enemy’s efforts to thwart the invasion before it could gain a foothold on the Canadian shore. 11 The Americans landed despite heavy musket and artillery fire and pressed on toward Fort George, which the British abandoned as they retreated 18

westward. Even from the British point of view, the American landing was an impressive show. As Brigadier General John Vincent wrote: the morning being exceedingly hazy, neither [the enemy’s] means nor his intention could be ascertained until the mist, clearing away at intervals, the enemy’s fleet, consisting of 14 or 15 vessels, was discovered underway, standing towards the lighthouse in an extended line of more than two miles, covering from 90 to 100 large boats and scows, each containing an average of 50 to 60 men…being on the spot and seeing the force under my command opposed by tenfold numbers, who were rapidly advancing under cover of their shipping and batteries, from which our positions were immediately seen and exposed to a tremendous fire of shot and shells, I decided on retiring my little force to a position I hoped would be less assailable. 12 The British retreated in good order toward Queenston under the command of General Vincent. From there, he sent orders to evacuate Fort Erie and fall back on a supply depot at Beaver Dams, 17 miles west of Fort George. Once these forces gathered, he marched them further back to Burlington Heights, near the present city of Hamilton. While Chauncey was endeavoring to assist the army, he received the alarming news that British forces under Commodore Yeo and Governor General Prevost had attacked the Sackets Harbor naval base. The attack was skillfully repulsed by elements of the US Army and New York State militia. Chauncey immediately returned to Sackets Harbor to repair the damage and reinforce the naval base. He would

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not sail again until September, when he was certain he had the strength to confront Yeo’s squadron.13 While the raids were not immediately followed up, they had long-term strategic effects. The evacuation of Fort Erie allowed the Americans to occupy

ron, and the destruction or removal of provisions, ordnance, and naval stores intended for Forts George and Malden deprived the British forces of the ship materials they needed for the upcoming summer campaign. These supplies could not be replaced easily in the extended

line of communications from Lower Canada to the British base at Amherstburg. The American amphibious raids ultimately weakened the British military and naval forces as they prepared for the summer campaign on and around Lake Erie.14

American troops landing at York, 27 April 1813.

BY PETER RINDLISBACHER

that important choke point at the head of the Niagara River. It enabled Perry to remove five naval vessels, whose sailing from Black Rock had been blocked by Fort Erie’s guns. At York, the burning of the Sir Isaac Brock, intended for the Royal Navy Lake Ontario Squad-

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The amphibious operations conducted on Lake Ontario at York and Fort George in 1813 provide the earliest examples of excellent advance planning and smooth inter-service amphibious operations of the US armed forces in modern times.15 William S. Dudley, PhD, retired as Director, Naval Historical Center (now Naval BY PETER RINDLISBACHER

History and Heritage Command) in 2004. He is the founding editor of Naval Documents of the War of 1812: A Docu-

Battle of Fort George, on the western bank of the Niagara River.

Commodore Isaac Chauncey proved to be a skilled administrator and pioneer amphibious commander. His two operations in 1813 demonstrated excellent use of intelligence, preparations for landing locations, the assembling and organizing of suitable landing craft, achieving numerical superiority at the beachheads, solid and close coordination of ship movements during the assault, initial softening of shore defenses by naval bombardment, and

naval close support for shore troops at climactic moments. His execution of amphibious landings at York and Fort George was achieved with a precision remarkable for its time. Chauncey was conspicuous in his concern for the army’s wounded and his cordial relations with army commanders, including Colonels Scott and Macomb, as well as General Dearborn. There were no comparable precedents for such operations in US military history up to that time.

mentary History, 4 vols. 1985–2023; the author of Maritime Maryland: A History; co-author, with Scott Harmon, The Naval War of 1812: America’s Second War of Independence (2013); and Inside the US Navy of 1812–1815 (2021). He serves on the Editorial Advisory Board for Sea History and is a trustee of the National Maritime Historical Society. Peter Rindlisbacher is a marine artist specializing in portraying moments in history. His research involves maps, logbooks, reports, technical studies, models, and computer graphics to compose key scenes to create his paintings.

Notes 1 Allan R. Millett, Semper Fidelis: The His-

5 Isaac Chauncey Letterbook, Vol. 2 (April–

tory of the United States Marine Corps (New York: Macmillan, Free Press, 1980), 10; Edwin H. Simmons, The United States Marines: A History (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1974), 3–5. 2 Secretary of War John Armstrong to Major General Henry Dearborn, 10 February 1813, American State Papers, Military Affairs 9 (hereafter ASPMA), 7 vols., (Washington, 1832), 439–40; Armstrong to Dearborn, 15 February 1813, War Department, Letters Sent, RG 107, pp. 293-94, NA; Dearborn to Armstrong, 18 Feb. 1813 ASPMA, I: 440. 3 Jones to Chauncey, 27 January 1813, Secretary of the Navy Letters Sent to Officers, Ships of War (hereafter SNL), 1813, RG 45, NA. 4 C. Van de Vinter to John Armstrong, 1 April 1813, Records of the Office of the Secretary of War, Unregistered Letters Received, RG 107, NA.

August 1813), William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (hereafter WLCL). 6 Robert Malcomson, Lords of the Lake: The Naval War on Lake Ontario, 1812–1814 (Annapolis, Md: Naval Institute Press, 1998), 104. 7 Ibid. 8 Dearborn to Armstrong, 28 April 1813 (Dudley and Crawford, eds. The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History, II, 450–451. 9 Chauncey to Jones, 28 April 1813, CL, Vol. 3, no.,63, RG 45, NA; Ernest Cruikshank, ed. The Documentary History of the Campaign upon the Niagara Frontier, 4 parts, (Welland, Ont., 1896–1908), hereafter, HCNF, 1813, I: 183. 10 Chauncey to Joseph Smith, 30 April 1813, Chauncey Letterbook, Vol. 2, WLCL. The fall of York, the capital of Upper Canada, has been well-described in Malcomson,

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

Capital in Flames: The American Attack on York, 1813 (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2008.) 11 Richard V. Barbuto, New York’s War of 1812: Politics, Society and Combat (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2021), 118–120; David C. Skaggs, Oliver Hazard Perry: Honor, Courage, and Patriotism in the Early US Navy (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006), 68–69. 12 E.A. Cruikshank, ed., The Documentary History of the Campaign upon the Niagara Peninsula, 1812–1814. 8 vols. (Welland, ON: Lundy’s Lane Historical Society, 1896–1908. 13 Patrick A. Wilder, The Battle of Sackett’s Harbor, 1813 (Baltimore, MD: The Nautical and Aviation Publishing Co. of America, 1994). 14 Robert Malcomson, Warships of the Great Lakes, 1754–1834(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2001), 74–76. 15 Barbuto, New York’s War of 1812, 117.

The National Maritime Historical Society presents

a limited-edition art print by marine artist PATRICK O’BRIEN

The USS Constitution vs HMS Guerriere An American Victory During the War of 1812 by Patrick O’Brien

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Mobile and Havana: Sister Cities Across the Gulf by John S. Sledge

Mobile and Havana: Sisters Across the Gulf is the first book to explore the many historic ties between these two exotic port cities. It is a project of the Mobile-La Habana Society, an organization founded in 1993 to promote the interchange of arts, culture, and educational activities between the two cities. The following excerpt focuses on the mid-19th century.

passengers. Among the latter was a 49-year-old woman whose securely tied bonnet partly obscured her long face and plain features. But Fredrika Bremer was no ordinary coastal passenger. She was a famous Swedish novelist and women’s rights champion, well into an American tour. Though her interests primarily concerned social causes, her active, wide-ranging mind devoured

STEEL ENGRAVING AFTER A 1872 ORIGINAL PAINTING BY ALONZO CHAPPEL, P.D.

he steamboat Florida pushed eastward across Lake Pontchartrain late on 7 January 1851, its sidewheels chopping the clear, placid water. A glorious winter sunset painted the western horizon red and gold, while rickety gray wharves, white cottages, and a darkening tree line lay ahead. The boat was making its regular New Orleans-toMobile run hauling mail, freight, and

everything in front of it. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote that she was “worthy of being the maiden aunt of the whole human race.” Bremer was on her way to Mobile to see yet another celebrity, Madame Octavia Walton LeVert. The 41-year-old LeVert was a prominent socialite and writer whose paternal grandfather was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. She was married to a Mobile doctor and presided over a cultivated salon in their Government Street home. She was also a slave owner, which was of particular interest to the abolitionminded Bremer. Madame LeVert greeted her guest at the city quay and ushered her into a waiting carriage. “I found her a short, handsome lady,” Bremer recalled. Unfortunately, LeVert was suffering the recent loss of two children and a brother, and so she displayed none of the “vivacity and grace” she was known for. Nevertheless, she was too well-mannered and conscientious to shirk her responsibilities to her guest, and she endeavored to cheerfully show off her city and its people. Antebellum Mobile was at the time the third busiest port in the nation, thanks to King Cotton. Roughly a third of its population of 20,000 comprised enslaved or free Black people. The city’s upper echelons consisted of cotton factors, commission merchants, bankers, insurers, lawyers, and doctors. It was a Novelist and champion of women’s rights Fredrika Bremer arrived in Mobile, Alabama, in 1851, where she found it to be a busy and charming city.

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MUTUALART.COM, P.D.

View of Mobile, Alabama, 1841. Painting by William J. Bennett (1787–1844)

agreed that the institution “is a curse” but nonetheless heavily depended upon Betsy, her personal servant. Bremer admired Octavia and Betsy’s mutual affection. Bremer invited her new friend to accompany her to Cuba, where she believed the tropical scenery would prove restorative to her depressed spirits. LeVert agreed and decided to bring Betsy, who spoke fluent Spanish. Both Mobile and New Orleans enjoyed regular steamship service to Havana at the time. The trio traveled to New Orleans

first, probably because the sailing schedule more closely conformed to Bremer’s needs. Unfortunately, LeVert felt compelled to cancel, leaving Bremer to journey south alone. After numerous vexing delays, Bremer finally departed New Orleans on 28 January aboard SS Philadelphia. She selected a cabin in the vessel’s stern, where she enjoyed “a little solitary threecornered cell” with a porthole. Bremer opened the porthole for some air and reveled in the experience of the open

Mobile

1848 MAP COURTESY DAVID RUMSEY MAP COLLECTION

place of business first and foremost, with all the attendant bustle. “With the exception of New Orleans and Havana,” one antebellum traveler opined, “there was no commercial mart on the Gulf of Mexico as thriving as Mobile.” The riverfront and bay were “crowded with vessels and ships of every possible description,” he continued, “while from their masts floated the flags of nearly every nation on earth.” Roustabouts unloaded steamboats arriving from Montgomery and piled the 400-pound cotton bales into teetering stacks. They subsequently stored the bales in brick warehouses, where other workers compressed them to a third of their original size. Steam tugs then lightered them down to the big sailing ships in the lower bay for transport to spinning mills in New England and Europe. In a letter to her younger sister, Bremer enthused about her time in Alabama’s busy seaport. To begin with, the temperature had turned mild, as it often does between cold fronts on the northern Gulf Coast, and her walks along sandy Government Street were pure delight. She marveled at the profusion of “beautiful villas surrounded by trees and garden plots” and gloried in the magnolia blossom-scented air and festoons of Spanish moss. One afternoon Madame LeVert took her down the Bay Shell Road, where the lapping waves charmed, and that evening they attended the theater. On a visit to the slave market “a few mulatto girls” asked Bremer to buy them. Despite slavery’s pall, Bremer enjoyed the city. “I like Mobile, and the people of Mobile, and the weather of Mobile,” she exulted to her sister. “I flourish in Mobile.” By week’s end, the two women had grown quite close despite their differences regarding the slavery issue. LeVert

Havana

The route from Mobile to Havana was a direct shot, 550 nautical miles across the Gulf of Mexico.

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arrived in 1859 and exclaimed: “What a world of shipping! The masts make a belt of dense forest along the edge of the city, all the ships lying head-in to the street, like horses at their mangers; while the vessels at anchor nearly choke up the passage-ways to the deeper bays beyond.” Havana rivaled New York and New Orleans as a major American entrepôt, exporting sugar, coffee, tobacco, and rum and importing cotton, machinery, textiles, lumber, and a thousand other things. It was also a market in the ongoing slave trade, despite growing foreign pressure to abolish it. Small boats containing customs officials, porters, and eager vendors immediately surrounded arriving merchant and passenger vessels. Only after much official delay and running a gauntlet of fruit and cigar vendors did passengers make the wharf.

PORTRAIT THOMAS SULLY (1783–1872), HISTORIC MOBILE PRESERVATION SOCIETY

Gulf. “The billows foamed and hissed close to my window,” she wrote to her sister, “and soon came into my bed.” Nonetheless, she preferred the fresh sea breeze with occasional warm-water soakings to “the suffocating air of the cabin.” The following morning the ship entered Havana harbor, and Bremer thrilled to the sight of big rollers smashing against the Morro and throwing up great curtains of spray. Much larger than Mobile, mid-19thcentury Havana was home to 200,000 people, a mix of whites (a minority), enslaved Blacks, free Blacks, and a smattering of Asians imported as laborers. Visitors almost always commented first upon the crowded harbor. Spain had relaxed its draconian trade restrictions, and it showed. No less a mariner than Richard Henry Dana Jr.—the famous author of Two Years Before the Mast—

Once onshore, Bremer admired the “low houses of all colors, blue, yellow, green, orange” amid the scattered palm trees. By evening she was ensconced in a small hotel “with a marble floor” and an animated group of diners at table. During the following days, Bremer drove the magnificent Paseo de Isabella; observed the high-wheeled volante carriages with their raven-haired female passengers and extravagant, thigh-booted Black postilions; ambled gardens studded by statues and fountains; visited the “handsome and light” Cathedral; explored narrow rain-puddled streets shaded by linen awnings; and attended the theater. She left enchanted by the plants and flowers but oppressed by the heat, dust, and the harsh conditions endured by the slaves. Madame LeVert was already well familiar with these sights. Despite having to cancel her trip with Bremer, she knew Havana well and had many influential friends there. She considered the city a second home and a natural waystation on longer voyages. During her second European tour in 1855, she arrived in Havana harbor aboard the steamer Black Warrior and spent several weeks at the Hotel Cubano before crossing the Atlantic. The hotel was a five-story pile located just steps from the Plaza Vieja. It featured a balcony, stables, a central courtyard onto which the apartments opened, a marble stairway, red-tiled rooms, heavy wooden windows and doors, billowing sheers, and potted plants and flowers everywhere. “We were received by Mrs. Brewer (who keeps the house),” LeVert wrote, “in the most friendly manner.” Sarah Mobile socialite Madame Octavia Walton LeVert hosted Bremer in Mobile and invited her to Havana, which she considered a second home. With regular steamship service between the two cities, LeVert frequented the route.

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DAVID RUMSEY MAP COLLECTION

Fredrika Bremer enjoyed exploring Havana in the city’s volante carriages, which in the 1850s were a regular sight along the Paseo de Isabella for elite white women visiting from Europe and the United States. Print based on the work of painter Pierre Toussaint Frederic Mialhe, who lived in Cuba from 1838–54. Published in Berlin, 1855, as Album Pintoresco de la Isla de Cuba. B. May y Ca. Ships sailed past Morro Castle, built in 1589 at the entrance to Havana Harbor. The fortress is visible for miles out at sea and was built to protect the harbor from invaders, but in more peaceful times it welcomed visitors arriving by ship.

PRINT BY PIERRE TOUSSAINT FREDERIC MIALHE, COURTESY DAVID RUMSEY MAP COLLECTION

Greer Brewer was the hotel’s proprietress, and a native Southerner herself. One guest called her a “strange mixture” of “parsimony and prodigality, vindictiveness and gratitude, a grand woman withal, capable of doing heroic things.” She had been either abandoned or widowed—the stories varied—at a young age and moved to Havana as a governess. She eventually opened a boarding house, prospered, and then bought the Hotel Cubano. Brewer specialized in easily digestible food, provided attentive English-speaking staff, and harbored ardent Southern (i.e. proslavery) sympathies, all of which assured a steady stream of guests. Mobile and Havana’s respective commercial prosperity, Spain’s relaxed trade restrictions, the efficiency of steam travel, and the presence of sympathetic friends, and comfortable accommodations like the Hotel Cubano, all combined for a robust affinity and trade between the two cities. As early as the mid-1820s, one visitor to Alabama’s

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Wood—logs, lumber, staves, ship masts, and spars—was Mobile’s most common export to Cuba. The island’s good timber was long gone, and its sugar planters and shipbuilders desperately needed forest products. For years, a self-sustaining trade loop operated. Cuban planters imported firewood to stoke their mills, lumber to erect their buildings, staves to make barrels for raw sugar, and shooks (slats) to fashion crates for refined sugar. The loaded barrels and crates then returned to Mobile, which sent back more staves and shooks. On the same winter day that the Belle made Mobile with the coffee, tobacco, and fruit, the schooner Augusta cleared the bay channel for Havana with 1,333 barrel staves, and the brig Guadalette with 2,500. The shipments steadily increased as the century progressed. In 1853–54, Mobile sent 180 finished masts and spars and more than two million board feet of sawn lumber to

PRINT BY PIERRE TOUSSAINT FREDERIC MIALHE, COURTESY DAVID RUMSEY MAP COLLECTION

seaport noted the presence of Cuban oranges on the store shelves, “at six cents a piece … besides bananas and cocoa nuts in abundance.” Some 15 years later, Hunt’s Merchants’ Magazine and Commercial Review enthused, “Mobile is more accessible from the Gulf than New Orleans. She is nearer Havana than either New Orleans or Charleston, and is better situated than either of those cities for supplying the great [Mississippi] valley with West Indian products.” And so the trade flowed back and forth in steamships, schooners, sloops, brigs, and barques. Shortly after Christmas 1841, for example, the schooner Belle tacked into Mobile Bay loaded with 931 sacks of coffee, 150,000 cigars, and numerous boxes of fruit out of Havana. Not surprisingly, Mobilians especially loved the tobacco, and several cigar shops downtown advertised Cuban smokes “for cash only.”

View of Havana Harbor, c. 1847–48.

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Havana, more than any other foreign port. By 1860, Havana was Mobile’s top lumber trading partner. All of that traffic meant numerous Mobilians visited the Cuban capital. When not working, they sampled its exotic pleasures. These included the renowned Havana Lottery and Cuban women. One Alabama sailor recalled his pre-Civil War attempts at winning the lottery. He and his mates quit unloading lumber at 2 pm when the Spanish customs officials knocked off early due to the heat. “We all invested money in the Royal Lottery,” he wrote, “but drew no prizes. The tickets were sold on the street by vendors, who received a commission on their sales.” On one trip he attended the drawing “in a building like a theatre.” The prizes started at $250,000 and finished at $100. “A remarkable audience was in the seats: rich and poor, black and white, and of all nationalities.” Excitement and interest

PAINTING BY JAMES BARD (1815–1897), P.D.

Black Warrior, 1852. Madame LeVert traveled to Havana aboard the Black Warrior. The ship would later be embroiled in an international incident in Havana, when her captain failed to declare his cargo with the Spanish authorities upon arriving in port.

“I am prone to fall in love with the first petticoat I meet after landing.” The objects of his fascination included “the pretty feet and ankles” of female shoppers, the “naked arms and busts” of the mixed-race market women, and the “naked arms and shoulders and heads

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dwindled after the biggest prizes, leaving the theater nearly empty at the end. In Mobile, the local papers published the winning numbers and trumpeted area winners. These included a 14-yearold sailor, who netted $20,000, and the dashing ship captain Harry Maury, who won enough to build a grand house. Happily, envious Mobilians did not have to travel to try their own luck. In 1851, native Cuban José Luis Diaz offered lottery tickets at his 7 Government Street barber shop in Mobile. Victorian reticence chilled public discussion of Havana’s sexual attractions. Mobile’s own Raphael Semmes penned but never published a remarkably frank appreciation after an 1845 visit. Semmes was a junior officer on board the brigantine USS Porpoise. The vessel put into Havana on a diplomatic mission, where Semmes remarked on all the women he saw. He admitted that after tediously patrolling the Gulf,

Raphael Semmes

dressed with natural flowers” among lady theatergoers. He also waxed eloquent on the “seductive” moonlight, the “feathery leaves” of palm trees, and the “graceful white muslin robes of the women.” If Semmes did not relieve his lust, it wasn’t for lack of opportunity. Mujeres públicas (public women), or prostitutes, were easy to find. According to one observer, they rented houses on “the best streets,” where they gazed “out of the bars of high windows at nightfall, with a lit cigarette in their mouths.” Mobilians’ interest in Havana, and more generally Cuba, was not limited to its pleasures. After the 1857 publication of Madame LeVert’s Souvenirs of Travel, a Boston reviewer wrote that “she lives in Mobile, where the desire to annex Cuba to the Union is stronger than in any other city we have visited.” As the issue of slavery tore at the North American body politic, Southern newspaper editors, politicians, and violently SeaHistory.org

inclined filibusters saw Cuba’s acquisition as key to maintaining power. By their calculations, Cuba as a slave state would counterbalance Kansas’s and Nebraska’s likely admission as free states. The more hotheaded among them joined forces with Latin American revolutionaries like Narciso López, whose desire to liberate Cuba from Spain dovetailed with their goals. Among the Mobilians who acted on this perverted dream were businessmen who invested in armed expeditions and various adventure-seeking sea captains, Mexican war veterans, wharf rats, and bespectacled bank clerks. The most prominent of these was Harry Maury. If antebellum Mobile had a gentlemanbeau ideal, Maury was it. He was charming, well-traveled, and urbane. He was also a crack shot and knew how to handle rough men. A regular at Madame LeVert’s salon, he was described by another guest as “one of the finest looking men I ever saw. Afterward, we had a good deal of him in a semi-public way. He was a fine horseman and when he rode up and down Government Street, he was admired for he made a very attractive looking spectacle.” Maury supported filibusters like William Walker and was even involved in Narcisco López’s 1851 attempt to take Cuba. Fortunately for him, Maury did not accompany López’s doomed expedition onto Cuban soil. The Spaniards handily defeated it and executed numerous survivors, including López and at least one Mobilian. Only three years later, Spain’s seizure of the Black Warrior in Havana harbor almost provoked a war. The vessel departed Mobile on 25 February 1854 carrying 900 bales of cotton and 17 passengers and arrived at Havana three days later. Since he was only dropping off mail in transit to New York, the ship’s captain did not declare his cargo. This was the usual procedure, with the letter of the law conveniently overlooked by all parties. But the 28

heightened tensions surrounding filibustering caused the Spaniards to seize the Black Warrior. Southern newspaper editors and politicians erupted, demanding a confrontation with Spain. Fortunately, after months of diplomatic correspondence, cooler heads prevailed. Neither President Franklin Pierce nor most US congressmen wanted a costly foreign distraction, and the northern public was not as upset as the Southern slaveocracy. William Rufus King did not live long enough to weigh in on the Black Warrior affair. As a moderate—proslavery but anti-secession—who helped craft the Compromise of 1850, he likely would have calmed matters. King was a native North Carolinian, a Jacksonian Democrat, a Unionist, and a slaveowner who moved to Alabama in 1818. Six feet tall, contemplative, and courtly, he enjoyed a distinguished political career, serving as a United States congressman, a senator, and minister to France. In 1851, the Democratic National Convention nominated him vice president and Franklin Pierce, president. They won, but a case of tuberculosis forced King to seek warmer climes. He arrived in Havana by steamer, and a week later traveled to Matanzas and settled at Col. John Chartrand’s plantation Ariadne. King’s regimen included rest and the vaunted but ineffective “sugar cure,” a regular inhalation of the hot vapors curling out of the sugar vats. In nearby Matanzas harbor, the steamer USS Fulton was standing by to convey him to his duties when possible. King was too weak, however, so Congress passed a special act to swear him into office on foreign soil. To date, he remains the only high US government official so privileged. The same day that Pierce swore his presidential oath in blustery Washington, King wobbled unsteadily between friends, who held him upright for an oath administered by the US Consul. A correspondent was beguiled

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by the scene, “the clear sky of the tropics over our heads, the emerald carpet of Cuba at our feet, and the delicious breeze of coolness over us.” King recognized death was near and wanted to go home. The Fulton carried him at full steam into Mobile Bay on his 67th birthday. An enthusiastic crowd that included a band, militia companies, civic officials, and very possibly Madame LeVert fell into a deep hush when attendants lifted the “feeble and attenuated” vice president from the ship. They took him to a hotel and later to his plantation upriver. He died there on 18 April 1853. The calm voices receded. As a US civil war loomed, everyone in Mobile and Havana anxiously watched developments, wondering what portent they held. John S. Sledge is senior architectural historian with the Mobile Historic Development Commission and a member of the National Book Critics Circle. He is the author of seven books, including The Mobile River and The Gulf of Mexico: A Maritime History.

Mobile and Havana: Sisters Across the Gulf by Alicia García Santana and John Sledge with photography by Chip Cooper and Julio Larramendi will be published in March 2024 by Ediciones Polymita,and distributed by the University of Alabama Press.

Explore the decks of the last Destroyer Escort afloat in America.

Mystic Knotwork

A New England Tradition For 60 Years

518-431-1943 ussslater.org

Nautical Ornaments Traditional Knotwork Made in Downtown Mystic CT Open 7 days a week - 860.889.3793 25 Cottrell St. • 2 Holmes St. MysticKnotwork.com

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CURATOR’S CORNER

Santa Barbara Maritime Museum Centennial of the Honda Disaster by Lydia Rao The Curator’s Corner series in Sea History offers maritime museums the opportunity to feature historic photos from their collections that, while available to researchers upon request, rarely go on public display. Each issue, we ask a museum curator to pick a particularly interesting, revealing, or representative photo from their archives and tell us about it. In this installment, we are invited into the archives of the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum in California. Enjoy!

On 8 September 1923, Destroyer Squadron 11 left San Francisco Bay, steaming south at 20 knots on a speed run to San Diego. The crewmembers aboard were unaware they would soon be embroiled in the greatest peacetime disaster in United States naval history. Commodore Edward Watson led the squadron, making the first of many mistakes when he declared his flagship, USS Delphy, would take sole responsibility for navigating. The other destroyers were forbidden from getting radio bearings, leaving formation to sight the coastline, or slowing to take depth soundings. Watson’s second mistake was retiring to his cabin and leaving the conn to Lieutenant Commander Donald Hunter. Hunter was an experienced and skilled officer, but he made several critical errors in his calculations. He was navigating by dead reckoning and had not been able to get a compass bearing on a known landmark or fixed navigational aid to correct the ship’s position on the chart in several hours. Using only their compass heading and counting propeller rotations to determine course and speed, Hunter failed to account for their reduced speed over the ground caused by headwinds and waves. His calculations placed the squadron in a position to enter the Santa Barbara Channel, when they were actually several miles north and about to turn east, directly into Honda Point—or the “Devil’s Jaw.” Ultimately, it was Watson who approved the fatal decision to alter course 90 degrees to port, and at 9 PM Delphy made the turn, with the rest of the squadron following in her wake. Plowing through thickening fog at 33 feet per

second, within minutes the 314-foot destroyer ran hard aground on the jagged rocks that form the Devil’s Jaw. Efforts to back off were in vain as waves dragged the ship over the reef and flooded engine rooms, causing a total loss of power. Six destroyers followed and wrecked within minutes: S. P. Lee, Young, Woodbury, Nicholas, Fuller, and Chauncey. Farragut and Somers hit the reef but were able to stay afloat. The rear half of the squadron—Percival, Kennedy, Paul Hamilton, Stoddert, and Thompson—narrowly avoided disaster. Five of the seven ships are pictured here the day after the accident in their final resting places. A surviving destroyer looks out from the fog upon the wrecks, while people on the cliffs peer down at Delphy in the foreground, ripped in two. To the left behind the cliffs lies Chauncey, where she ran aground trying to rescue sailors from the capsized Young, almost fully submerged in the center. Woodbury and Fuller are just off Woodbury Rock, where their crews spent the night until their rescue the following morning by a brave fisherman. Crewmen stood by as power failures plunged them into darkness and radio silence. Then came the orders to abandon ship, a treacherous task of making it through the oily, surging sea to jagged cliffs, where the crews were eventually discovered and aided by the townspeople of Lompoc. Even with countless acts of bravery that night, 23 lives were lost and seven ships were declared a total loss estimated at $13 million. Today, none of the ships are visible above water, but salvage divers report the sand on the bottom is still an inky black from the rusting hulls.

Lydia Rao is the manager of collections and exhibits for the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum.

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SANTA BARBARA MARITIME MUSEUM

Tragedy at Point Honda, 1923

“Using only their compass heading and counting propeller rotations to determine course and speed, Hunter failed to account for their reduced speed over the ground caused by headwinds and waves. His calculations placed the squadron too far to the south...” The Santa Barbara Maritime Museum is located in the former Naval Reserve Building on the harbor waterfront. The museum was founded in 2000 by a group of fishermen, divers, and sailors, who envisioned it as a place where people could experience the region’s rich maritime culture without having to leave the harbor. In addition to its interior exhibit space, on the dock just outside is the museum’s largest artifact, the big-game fishing yacht Ranger. Launched in 1917, she is the first private fishing yacht built on the West Coast and the oldest boat in the harbor. Ranger is fully operational and takes passengers on tours of the harbor and channel. Santa Barbara Maritime Museum, 113 Harbor Way; Ste. 190, Santa Barbara, CA; www.sbmm.org

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HISTORIC SHIPS ON LEE SHORE

One of the last views of the tug Grouper before she was cut up in Lyons, New York, September 2023.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

WILL VAN DORP

n unlikely maritime icon was lost this past September in the sleepy Erie Canal town of Lyons, New York. Locally known as Grouper, the 111-yearold tugboat had been disintegrating there for the past two decades; she was dismantled by the relentless hydraulic jaws of a scrapping company’s machinery. The tugboat, not noticed by most but cherished by some, is now just a memory. Grouper was built as Hull No. 21 at Cleveland’s Great Lakes (GL) Towing Shipyard on the Cuyahoga River in 1912. The tugboat began life christened as Gary, memorializing the Indiana city named for a founder of US Steel. Her loss thins out the ranks of survivors of that era of G-tugs, iconic Great Lakes tugboats that seem to defy aging. An older boat (Hull No. 8) launched in 1909 is still working as GL Towing’s Arkansas, and a dozen or so other G-tugs nearing a century or older are still active along the US “third coast.” Meanwhile, since 2016 the shipyard has been in the process of building a series of ten innovative Damen Stan 1907 ICE tugboats, better designed for the current century. Tugboat Gary worked for GL Towing of Cleveland, Ohio, for 22 years before C. Reiss Coal Company of Sheboygan, Wisconsin, purchased her and renamed her Green Bay. Reiss operated the boat in Wisconsin’s Lake Michigan ports, primarily Green Bay, for the next 47 years, from 1934 until 1981. Photos, such as those of the Wisconsin Maritime Museum in Manitowoc, show

by Will Van Dorp

WILL VAN DORP

Tug Green Bay, a.k.a. Grouper— an Ignominious End

Bulk carrier Joseph H. Frantz being towed stern-first by the tug Green Bay in Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

WISCONSIN MARITIME MUSEUM

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COURTESY WISCONSIN MARITIME MUSEUM

COURTESY BRENDAN GROH

Green Bay as a well-maintained tugboat assisting a variety of vessels of that region and era. The number of photos of her crew attests to her being well-loved. Around 1957, her steam engine was replaced by a Kahlenberg E6 diesel, an experimental design developed by the Kahlenberg Industries, Inc. (established in 1895 as Kahlenberg Brothers Company) of Two Rivers, Wisconsin. Members of the Groh family, who have worked out of Sheboygan, Wisconsin, since the 1840s, have fond memories of Green Bay. Rocky Groh, whose father served as the tug’s skipper, has made scratch-built models of Green Bay and her fleet mate Reiss (Hull No. 24), launched in 1913 from the Great Lakes Shipyard on the Cuyahoga as Q. A. Gillmore. These models won gold in the 46th Annual Midwestern Ships and Boats Model Contest held in May 2023 at the Wisconsin Maritime Museum. Reiss is in private ownership and has been rechristened with her original name. Reiss worked for C. Reiss Coal Company from 1932 until 1969, overlapping over three decades with Green Bay; often the two tugs worked large ships in tandem. Brendan Groh, Rocky’s son and currently a working Great Lakes tugboat mate, reminisced about the boat. “I’m the first member of my immediate family’s past four generations who never worked for Reiss,” Brendan explained. “But I heard lots of the stories about Green Bay while growing up. The Reiss and the Groh families go back a long time. In fact, we still occasionally talk.” According to Groh, Green Bay was repowered in Manitowoc. “That E6 diesel was donated to Reiss by the

(top left) Tug Green Bay crew. Second from left is Capt. Harry T. Groh, once a skipper of the tug. (left) Green Bay towing the passenger vessel South American through a railroad bridge.

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obscure a skipper’s ability to see as he worked a ship. And jobs on a steam tug were difficult; the fireman was happy to become an oiler, an easier job monitoring gauges rather than shoveling coal. Deckhands no longer had to constantly hose the soot off the decks. Great Lakes mariners may have the reputation of stubbornly resisting change in some things, but switching over to diesels was generally accepted as an idea whose time had come.”

COURTESY BRENDAN GROH

Kahlenberg Company for the repowering as an attempt to gain traction for its new E6 product line, advertising Kahlenberg’s switch from making steam engines to diesels.” The company built engines from 1895 until 1960. Operating a coal-fired steam tugboat in a port had notable negatives, Groh pointed out: “Embers from the stack would sometimes catch wooden port structures on fire. Thick black smoke pouring from the stack would

Rocky Groh’s model of Green Bay won gold at the 46th Annual Midwestern Ships and Boat Model Contest in May 2023.

Tug’s Names Over the Years Gary: 1912 to 1934 (22 years). GL Towing. Green Bay: 1934 to 1981 (47 years). C. Reiss Company. Oneida: 1981 to 1987 (6 years). Seaway. Iroquois: 1987 to 1990. (3 years). Wellington Towing Alaska: 1990 to 1999 (9 years). GL Towing.

JIM DENEARING

Grouper: 1999 to 2023. (24 years). Florida Marine Terminals and a series of owners. Scrapped in September 2023 by Carrier Salvage and Recycling.

JIM DENEARING

Tug Grouper being broken up for scrap, September 2023, Lyons, New York.

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The Grohs were not the only Wisconsin family with fond memories of the vessel. Julie (Jewel) Sowers of Green Bay recalls the times she would spend aboard the tug and in the Reiss office; her father, Liel Osell, was a captain and Green Bay harbormaster off and on between 1959 and 1979. He had an agreement to purchase the tug from Reiss, but for reasons she still doesn’t understand, the boat went to a series of towing companies called Seaway and Wellington Towing working on Lake Superior, based in Sault Ste Marie. Sowers had enough sea time on the tug to apply for a captain’s license, “but my father wouldn’t sign off on my time because he felt that women did not belong on tugboats,” she explains. “Except as passengers.” In the fall of 1976, Jewel and her sorority sisters boarded Green Bay for an excursion. “They’ve never forgotten that fabulous experience,” she said. Captain John Wellington was one of the founders of both Seaway Towing and Wellington Maritime. He also owned several generations of Sugar Island ferries. Seaway Towing based the tug at Sault Ste Marie, where it provided ship assists for foreign vessels—

”salties.” “When I purchased it,” Wellington explained, “I renamed it Iroquois, because no Great Lakes vessel had carried that name before.” Eventually, he sold the boat back to Great Lakes Towing, which subsequently moved it back to Cleveland. Renamed Alaska, the boat was transferred to interests in Florida in 1999, but because of the Erie Canal shallows and the boat’s draft, she could get no closer to the ocean than Lyons, in western New York. She was sold to a series of buyers, who offered no credible plans for a working future. Some thought to return her to service in deeper waters, others to make her a houseboat, and still others an excursion vessel. Folks in the Lyons area came to know the boat as “Grouper,” which alluded to saltwater aspirations of the party that left her there. It’s the name I learned to attach to her, although I’ve forgotten from whom. She never had a nameboard declaring that appellation, nor did any VHF radio calls ever emanate from the wheelhouse identifying her as Grouper. Her broken windows, rusted superstructure, peeling paint,

December 1971, tug Green Bay powering through the icy river beside the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company. The shipyard’s dry dock is off her port side.

and riveted hull confirmed her age and dereliction. She even had illegible, faded graffiti across her house. Unmistakable, though, were the lines of a classic Type-1 Great Lakes Towing G-tug. Eventually, New York State Canal Corporation declared the boat abandoned, assumed ownership, and auctioned her off. Despite efforts to return Grouper to the Lakes, the high bid came from a western New York salvage and recycling company called Carrier. Carrier offered to spare the engine if a buyer stepped up to pay the scrap price and arrived with a suitable trailer and realistic plan to safely remove the engine from the scrap site. September 2023 proved to be the cruelest month for the tugboat; the 111-year-old vessel is no more, nor was the engine spared. Hydraulic jaws nipped, snipped, pounded, twisted, shook, and yanked the tugboat into thousands of pieces small enough to be loaded onto six scrap trailers and three dumpsters, then hauled to the boneyard where further dismantling will happen. Eventually, the pieces will be sold to mini-mills, either domestic or foreign, where the metals will become liquid again until they solidify and reassemble as new entities. What’s left are these and any additional stories, those troves of photos, and even a scratch-built model. And if a buyer has cash for the propeller or H-bitt and a realistic plan to move either of those objects, they are available.

COURTESY WISCONSIN MARITIME MUSEUM

Will Van Dorp is a mariner and writer who produces Tugster, a “waterblog,” that largely focuses on workboats in and around New York Harbor, which he refers to as the “Sixth Boro.” He is the director of the 2013 documentary The Graves of Arthur Kill, examining the status and history of the partially submerged remains of mothballed tugboats, ferries, and other vessels throughout the waterway separating Staten Island from New Jersey.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

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Never Too Late: A Case of Mistaken Identity and the Purple Heart Project

n 26 September 1918, USS Tampa was nine days into its 19th convoy escort, running low on coal. Her captain, Charles Satterlee, requested permission to detach from the convoy but was denied because of the risk of sailing alone in broad daylight in submarine-infested waters. He made a second request at 4 pm, as the coal bunkers were now dangerously low. This time, the request was granted. At 4:15 pm Tampa detached and proceeded full steam ahead towards the Bristol Channel to make port at Milford Haven, Wales. With her lights extinguished as a security measure, Tampa, sailing alone at dusk with her silhouette visible against the night sky, was sighted by a German submarine, UB-91. At 8:15 pm, UB-91 fired off a torpedo, which blast-

by Charles W. Meyer

ed a hole in Tampa’s hull amidships. This was followed by a second explosion. The 190-foot Coast Guard escort vessel sank with all hands in fewer than three minutes, just off Bristol Channel— seven weeks before the war ended. This sinking would be the greatest single casualty incurred by any naval unit as a result of enemy action during the fourplus years of World War I. Tampa’s crew totaled 130 men, including 111 Coast Guardsmen, four US Navy personnel, and 15 British Navy sailors and dockworkers. The Tampa Purple Heart Project

The Purple Heart originated from an honor George Washington bestowed on a handful of Army soldiers during the Revolutionary War. It was originally called the Badge of Military

Merit and was made of a purplish cloth in the shape of a heart with the word “merit” sewn across the center. At the time of Tampa’s loss, the Purple Heart was not in use in any military service. General Douglas MacArthur, in his role as US Army Chief of Staff, had the medal restored as an Army decoration on 22 February 1932. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt extended eligibility to the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard. Finally, on 12 November 1952, President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 10409, allowing for the Purple Heart to be awarded retroactively for actions after 5 April 1917. New eligibility criteria required recipients to have been wounded or to have died as a result of direct enemy action. This automatically made the

NAVAL HISTORY AND HERITAGE COMMAND

The Coast Guard cutter Tampa, in service during WWI to the US Navy (thus USS Tampa), moored in Europe, c. 1917–1918 .

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UB-91 firing a torpedo at USS Tampa in Bristol Channel, Wales. Painting by John D. Wisinski, US Coast Guard Collection.

crew of Tampa eligible for the Purple Heart, but her case was overlooked until 1999, when James Bunch, a retired Coast Guardsman, proposed to then COMDT James Loy that the Purple Heart be awarded posthumously to her crew. Eighty-two years after she sank, on 11 November 1999, Tampa’s crew was recognized as Purple Heart recipients in a ceremony at the Coast Guard Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery. Three descendants of Tampa crewmembers received Purple Hearts on behalf of their ancestors. Today, more than 105 years after Tampa was lost and 24 years after the first Purple Heart was awarded to one of her crew, the Coast Guard has awarded 62 Purple Hearts to lost crewmembers from

USS Tampa. Efforts are ongoing to identify families who have yet to receive their relatives’ Purple Heart medals. A Case of Mistaken Identity

This is the story of one such crewman, (WT2) Charles E. Green, who is listed in Coast Guard records as “Frank C. Garrett,” and his family’s struggle to prove that Frank C. Garrett was, in fact, Charles E. Green and they should receive the Purple Heart on his behalf. Charles Green was born on 13 February 1899 in East Bernstadt, Kentucky, to Jasper and Margaret (Cloyd) Green; his sister Stella was born in July of 1900. Their mother and a younger sister both died in June of 1903 of a fever, when Charles was about four years old. His

father remarried around 1904 to Ida Belle Rice. With that union, Ida brought her four-year-old son Lawrence into the family. At some point, the Greens moved to Marion, Illinois, where Charles’s father worked as a teamster for the mines. According to family lore, around 1916 Charles bought some items from the company store on his father’s account without permission. His father’s violent reaction caused Charles to run away from home. News of the altercation did not sit well with the townspeople, and they forced Jasper to leave town. The family moved to Shannon County, Missouri, where Jasper took up farming. There is no record of where Charles went after running away, but given the SeaHistory.org

timetable, it appears that he made his way to Florida, where on 9 January 1917—a month before his 18th birthday—he enlisted in the US Coast Guard under the alias “Frank Charles Garrett,” using a false birth date of 5 January 1896, claiming to be 21 years old. He was assigned to USS Tampa as ordinary seaman. According to his service record, which his family only recently received, he appeared to have been a quick learner and good worker. He advanced rapidly from a “coal heaver” (on the job only seven days) to “fireman” (four days) advancing to “Water Tender A” (roughly equivalent to an E-4 Petty Officer today) for three months. He was promoted to Water Tender – 2nd class, a rating he held for ten months and thirteen days. This photo of Charles Green taken on 25 January 1918 in Plymouth, England, is a perfect example of how young and full of pride these men were. The photo was taken just before his 19th birthday; his youth comes through clearly, but his true strength is revealed in his steady gaze. The tragedy of Charles Green’s story at this point in time lay both behind him and ahead. He had become so estranged from his immediate family—in particular his father— that he felt the need to distance himself from them to the point of changing his name. Eight months after this photo was taken, Tampa was torpedoed and sank, taking 130 souls to their watery graves in under three minutes. Seven weeks later, the war was over. Never Too Late

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

In the decade immediately following the loss of the Tampa, families, friends, and former colleagues of the men who perished erected various memorials throughout towns, cities, and states associated with the lost crew. Of these, several have plaques listing the names 1917 Coast Guard Recruiting Poster

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COURTESY MEG NEIDERT, GREAT-NIECE OF CHARLES GREEN (A.K.A. FRANK GARRETT)

New Coast Guard recruit Charles Green, who enlisted under the alias “Frank Garrett” in January 1917, was assigned to USS Tampa. He and his shipmates perished when the Tampa was torpedoed by a German U-boat on 26 September 1918.

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CHARLES SATTERLEE COLLECTION, USCG HISTORIAN’S OFFICE

of all the Coast Guard crew, plus the four US Navy personnel and the British sailors and dockworkers who were also on board. One of the most prominent memorials is the US Coast Guard Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery, which was dedicated on 23 May 1928. Architect George Howe and sculptor Gaston Lachaise captured the spirit of the Coast Guard’s legendary steadfastness in the monument’s rock foundation and pyramid design. Above the Coast Guard motto, Semper Paratus (“Always Ready”), a bronze seagull appears poised to take flight. The gull symbolizes the Coast Guard’s tireless vigil over the nation’s maritime territory. The names of the vessels Seneca and Tampa and their crewmen, as well as all Coast Guard personnel who lost their lives during World War I, are inscribed on the sides of the monument. You will not find Charles Green’s name on this monument or in any other Coast Guard record. His alias, Frank Garrett, can be found on the right side of the lower left panel—six names down from the top. This mere One of many news clippings about the loss of Tampa, which was lost with all hands, a total of 130 servicemen. Her sinking was the greatest single casualty incurred by any US naval unit as a result of known enemy action, and because of it the Coast Guard suffered the greatest loss, in proportion to its size, of any armed service in the war. —USCG Historian’s Office

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY PHOTO

(left) The US Coast Guard Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery, located across the Potomac from Washington, DC. Architect George Howe and sculptor Gaston Lachaise designed the memorial to capture the “spirit of the Coast Guard’s legendary steadfastness in the monument’s rock foundation and pyramid design.” The bronze gull taking flight represents the Coast Guard motto, Semper Paratus, (“Always Ready”). The names of all Coast Guard personnel lost during World War I are inscribed on the sides of the monument, including the crews of the cutters Tampa and Seneca—except one. Charles Green’s name does not appear there but rather his alias, Frank C. Garrett.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

GETARCHIVE.NET

glitch in the historical record may seem insignificant, but even after 105 years the record can be corrected. Charles Green’s relatives set out to prove, beyond a doubt, Frank Garrett’s true identity, and they have succeeded. Charles Green’s Purple Heart will be awarded to his family on Memorial Day, 2024. Green will be the 63rd Tampa crewmember so recognized. The Purple Heart Project’s work is ongoing to identify and recognize the remaining crewmembers eligible for this honor, men who gave the ultimate sacrifice for their country. CWO3 Charles W. Meyer (USCG, Ret.)

The US Coast Guard and the US Navy in Wartime.

would like to acknowledge the efforts of

The United States Coast Guard was established within the Department of the

Nora Chidlow, Archivist, USCG Historians

Treasury on 28 January 1915. Under 14 US Code § 101, the USCG comes under

Office, and assistance from Charles E.

control of the US Navy during times of war or when the president or Congress

Green’s great niece, LTC Meg Neibert

directs during periods of peace. From World War I to the present, US Coast

(US Army Ret.), and grand niece, Tami

Guard personnel have supported the Navy in its operations during times of

(Vest) Glock.

war and armed conflict. —US National Archives and Records Administration

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Tugboats to Remember written and illustrated by Austin Dwyer

Scotland in the early 1900s was called the “Cradle of Steam.”

he Encyclopedia Britannica describes the tugboat as “a powerful watercraft designed to perform a variety of functions, especially to tow or push barges and large ships.” In 1736 Jonathan Hulls of Gloucestershire, England, patented a small boat powered by a steam engine, designed to maneuver larger vessels in and out of harbors. The tug could not exist without power, of course, and it was the development of the steam engine that made it possible. The real credit for the first steam-powered boat goes to the William Symington for producing the 58-foot Charlotte Dundas. She was powered by a Watt engine generating 14 horsepower (hp) to a paddlewheel installed in a well at the stern. For a short time, the Dundas was used on the Forth and Clyde Canals in Scotland. More than 50 years before James Watt formulated plans for powering steamships, an English ironmonger named Thomas Newcomen developed

a steam engine powerful enough to pump water from great depths. By 1733, Newcomen pumps were in operation in 125 mines. His engines prevailed for 75 years in regions with both abundant coal to heat homes and fresh water to create steam. It was Watt who adapted what had been done for pumps in mines to an engine that could move watercraft. In 1775 he formed a partnership with engineer Matthew Boulton, and together they devised improvements to the steam engine that would have lasting effects on transportation and the Industrial Revolution. A year later, Watt developed a steam engine more powerful than any existing engines at the time. As steam engine technology developed, paddlewheels were replaced by the screw propeller. Its configuration varied so much in design and material that there were many who are credited as its inventor. In 1836, Swedish-American engineer John Ericsson patented a

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

screw propeller, and it was first used on a boat built in London in 1837 named Francis B. Ogden. In the United States, the first inventor of the screw propeller was Col. John Stevens of Hoboken (1802). These examples were powered by a simple steam-expansion engine, which was eventually replaced by tripleexpansion steam (each revolution powered by three cylinders). The first steamboats built in the United States were constructed in 1802 and are credited to John Fitch and James Rumsey. Fitch had designed and built the first successful steamboat that went into service on the Delaware River. The Perseverance was powered by a James Watt steam engine. The evolution of the steamboat continued rapidly, and in 1819 the first transAtlantic steamboat crossing was achieved when SS Savannah sailed from Georgia to Liverpool. The Savannah was a full-rigged, three-masted ship with a 90-hp steam engine. Today, she

would be considered a hybrid. Later, the sidewheeler Great Western made regular crossings. For about 100 years, steamdriven ships were the most effective means to transport people and cargo. It took until the turn of the century to see the first diesel engines emerge as the successor to steam power. The Yelcho Rescue

In July 1916, Captain Luis Pardo and his passengers, Captain Frank Worsley and Ernest Shackleton, braced themselves in the wheelhouse of Pardo’s steam tug, Yelcho, as the 120-foot cutter powered through 20-foot seas and ferocious winds en route from South Georgia Island and Elephant Island in the Antarctic. Shackleton’s 2nd officer, Tom Crean, was below in the galley trying

desperately to hold a pot of stew steady on the stovetop. Pardo was taking the Endurance crew to rescue the rest of their shipmates who had stayed behind when they set out to find help after Endurance was lost in the Weddell Sea. Yelcho was south of Cape Horn in an area known to mariners as the Screaming Sixties. Furious 75-knot winds and lashing rain obstructed their visibility almost entirely. Pardo assured Shackleton that he knew these waters well and was confident that his tug would prevail. This was Shackleton’s 4th attempt to rescue his men, whom he had not seen in more than four months. Pardo may have been overly enthusiastic, considering that Yelcho was not built with a double hull, a dubious distinction for

ships attempting to cross 600 miles of treacherous ocean. She had no heating system, no electric lighting, nor radio. She was powered by a 350-hp compound steam engine with a maximum speed of ten knots. This is the final chapter of the remarkable survival story of the failed Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (1914–1917), Shackleton’s attempt to make the first overland crossing of the Antarctic continent. Most people have at least heard of Ernest Shackleton, the loss of Endurance in the pack ice, the crew’s incredible feats of self-reliance and survival, and the remarkable 800mile voyage in the ship’s 22-foot boat that carried Shackleton, Worsley, Crean, and three others to South Georgia. The saga about Shackleton’s leadership has

Cheers erupted when the tug Yelcho came into view at Elephant Island to rescue the men from Shackleton’s expedition. They had been left there four months earlier, when Shackleton and handful of others set out in the 22-foot James Caird to find help at the whaling station on South Georgia—800 miles away.

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been told, studied, dramatized, and written about countless times. Once the six men made it to the whaling station, they did not rest until they could secure a boat to return to rescue the others, whose lives depended on their six shipmates to save them. This is the story of that rescue. The Yelcho was built on the River Clyde in Scotland in 1906 and was used for towing and related cargo duties. Two years later she was sold to the Chilean Navy and went into service maintaining lighthouses. After Shackleton’s first three attempts to reach his men on Elephant Island failed using other vessels, he persuaded the Chilean Government to loan him the Yelcho. Captain Pardo was well aware that she was unsuited for Antarctic regions, but he would not be dissuaded. After precarious maneuvering through icebergs, Worsley was first to spot Elephant Island in the distance. As Yelcho made its approach, Shackleton was straining to count the men as they crawled from the upturned boat they had converted to a hut for shelter. One can only imagine the excitement of those on the beach upon seeing the little tug flying the Chilean flag. Shackleton got into the lowered tender, and, as he approached the beach, the cheers were thundering. His men were all accounted for—all safe at last. Remember the Maine! (and the Hudson and the Winslow)

When asked about the Spanish American War, most folks conjure images of Teddy Roosevelt on horseback leading his Rough Riders up San Juan Hill in Cuba 125 years ago. I take issue with the publishers who shaped public opinion by repeating the Secretary of State John Hay quote calling the conflict “a splendid little war,” and for the future president who charged up the hill that day and declared that it was “great fun…a bully fight.” If you turn your attention to the war at sea, however, it 46

The Hudson maneuvering in harm’s way to rescue the Winslow.

was there that bloody battles were fought, but they would attract less attention in presidential politics. I found inspiration in the feats of the US Revenue Cutter Hudson, built in Camden, New Jersey, by John Dialogue and Sons. She was the first revenue cutter to be completely designed by the recently established office of the Superintendent of Construction, headed by Commandant Leonard G. Shepard. All the men in her crew were appreciative of their good fortune in serving on the first cutter built with an all-steel hull, and they took pride in pointing out the strength of the ship. The Hudson would play a heroic role in this conflict. As a vessel in the US Revenue Cutter Service (predecessor of the United States Coast Guard), the Hudson was officially a “cutter,” but she was in reality a powerful tug. Her strength came from precise metallurgical specifications calling for boilerplates that could sustain the pressure required to drive the powerful triple-expansion steam engine. Her armament featured two six-pound Driggs-Schroeder rapid guns and one X model 1895 Colt automatic machine gun. The 94½-foot Hudson was commissioned on 15 September 1893 and

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manned by experienced sailors who had come off the decommissioned tug USRC Washington. The new cutter was assigned to New York Harbor, where her duties included merchant ship assistance, documentation, and search and rescue missions. In 1897, riots erupted in Havana, Cuba. Theodore Roosevelt, then-assistant secretary of the navy, supported President McKinley’s decision to send the battleship Maine to Havana. Newspaper reports contended that the Maine was sent to ensure the safety of American citizens and interests. What wasn’t expected was that the battleship would explode and sink in the harbor at 9:40 pm, 15 February 1898. Americans, furious, blamed Spain and demanded a swift response for the deaths of the 266 sailors in the crew. The United States sent Spain an ultimatum. On 19 April, Congress approved legislation ordering the Spanish to withdraw from the area. The bill authorized the president to use as much military force as necessary to achieve Cuba’s independence and the Americans set up a blockade of Cuba. Spain responded by severing diplomatic relations and declared war against the United States on 23 April.

When the Spanish-American war broke out, the Hudson was working under control of the US Navy along the Cuban coast. On 11 May 1898, the Hudson was ordered to join USS Wilmington, a gunboat, and the Winslow, a torpedo boat. The Wilmington, 251 feet in length, carried eight 100mm guns and four three-pounders. Her commanding officer ordered the Hudson to destroy small vessels near Diana Cay; later that same day, the Hudson reported that the coast was clear of small craft. Meanwhile, American naval warships had pursued three Spanish gunboats into the confined waters of Bay of Cardenas, in view from Hudson’s position across the bay. Lieutenant Frank Newcomb, commander of the Hudson, saw the Wilmington and the Winslow under heavy fire from shore batteries. USS Machias, the lead ship at 204 feet in length, was also assisting close by in deeper water. Her 100mm guns easily reached the shore. Newcomb

maneuvered the Hudson within range of the shore batteries and commenced firing her two six-pounders. USS Winslow spearheaded the attack. The 162foot torpedo boat, with a shallower draft, maneuvered dangerously closer to the shore. The shore batteries pounded her; a direct hit exploded her boiler and another took out her rudder. With her steering compromised, she was at the mercy of the onshore wind that edged her broadside toward the shore. Winslow’s commanding officer was hit, and several of his crew were also wounded. The Hudson responded immediately to the disabled Winslow’s request to be towed out of range. The Hudson followed the Winslow as she drifted towards shore and inevitable disaster. Both boats were being pounded by shore artillery and now risked running aground in the shoal waters, but the tug continued to move closer to the crippled Winslow. Hudson’s gun crew, commanded by Lieutenants Mead

and Scott, fired a barrage of 135 rounds as their vessel made her approach to rescue the Winslow. The two ships were bombarded with a hail of gunfire and valiantly returned fire from their position in the water. The Hudson was finally close enough to throw a towline to the crippled ship, but the crewmember who caught the line was immediately hit by gunfire. Thirty minutes passed before a line could be made fast onboard the Winslow. Finally, still taking on fire, the torpedo boat was towed to deeper water and secured alongside the Wilmington, where her wounded were treated. By 3:30 pm the three vessels steamed out of the bay with the Hudson still towing the Winslow. By 9:15 pm the Winslow was left anchored with the Machias, while the Hudson headed for Key West, carrying the bodies of the dead and wounded. The ship also carried dispatches of the battle in Cardenas, where US ships had destroyed two Spanish gunboats.

The Hudson getting a tow-line to the crippled torpedo boat Winslow.

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The Foundation Franklin (ex-HMS Frisky) tows the British freighter Firby in fierce seas to Quebec City. 48

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A Frisky Little Tug

At the outbreak of World War I, the Royal Navy possessed just four oceangoing tugs. With German submarines and mines having a devastating effect on British merchant ships, more tugboats—especially salvage tugs—became critical. That need was met and by the end of the war, the Royal Navy had a fleet of tugs capable of towing large freighters and warships. The Frisky-class tugs were purpose built in World War I, designed for rough seas and heavy work. These powerful tugboats, with tall twin stacks and rounded sterns, boasted triple-expansion steam engines. HMS Frisky was launched in 1918 in Aberdeen, Scotland. She was soon employed in fleet duties at Scapa Flow, a sheltered harbor with easy access to both the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean. In 1924, HMS Frisky was sold to the Atlantic Towing Company in Hamburg, Germany, and was renamed Gustavo Ipland. After five years of towing ships in the Baltic and on the Rhine, she was laid up for another five years, after which she was sold to Foundation Maritime in Montreal, Quebec. She was refitted in Halifax with new crew quarters and her open bridge was enclosed. The main mast was strengthened to support a new derrick boom. Under a new name, Foundation Franklin, she would be credited with saving hundreds of lives and more than 100 rescue operations. The salvage business was—and is—brutally competitive. By the time a ship needs salvaging, it is usually in desperate straits, many times aground and foundering in ferocious weather before a rescue tug will arrive. It is always a last resort when a tugboat is called. Foundation Franklin often put to sea in these perilous conditions, and it was full steam ahead to get to these vessels before they broke up or before competitors got to the site first. 50

Sometimes insurance agreements had to be negotiated, and, even then, there was a high risk of failure and no compensation for a lost tow. Foundation Franklin’s first salvage attempt was made in March 1932. It was an unsuccessful effort that nearly ended her career. After answering a call from the Hamburg America freighter Hamburg, the Franklin ventured out into the Atlantic. As she pushed on through a ferocious hurricane, visibility was non-existent. When she finally reached the distressed ship, she was barely visible, shrouded in a thunderous squall. The seas were fierce and enormous waves had broken Hamburg’s rudder stock. She was drifting out of control between the troughs of the mountainous waves. Foundation Franklin was struck by a savage wave that snapped a turnbuckle on her steering chain. Without steering, she, too, was at the mercy of the seas and her crew rightly feared she would broach. After three hours the crew succeeded in shortening the chain and manufactured a new turnbuckle. The men were drenched, cold, and tired, but they drove on to see if they could locate the Hamburg again. In the meantime, another tug out of New York was also steaming towards the freighter. Four days after the S•O•S call went out, the competing salvage tug arrived at the Hamburg—three hours ahead of the Franklin. Four days later, the Foundation Franklin entered Halifax Harbor with a dejected and worn-out crew and zero compensation for a voyage that almost cost them their boat—and their lives. Foundation Franklin’s next salvage operation involved a British freighter, SS Firby, and it proved to be almost as difficult as the previous rescue attempt. In June 1932, Firby was carrying wheat and ran aground in the Straits of Belle Île off Brittany, France. Two days after departing Halifax, the Franklin reached

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the stricken freighter lodged on a reef surrounded by icebergs. Before the tow could be set, the Firby had to jettison her cargo and pump her holds. It took eight full days to accomplish this task because the salvage pumps were constantly clogging. When she was finally light enough to be towed off the reef, the weather turned foul—torrential rains, accompanied by strong winds and enormous waves that broke over the tug’s gunnel. With Firby’s engines full astern and the Franklin’s boilers at a bursting point, the hawser towline was stretched to its limit. The bottom plates on the freighter screeched, grinding against the reef as she was pulled away. As the ship eased off the rocks, her holds began filling with water, but her crew kept her afloat by running the pumps flat out. Three days later when the storm finally subsided, SS Firby was towed to Frigate Harbor and beached. Eventually, she was made sufficiently watertight for the 625-mile tow to Quebec City. It was another 14 days before the stubborn freighter could be nursed through the mudbanks and narrow channels of the St. Lawrence River. The Franklin had persevered through perilous weather at great risk. Most of Foundation Franklin’s rescues occurred in the dangerous coastal waters around Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but there were also abundant cries for assistance from ships in the open Atlantic. Just before Christmas in 1934. The 6,000-ton Belgian freighter Emile Jacque lost her rudder in a gale 350 miles southwest of Halifax. An effort was made by her sister ship, Henri Jaspar, to steer the injured vessel from astern. Their failed attempt was corrected by the Franklin, which was standing by. For more than seven hours, the tug towed the Emile Jacque in raging seas with 90-knot winds. Franklin herself was put in danger when the tow parted

off Chebucto Head. Fortunately, she had successfully towed the freighter to a good holding ground, where she set two anchors and held fast until the storm blew over and the tug crew could reattach the hawser. With all hands accounted for, eventually the Foundation Franklin arrived in Halifax—the freighter in tow. Four months later, another of Emile Jacque’s sister ships, Jean Jadot, experienced rudder trouble 300 miles southeast of Newfoundland. She was underway in a fierce gale and had jammed her rudder, putting the ship and crew at the mercy of heavy seas. The USCG cutter Mendota was the first to arrive on the scene and got a towline to the big freighter, but the size disparity between the Mendota and the Emile Jacque forced the small cutter to let go of the tow. The Franklin arrived on the scene and managed to get a hawser over to the freighter. The Emile Jacque’s rudder had jammed at an angle that made it difficult to steer the ship. The tug fought desperately for two days to keep the big freighter off the lethal shoals surrounding Sable Island, the famous “Graveyard of the Atlantic.” In time, the seas settled somewhat to give the tug a reprieve and the jammed rudder finally broke off, making the tow more manageable. Another rescued ship was delivered triumphantly into Halifax Harbor. During World War II, rescue tugs like the Franklin were unescorted and at the mercy of U-boats out in the Atlantic. Forty-one-year-old Harry Brushett was Foundation Franklin’s captain during this period, and after many close calls, he started to browbeat the naval authorities to provide an escort; they eventually conceded. Of all the extraordinary rescues this tug performed, the one that strained her to the limit took place 1,000 miles east of Halifax. The British freighter King Edward was in extreme weather and taking on water after a collision left her with a massive

gash in her bow. The Franklin eventually reached the beleaguered ship and successfully got her to port in St. Johns, Newfoundland. The whole operation had taken 20 days. The Franklin had steamed approximately 2,500 miles and arrived to the dock with only a half-ton of coal left in her bunkers. In 1944, the tug rescued no fewer than 22 ships, followed by another eight in 1945. By the end of World War II, oil had become the preferred fuel to drive boats longer distances. Franklin was converted to oil, resulting in her range increasing by 50 percent, but it was only a matter of time before her future was in jeopardy. Foundation Maritime purchased a Bustler-class tug and renamed her Foundation Josephine. The Franklin performed her final salvage operation in 1948. The Norwegian motor ship Arosa became disabled in an Atlantic hurricane, 870 miles from Halifax. With the Foundation Josephine undergoing repairs, the gutsy Franklin ventured into the storm. After four grueling days, Franklin found the Arosa on the open ocean. Fortunately, at that moment she was located in the eye of the hurricane, making the job of connecting the hawser between the two vessels manageable. As soon as they steered out of the eye, the Franklin was blasted with fierce northwest winds, forcing the tow to less than one knot. It became obvious to the captain that her fuel would be spent shy of Halifax. As the Franklin battled gale force winds, her crew chipped away the crippling ice from her superstructure. Her radio went out of commission, and the towline was stretched beyond its capacity. It wasn’t long before the winch ripped from its mounts, and the Franklin slowly left the Arosa astern, disappearing in the poor visibility. The Norwegians broadcast a new S•O•S and the urgently repaired Foundation Josephine put to sea to rescue them. Eleven days later, she towed the

big freighter into Boston Harbor. Meanwhile, with water pouring in from her damaged deck, almost out of fuel, and her tired engine failing, the Franklin was in desperate peril. To the astonishment of those along the Halifax waterfront, five days later the Foundation Franklin slowly emerged like a disembodied specter out of the mist. The damage to the tug was extensive, and she was deemed beyond repair. All that is left of the mighty tug today is her bridge and much of her heavy tackle, which have been preserved in Halifax at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, along with a plaque along the city’s boardwalk commemorating her many rescues. The ship’s bell bearing her original name, “Frisky,” was also saved. The Stockwell in the “Pool of London”

In early 1950, I lived in Roehampton, just outside of London, about a ten-mile bicycle ride to the city center. On my way to work, I would cross the Tower Bridge, associated with the “Pool of London.” Unless I was running late, I always stopped on the bridge, especially in the early morning when the sky was murky, overcast by the plumes of dark smoke from the tugs and barges that lined the wharves on both sides of the Thames. With my bike parked, I would lean over the rail and light a Woodbine between cupped hands and dream about going to sea. I could see in my imagination the sailing ships of earlier years, while I listened to the punctuated staccato of the steam-driven engines and the occasional blast from a tug’s horn. To say that navigating the river seemed hazardous is an understatement. It was so busy on some mornings that I thought I might have been able to go from one side of the river to the other just stepping on a bridge of boats. When the tide was low, I could smell the river, an ugly pungent aroma of sewage SeaHistory.org

The Stockwell In the Pool of London

and decaying seaweed. I liked it better on a high tide, when I could smell the residue of burning coke that pervaded the air. Either way, low tide or high, the river was always alive. I have chosen to show in this painting a perspective of the Pool of London on one of the most memorable events in British maritime history—the Dunkirk evacuation in June 1940. The event is especially indelible in the minds of those of us who were alive at the time. It involved hundreds of small boats that crossed the English Channel to save the 330,000 British and French soldiers forced to the beaches of Dunkirk by the German army. All of the small boats were skippered by volunteers, men and women, young and old. Had it not been for the brave souls who took command of these boats, the troops on the beach would have surely been killed or cap52

tured. There is little doubt that the Stockwell was among the boats that answered the call. Most of the shipping business in the early 1900s was centered on the increased need for coal, the fuel that drove the Industrial Revolution. The Stockwell first went into service in 1890 on the Thames in London. I chose to paint her because she embodies all those classic tugboat lines: the flush deck, the low rounded stern, and a tall stack that billowed out great plumes of umber smoke. She was 67 feet long with a beam of 15 feet. I painted her as she would look in the early morning when the Pool of London was just awakening to the bustle of marine activity. The Stockwell towed other, much larger ships on the Thames and for many years delivered goods and performed other services. After the war, she was transferred back

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to the Admiralty. I have tried desperately to research what became of her, unfortunately—to no avail. Austin Dwyer is a Senior Fellow with the Pacific Rim Institute of Marine Artists and a Signature Member of the American Society of Marine Artists. A native of County Tipperary, Ireland, Dwyer is also a published author, teacher, and musician having studied at the Municipal School of Music in Dublin. He came to the US States in 1957 and joined the Air Force. After his discharge from the military, he was accepted to the Burnley School of Professional Art in Seattle and later founded an advertising and marketing firm in Seattle with Dale Cohen. Tugboats to Remember (2023) is published by Austin Macauley Publishers, New York. You can learn more about the artist and his books at www.austindwyer.com.

The American Society of

MARINE ARTISTS 19th National Exhibition Albany Institute of History & Art, Albany, NY September 8th - December 31st

Minnesota Marine Art Museum, Winona, MN January 20th - May 12th, 2024

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SeaHistory.org 53

SEA HISTORY FOR KIDS

Maritime Careers Daniel Forster is a freelance photographer who specializes in marine and sailing photography. As a freelancer, he is self-employed and often supplements his marine photography with work as an architecture, portrait, and fine art photographer. Daniel was born in Switzerland, but he moved to Rhode Island in 1988 to be closer to the sea and Newport, long considered the yachting capital of the world. Daniel got his initial training through a three-year apprenticeship at a photography studio in Bern, Switzerland, which included one day a week taking classes at a photography school. Once he realized he could enjoy both sailing and photography and make a living doing it, he went freelance and hasn’t looked back. Daniel has worked as an official photographer for major regattas all around the world, plus commissioned work shooting big events, such as the Olympics (12 times), the America’s Cup (13 of them!), and Rolex regattas. So, yes, he travels. A lot.

COURTESY DANIEL FORSTER

Freelance Photographer—Daniel Forster

Daniel Forster hoisted aloft to get a shot of the deck from above.

In this profession, no two days are alike. When he isn’t traveling for photo shoots, he spends time in his office editing photos, backing up files,

archiving slides and past shoots, and planning the next gig. But the real excitement is when he’s working an event, often as part of a team. Daniel might be shooting from a chase boat, onboard a competing boat, or in a helicopter to get views from overhead. This is where his skills as a yacht racer and oceangoing sailor are critical as well.

I typically join the regatta a few hours before the start, where I join my team in a photo boat. I follow the race from the start to finish, including getting up close to the boats as they tack and jibe and round the race marks. I usually work with an Action shot of the racing crew during the Rolex NYYC Invitational Cup off Newport, Rhode Island, in September 2023.

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19 teams from 14 countries raced in this year’s Rolex NYYC Invitational Cup. Here, Daniel captured the boats as they head to the starting line.

It sounds like a lot of fun—which it is—but his work environment can be challenging, to say the least. When Daniel’s on the water in a chase boat or on a competing boat in a race, he might spend hours, days, or even weeks putting himself in uncomfortable positions to get the best shots. While some days are warm and calm and lovely, many are cold and wet. He

carries multiple cameras and lenses with him and has to make sure he protects his gear at all times from the elements. If a piece of equipment gets damaged, his options to replace them during a race are limited. In addition to Daniel’s skills as a photographer, to do this kind of work he also has to be a very skilled sailor. His jobs are not necessarily one day at a time. In 1986 he was aboard the winning maxi yacht as a crewmember and official photographer during the

Uruguay-to-England leg of the Whitbread Round-the-World Race, a distance of almost 6,000 miles on the open ocean. What does he do during his time off? You guessed it—he goes sailing! Daniel has had a lot of success in his career and his photographs have appeared in major magazines, such as TIME, Yachting—and Sea History! You can view his portfolio and learn more about him on his website: www. danielforster.com.

assistant, who is either with me on the boat or following from overhead in a helicopter. My camera has a transmitter and my assistant can receive my photos on his iPad in real time. He selects the best ones, edits them with Photoshop, and sends them to a dropbox, which the client can access to download the photos instantly. —DF

Daniel Forster (in orange foul weather gear) and crew getting wet and trying to keep camera gear dry as they race out on the open ocean to shoot photos during the Rolex Transatlantic Race in 2016.

SeaHistory.org

COURTESY PENOBSCOT MARINE MUSEUM

n the Age of Sail, ships that traveled the world’s oceans kept their captains and crews away from their families for long periods of time. Whaling ships, in particular, might be away from home for years at a time. This was in an era when the only way of communicating from far-flung places was by sending letters via other ships they met up with that were headed in the direction of their home port. But this was no guarantee, and at home their wives (in this era, it was rare for a woman to sail as crew) had no way of knowing if their husbands were alive and well and had no way of telling them news from home. Loneliness for loved ones proved difficult for both those at sea and those holding down the homefront ashore. Sea captains, who were afforded a few more privileges than the rest of the crew, would sometimes bring their wives and children to sea with them. This was facilitated by the fact that the captain often had use of a private cabin and sitting area back aft. One thing mariners who sail on long-distance voyages know well is that everything in their lives has to be taken care of onboard with whatever supplies and personnel they have with them. This includes healthcare. For

COURTESY PENOBSCOT MARINE MUSEUM

Born to Sail

Two-year-old Joanna Colcord on deck with the ship’s sailmaker. Joanna was born in 1882 onboard the barque Charlotte A. Littlefield while they were in the South Seas. She spent most of her childhood sailing on voyages between Maine and China. Her brother Lincoln was born 17 months later, delivered by their father who was simultaneously navigating his 548-ton ship around the Cape Horn during a major storm.

women, this could also include childbirth. If a woman was pregnant when she embarked on a voyage, some captains would bring a midwife onboard to assist when it came time to give birth, but plenty of women whose due dates arrived out at sea delivered babies on their own or only with the help of their captain-husbands. Couples who brought their children to sea with them tended to send

Lincoln and Joanna Colcord on deck with their pet goat.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

them ashore once they became teenagers for more formal education. As young children aboard ships at sea, their lives were as varied as the kinds of ships they sailed in and the places they sailed to. While this environment in and of itself provided an education in geography, meteorology, and marine science, most kids were taught by their parents with varying degrees of formality, not unlike homeschoolers today. Mothers typically took on the role of teacher; as kids got a little older, some took correspondence classes from schools and educators ashore, but this was relatively hard to achieve considering how infrequently they could send and receive mail. Zoom meetings were still centuries away. Kids today still go to sea on longdistance voyages with their parents, but these are usually cruising families who are sailing on their own, not running a commercial ship. How about you? Is that a childhood you would have liked? What would you miss?

ANIMALS IN SEA HISTORY by Richard J. King

PHOTO BY DOUG PERRINE, ALAMY

y late afternoon on his first day out of Boston Harbor, Bill Pinkney was already out of sight of land. Aboard his 47-foot sailboat, Commitment, Pinkney was embarking on a voyage around the world—solo. He skimmed across the waters of Massachusetts Bay and Stellwagen Bank, clearing Cape Cod before sunset. It was then that Pinkney heard a “whooshing sound,” but he couldn’t see from where it came. He even went down into the cabin to see if the noise was coming from there. I heard the sound again,” he wrote in As Long As It Takes, his story of the voyage. “This time it was directly to my right. Peering into the water, I spied a smooth, slick, black surface. Then I saw a hole on the top open and close, creating the whooshing sound. I was staring down at a pilot whale. The whale swam alongside his boat, which was cruising along at about 5 or 6 knots. Although Pinkney had been sailing for many years, his experiences had been mostly on coastal trips, and, he admitted, having grown up in inner-city Chicago, this was the closest he had ever come to a truly wild animal of any kind—on land or at sea. What struck him was “how large and powerful” it was—and its breath smelled so foul!! Pinkney leaned over the rail and watched, spellbound, for about 15 minutes before the whale disappeared from view. Pilot whales are technically dolphins—or toothed whales—and, with the exception of orcas, are the largest of the ocean dolphins. Pilot whales have had a handful of other common English names over the years, including “blackfish,” the “social whale,” “pot-head,” and “bottle-head.” The latter two are because of their bulbous foreheads. They’ve been called the social whale, including by SeaHistory.org

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Henry David Thoreau when he was writing about the shores of Cape Cod, because pilot whales are so regularly found in large schools. Although Bill Pinkney considered his single pilot whale as a “welcomer,” an escort out to the open sea, pilot whales are more commonly found in larger pods. They originally got their name because early Western observers thought a single pilot whale guided its group. Modern biologists, however, do not think the pods are led blindly by a single whale, but it has been observed that they are often led by female members of the pod. Pilot whales are found in all oceans throughout the world. For several centuries, people have hunted pilot whales out at sea for their oil and meat, and in coastal waters hunters have herded them into the shallows, sometimes by the hundreds. Biologists identify two species of pilot whale. Short-finned pilot whales have a larger range, preferring warmer waters, while long-finned pilot whales tend to live in the more northern latitudes, up around Greenland and Iceland and south nearly to the Antarctic Peninsula. Both species can be found off Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Long-finned and short-finned pilot whales both have the genus name Globicephala, which translates to “round head.” Like other toothed whales, such as belugas and sperm whales, their head is filled with special oils and fats, as well as a special valve in their nasal passage to make clicks and buzzes for echolocation to help with navigating underwater. They can dive down beyond 1,500 feet into the darkness to find their main food sources—squid, octopus, and fish. Pinkney’s observation of the whales’ bad smell from their spout is not an Herded and captured pilot whales on a Cape Cod beach in 1885

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

COURTESY OF THE PINKNEY FAMILY

He made it! Bill Pinkney celebrating his triumphant return to Boston after having sailed more than 27,000 miles around the world.

For more Animals in Sea History, see www.seahistory.org, or the new book Ocean Bestiary: Meeting Marine Life from Abalone to Orca to Zooplankton, a revised collection of over 15 years of this column! “Sea History for Kids” is sponsored by the Henry L. & Grace Doherty Charitable Foundation SeaHistory.org

NOAA PHOTO LIBRARY

uncommon one for mariners who have gotten that close to a whale at the surface. Mammal halitosis, both humans and whales, is caused by various bacteria and fungi. Imagine if you ate only squid and fish and never brushed your teeth! In that late summer of 1990, Bill Pinkney continued along his way and would become the first African American to sail alone around the world via the tempestuous Southern Ocean route. Pinkney, who died this year at the age of 87, had one more notable experience with pilot whales before his world-circling voyage A rare photo of two pilot whales “spy-hopping,” sticking their heads up was through. As dawn broke on the vertically out of the water off Guam. Note the shape of the head and the size of the open blow hole. morning that he was approaching Tasmania, after a 50-day passage from South Africa, he observed: “The rippling on the surface proved to be caused by a very large pod of pilot whales. Curiously, they were heading south, away from the island, toward Antarctica and the coldest part of the ocean.” Pinkney didn’t at first understand why they were heading in that direction, but then three hours later, he explained: “Their odd behavior became apparent.” Pinkney interpreted their behavior as having anticipated heavy weather because a couple of hours later, the weather changed quickly—so hard and so fast that a squall knocked his boat on its side for a few terrifying moments. Pinkney and Commitment survived (aside from a torn sail) and then coasted into the port of Hobart, Tasmania, before resuming his circumnavigation. Bill Pinkney sailed on, passing Cape Horn at the southern tip of Africa before crossing the Atlantic and navigating his boat back into Boston Harbor— just maybe with a pilot whale following astern.

MARLINSPIKE NEWS: SAILING SHIPS & SAIL TRAINING Welcome to the debut of a new feature in Sea History that covers news from the sail training and traditional sailing ship community. The fall issue of Marlinspike (#40) was our final print issue; all remaining subscriptions will be fulfilled by Sea History. Beginning with this issue, Marlinspike magazine is joining forces with the National Maritime Historical Society to continue to publish content about the topics our readers care about. Marlinspike will continue to maintain its Facebook page (www.facebook.com/marlin spikemagazine), where more than 29,000 followers discuss traditional sailing vessels and sail training. —Captain Michael Rutstein, publisher/editor Marlinspike We Can’t even Preserve All the Original Historic Vessels. Should We Be Preserving Replicas?

s this issue goes to press, a reader sent me the accompanying photo of the Lois McClure being towed under the Crown Point Bridge that connects Vermont and New York across Lake Champlain. The schooner had been built by the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum in 2004 as a replica of a 19thcentury sailing canal vessel, based on two shipwrecks located in the lake. The museum announced last year that it would retire the schooner after 20 years, and the original plan called for her to be disassembled. At least for now, she has been saved from dismemberment, and in this photo was en route to her new home under the stewardship of the Canal Society of New York, based in Port Byron. The photo raises a common question among preservationists: which vessels are worth preserving? Should “original” vessels take precedence over “replica” vessels? What does the term “original” even mean for vessels that must be constantly renewed to survive? What does the term “replica” mean, when information about the vessel being replicated is incomplete, or when compromises are made to allow passenger certification? Most readers of Sea History will be familiar with the concept of the ship of Theseus—the fabled vessel whose components were replaced over the centuries, until finally no original elements remained. Was this still the same ship sailed by the Greek demi-god? Some argue that a vessel consists of the relationship between its elements to one another, and if that relationship is maintained while the components are re60

COURTESY ELISA NELSON

Canal Schooner Lois McClure

placed, then it is still “original.” Others insist that once no original elements remain, it ceases to be the original vessel. The Coast Guard takes the view that as long as the original beam or bulkhead, which features the ship’s documentation number, is incorporated, a new boat of similar design can be built around it and still bear the name and number of the original vessel! Most historic vessels, over time, come to contain very little original material. Take USS Constitution, for example, launched in 1797. Estimates of what percentage of original material remains range as low as the single digits, but few would argue that this is not the original “Old Ironsides.” Mystic Seaport’s 1841 whaler Charles W. Morgan has had major work, but we see her historic value. Some members of our sail-training fleet have been nearly 100% rebuilt, such as the schooner Ernestina-Morrissey—launched in 1894.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

Several Maine windjammers dating from the 19th century have undergone multiple, major rebuilds over their long lives. The historic 1925 William Handdesigned schooner Hindu is undergoing one as this is being written. Then there are the replica vessels built to represent historic vessels, containing no original material whatsoever. Probably the best-known replica vessel in our country is the Mayflower II, presented to the US by the UK in the 1950s and rebuilt recently in preparation for the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims’ landing. Plimoth Patuxet feels that its long-lived replica has become a historic vessel in her own right. It applied for, and received, National Register of Historic Places status for her. Discuss amongst yourselves whether this is warranted. Visit the National Park Service website for details on what is and isn’t eligible to be named a National Historic Landmark. This designation of the Mayflower II opens the door for other replicas. We have a host of replica vessels from colonial and early US history: other vessels from the Age of Exploration, such as the Maryland Dove, Elizabeth II, Godspeed, Discovery, Susan Constant, Virginia, San Salvador, and Kalmar Nyckel; vessels dating from the Revolutionary era, such as “HMS” Surprise (ex“HMS” Rose,) Sultana, Lady Washington, and Providence; and no fewer than five representing vessels and vessel types from the War of 1812, most notably the Pride of Baltimore II and the brig Niagara. There are also “representations” (namesakes rather than replicas) that

serve as dockside attractions, such as the Boston Tea Party ships, the coldmolded Friendship of Salem; and the late brig Pilgrim. The Lake Champlain Maritime Museum ran smack into this conundrum with the Lois McClure. She needed serious work, and the museum had to decide whether it wanted to commit major resources to the restoration of what is, after all, a replica. As LCMM’s executive director said at the time, “replicas are teaching tools, tools to use to meet your mission.” They are not, themselves, the mission. The museum made the bold decision to document, and then disassemble, the schooner after the 2023 season. A lot of people were much relieved when the Canal Society of New York State stepped up at the eleventh hour to take custody of the vessel. (She will winter over at Beacon Bay Marina in Cayuga, New York, while plans are being formulated to make repairs and decide her ultimate role for the Canal Society.) Historic St. Mary’s City in Maryland recently faced a similar dilemma with their aging re-creation of the Maryland Dove. Museum leadership decided that they liked having a boat around, but, given a wealth of new scholarship about the original, opted to build a new vessel, a true replica, and to retire the previous vessel (the current hope is to create a land-based exhibit around her). In both cases, tough decisions had to be made. Replica vessels, no less than originals, represent large investments of time, energy, and money. Some of their supporters are not going to accept that “their” vessel has outlived its usefulness. Not every vessel can be preserved forever. In fact, very few can. Most of the replica vessels named in this article will, at some point, reach the tipping point, where they have become a burden rather than a benefit for the organizations that own them. What then?

Visit the historic seaport of Salem, Mass for a cruise on our recreation of the 1812 privateer FAME! Sailing May through October from our downtown dock!

978.729.7600 SchoonerFame.com “FAME is ... particularly successful and authentic.” — WoodenBoat

SeaHistory.org

Hindu Restoration

Hindu’s restoration proceeds apace in Maine. The scope of the rebuild has expanded, but owners Josh Rowan and Erin Desmond remain committed to doing right by their 100-year-old schooner, which they have operated out of Provincetown, Massachusetts, and Key West, Florida, for many years. One of the nice things about doing such a complete rebuild, according to Rowan, is that the schooner’s original sheer is being fully restored.

the Boothbay Harbor Shipyard to use at the turn of the main mast, at the chain plates. I really wanted that part of the boat to have no worry of grain runout and no worry of strength. I went with live oak because of the way that the grain runs in every direction and even curls around itself. I’ve tried to break the stuff—and I couldn’t! I wanted that part of the boat, where boats tend to fail, right by the chain plates, right at that turn of the bilge—to be right.” (www.sailschoonerhindu.com) Tall Ships America Mentorship Program

Picton Castle Berths Available

The barque Picton Castle is halfway through her 2023–24 circumnavigation; at press time she was bound for Fiji from Tonga. Berths are available for Leg 4, which begins in Cape Town on or about 22 February 2024. The itinerary includes Namibia, the island of St. Helena, and island-hopping in the Eastern Caribbean. From there, the barque will sail north to Bermuda, then on to Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, where the voyage will wrap up in July of 2024. (www.picton-castle.com)

COURTESY SCHOONER HINDU

Tall Ships America is offering a mentorship program: a 3-to-4 month professional development opportunity for individuals looking for help with the merchant mariner licensing process. Mentors and mentees meet once a month for an hour, either virtually or

in person, and report back to the oversight committee. Applicants must be current members of Tall Ships America, pursuing a license, renewal, upgrade, or medical certificate. Applications are taken on a rolling basis and space is limited. Additional info can be found at tallshipsamerica.org.

“We brought the stern up 13 inches and the bow up 16. We badly wanted the boat to take its shape back. We have a sideline drawing of the boat, and we put the bow and the stern at the position that they should have been in the line drawing, which we got out of Rudder magazine. Once we got to those places, the boat just looked and felt right. We went with locust because it’s far more rot-resistant and easier on the metal fasteners. White oak is an incredible wood, but it’s not great in the tropics and it’s not great for fasteners. I also got some live oak from Andy Tyska at Picton Castle at anchor in Tonga.

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

COURTESY BARQUE PICTON CASTLE

Schooner Hindu rebuild.

SHIP NOTES, SEAPORT & MUSEUM NEWS

Kit Jones

of the Kit Jones, which also secured her a designation on the list of Georgia Historic Trust Places in Peril—the first and only Vessel in Peril on that list. The Friends purchased the original blueprints to the tug and enlisted the help of craftsman Steve Ellis to direct work on restoring her as closely as possible to her 1939 configuration. Kit Jones is now located adjacent to the town’s historic Old Jail Museum on Highway 17. The Friends are hard at work making the vessel the focal point for a new park, including 1950s-era bollards and chains recovered from a Georgia military installation, commemorative benches, and a splash pad for kids. Designed by Sparkman & Stephens, the 60-foot tug was launched off of Sapelo Island in 1939; tobacco heir R. H. Reynolds Jr. needed a boat to carry supplies and passengers to the island, which he had recently purchased. She was built of live

IMAGE BY TAMARA THOMSEN AND ZACH WHITROCK, WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY

3D photogrammetry model of the Trinidad wreck site.

oak and pine that had been cut and milled right on the island. She would go on to work as a fireboat for the US Coast Guard in WWII, and later she would serve as a research vessel for the Sapelo Island Research Foundation, for the University of Georgia Marine Institute, and finally for the University of Mississippi. (www.savethekitjones.com) … In July, Wisconsin shipwreck hunters Brendon Baillod and Bob Jaeck located the remains of the 156-year-old schooner Trinidad off the shores of Algoma, Wisconsin. The team had been searching for the wreck site for two years with the aid of sidescan sonar in a location determined by contemporary reports of the loss of the ship and documentation of local shipping lanes. Trinidad was en route from Port Huron to Milwaukee in the spring of 1881 with a load of coal, but her already-leaky hull began to take on water at a dangerous rate on the morning of 11 May; Captain John Higgins and his crew were forced to abandon ship, having no time to grab warm clothes or foul weather gear. After 8 hours in the ship’s yawl boat, the crew made it to shore at Ahnapee (now Algoma), where they were fed and given dry, warm clothes. The insurance investigation indicated that the sinking was attributed to the poor condition of the ship due to neglect. Trinidad was built in 1867 by William Keefe in Grand

Island, New York, for Oswego merchants John Keller and Aaron Merriam. She served in the grain trade, hauling coal and iron from New York to cities along the Great Lakes and returning with grain. The identity of the ship was verified following a survey conducted by Crossmon Consulting via remote operated vehicle (ROV), taking precise measurements of the hull and comparing them with Trinidad’s customs house enrollment records. The sunken vessel is intact and contains crewmembers’ personal possessions, anchors, and other artifacts. Wisconsin state underwater archaeologist Tamara Thomsen and diver Zach Whitrock documented the shipwreck and created a 3D photogrammetry model of the site. Baillod is working with the Wisconsin State Historical Society to nominate the site for the National Register of Historic Places. (www.wisconsinhistory.org) … Schooner Trinidad, 1873

JOHN S. ROCHON COLLECTION

FRIENDS OF THE KIT JONES

The historic tug Kit Jones has been restored and installed as a static display ship in Darien, Georgia—her original stomping grounds. Many Sea History readers first learned about the Kit Jones in 2016 via a Historic Ships on a Lee Shore article in Sea History 154. At that time, her then-owner, the University of Mississippi, did not have the resources to restore and maintain the vessel and was hoping for an entity to step in and take over her care. We were happy to report in Sea History 168 (2019) that she had safely made the overland journey to Darien, a complex road trip made possible by the Friends

SeaHistory.org

FLORIDA DOT

In early October, Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) crews digging in St. Augustine unearthed part of a 19th-century wooden vessel buried downtown. Believed to be a fishing vessel (at left) originally about 28 feet long, the boat’s remains were found at a depth of about eight feet below ground; it likely sank and was silted in. The soil and mud that settled around it helped preserve the MAINE WINDJAMMER CRUISES ® SELECT YOUR A DVENTURE! Choose from 4 Traditional Sailing Vessels NEW!

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The US Navy History Experience: 1776–1945 9

c. 1780, cutaway, working decks

The all new Nautical History Gallery & Museum opened #in 2023, featuring ship models that cover the evolution of US Navy ships from the Revolutionary War, Civil War, -9 Spanish-American War, and World Wars I & II—includes #9 the beginning of naval aviation. These hand-crafted 3-D miniatures were created by Joe Frangiosa Jr., a retired #-9 4-year Navy vet & 16-year USMC helicopter crew chief.

Located at:

2640 Historic Decatur Rd. Bldg. 200, Suite 108 San Diego, CA 92106 Ph. 619 366-2469 www.nhgallery.org USN, White Fleet cruiser, cutaway in dry dock, c. 1895

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

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LINDA ROY WALLS PHOTOGRAPHY

Skipjack Rebecca T. Ruark

NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE ROYAL NAVY

structure, although the stern portion has been lost to decay. FDOT enlisted Southeastern Archaeological Research Inc. (SEARCH) to work with crews on-site to monitor for discoveries of this nature; SEARCH conducted detailed measuring and documentation of the vessel and conducted its removal for preservation. (www.fdot.gov; www. searchinc.com) … The conservation team working on Nelson’s flagship HMS Victory has discovered that the ship was in much worse condition than their initial assessment, made a year ago. Andrew Baines, director of the project, said: “Although a cursory look at Victory in early 2022 might have given the impression that the ship was in good condition, in reality a thin skin of paint and filler masked planking that was almost entirely rotten on the ship’s starboard side. As soon as the outer, sound layer was removed, the team of shipwrights were confronted with material that no longer resembled timber and was much closer to potting compost.” Work began on Victory’s hull in May 2022 after the erection of a protec-

HMS Victory

tive structure around the historic ship, which allowed work to be carried out in all types of weather, facilitating the drying out of her timbers and allowing visitors to view the work in progress. Baines also reported that much of the material that needs to be replaced was from restoration work performed subsequent to 1955. The first stage of the

current project was the removal of degraded planks from the ship’s midsection and conducting detailed surveys of the ship in her current form. The next step will be to replace the rotted timbers. Baines estimated that the project will be completed in less than ten years, with a price tag of £40–£45 million (roughly $49–$55 million). The oldest commissioned warship in the world, HMS Victory was completed in 1765 at Chatham Dockyard at a cost of £63,000 (the equivalent of about $900 million today), and she spent the next 13 years in reserve; by the end of that period, about one-third of the ship had been replaced due to decay. (National Museum of the Royal Navy, www.nmrn. org.uk) … Rebecca T. Ruark, said to be the oldest skipjack still sailing, is back in the water after she was severely damaged on 27 December 2022. A pickup truck crashed through a piling on the pier on Tilghman Island in the Chesapeake Bay and landed with its front half on board the vessel, damaging the cabin and starboard stern. The repairs, including significant fiberglass and resin work and a new cabin—carrying a price tag of approximately $60,000—were completed by the end SeaHistory.org

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of the summer. Her owner, Wade Murphy III, who assumed ownership from his father, Wade Murphy Jr., successfully competed in the 64th annual Deal Island Skipjack Races, held this year on 4 September, taking home 2nd-place honors. Murphy said he intends to put her back to work oystering. The Ruark was built in 1886 by Moses Geohegan at Taylor’s Island, Maryland, for William T. Ruark and was named for Ruark’s wife. It is believed that this skipjack was originally built as a two-masted schooner and converted to a sloop. The Ruark started her oystering career out of Baltimore and Crisfield, Maryland; she would continue to work out of Maryland under several owners until her purchase in 1984 by Capt. Murphy, who had owned the skipjack Sigsbee since 1964. Murphy moved her to her new homeport on Tilghman Island and had the vessel rebuilt in 1986. In 1999 Rebecca T. Ruark encountered a gale and capsized; she had to be refloated and received a new mast, as well as other repairs. She was relaunched in 2000 and added charter cruises in the off season to her calendar. … In July, Senator Charles Schumer announced that the historic FDNY Marine Co. # 1 John D. McKean fireboat was added to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP), which will help secure access to critical funding to preserve the vessel. The 1954 fireboat served the City of New York for 58 years, responding to countless emergencies, including the 9/11 attacks, the “Miracle on the Hudson” US Airways emergency landing in the Hudson River in 2009, and the Staten Island ferry’s Manhattan terminal fire in 1991. The McKean Fireboat organization seeks to reach out to communities and schools along the Hudson River to engage students about the possibility of a maritime career. The NRHP designation will allow the organization access (continued on page 68)

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

USCG Barque Eagle 2023 Training Cruise

PHOTOS COURTESY USCG / DVIDS.COM

his year, the crew of the Coast Guard barque Eagle sailed over 16,800 nautical miles, traveling to the Azores, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Madeira, and Bermuda as part of their annual training cruise, after departing New London in April for a four-month deployment. During this time more than 800 cadets and officer candidates trained onboard. In addition to her primary mission to train future Coast Guard officers, Eagle serves as a diplomatic tool and global ambassador, embarking more than 37,000 visitors during the deployment. The Coast Guard Academy’s flagship helped advance US interests by reinforcing key Arctic partnerships while visiting the Baltic and North Sea. Eagle welcomed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s newest member state, Finland, with a port call in Helsinki alongside the Finnish offshore patrol vessel Turva. “America’s Tall Ship” also hosted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and numerous other dignitaries and distinguished guests. As part of a long-standing partnership with Tall Ships America, more than 20 members of that organization sailed during portions of the trip and assisted Eagle with sail handling and training, providing a unique opportunity to share knowledge among the traditional sailing ship community.

One historic highlight came this summer when Eagle sailed alongside Danmark, a full-rigged Danish sail training vessel, which was placed at the disposal of the United States by Captain Knud L. Hansen during World War II after Denmark was invaded by Germany. For the remainder of the war, Danmark was leased to the US Coast Guard and trained future officers—just as Eagle does now. “Once again, Eagle’s crew trained hundreds of cadets and officer candidates with resounding success,” said Capt. Jessica Rozzi-Ochs, Eagle’s commanding officer. “But this deployment also served to demonstrate to those future officers that, in addition to our statutory missions, the Coast

Guard has an important role protecting and advancing US interests around the world with our allies and partners.” Eagle is the only active square-rigged vessel in US government service. Built in 1936 at the Blohm and Voss Shipyard in Hamburg, Germany, and originally commissioned by the German navy, Eagle was taken as a war reparation by the United States following World War II.1 Eagle’s route home from Europe this year closely mirrored the ship’s first post-war voyage as a commissioned US Coast Guard cutter, when the ship traveled from Europe to the United States with stops in Madeira, Bermuda, and New York City. Eagle, a 295-foot barque, has served as a classroom at sea to future Coast Guard officers since 1946, offering a unique leadership and professional development experience to cadets and officer candidates. “I am extremely proud of the crew of Eagle,” Rozzi-Ochs said. “The dedication and commitment of the ship and its crew during this deployment shows the high level of training and professionalism that embody our Coast Guard core values. I have no doubt that the future Coast Guard officers who have trained aboard the decks of Eagle are well prepared for whatever challenges the future brings to our nation.” Eagle’s 2024 training schedule is still being finalized, but planning is underway for a Caribbean deployment to maximize US relationships with important partners in that region. 1 Capt. Gordon MacGowan captured Eagle’s postwar transfor-

mation and that 1946 voyage in his memoir The Skipper and the Eagle, published by Sea History Press. You can purchase a copy, on sale now for just $10 plus s/h at the NMHS Ship’s Store: www.seahistory.org/store.

SeaHistory.org

(continued from page 66) to the historic rehabilitation tax credit and grants through the Historic Preservation Fund. (www.fireboatmckean.org) … LaGuardia Community College / CUNY in Long Island City, NY, has received a $189,986 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities for the project “New York as Port City,” which focuses on the city’s maritime history and migration. The

project, led by English professor Christopher Schmidt and history professor Karen Miller, will be an experiential case study comprising two one-week workshops for higher-education and humanities professionals in 2024. “The Port City workshops will conduct site visits to landmarks, including Manhattan’s historic port architectures, museums of maritime and migration history,

and shipping infrastructures,” said Miller. “Through readings and discussions, walking tours, and four visiting scholar presentations, we will explore how the city’s waterfront has changed in response to shifting economic conditions and ecological crises. The city will serve as a learning lab as we explore the cultural shifts and ecological challenges that have transformed the original

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SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

PHOTO BY CAPT. TODD BURGMAN

port into today’s vibrant and diverse global city.” Some of the locations to be toured by the groups include South Street Seaport Museum, the lower Manhattan waterfront, the Port of Newark Container Terminal, and the Billion Oyster Project on Governor’s Island. (CUNY LaGuardia Community College, www.laguardia.edu) … Miles and Alex Pincus, the brothers and business partners who own and manage the historic vessels Sherman Zwicker and Pilot (both operating as oyster bars in New York City), have purchased the three-masted Maine windjammer schooner Victory Chimes. While the long-term plans for the vessel have not been determined, she will be on display at Hudson River’s Pier 25 for the near future. Victory Chimes was built in 1900 in Bethel, Delaware, at the George K. Phillips Co. shipyard. Christened Edwin and Maud, she operated as a freighter out of Baltimore for C. C. Paul & Co. and Albert F. Paul, carrying fertilizer, grain, coal, and lumber. In 1946 she was sold to Herman Knust to carry passengers for Chesapeake Bay Vacation Cruises, and in 1954 she changed hands, sailing for Maine Schooner Cruises and then for Captain Frederick Guild under the name Victory Chimes. She was sold in the mid-1980s to Thomas Monaghan of Domino’s Pizza, who renamed the schooner Domino Effect. She received an extensive overhaul in 1988; within three years she had returned to Maine under the ownership of Captains Kip Files and Paul DeGaeta with the name Victory Chimes restored, carrying passengers for seasonal windjammer cruises. Her image was selected to appear on the face of the Maine state quarter. The Pincus brothers are the founders of Crew NY; they also acquired the historic schooner yacht Coronet (1885) in December 2022 and plan to restore that vessel as a fully operational yacht. (www.crewny.com)

Victory Chimes departing Rockland Harbor, 11 October 2023.

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Neith, 1996, Cover photograph

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REVIEWS The Ship Beneath the Ice: The Discovery of Shackleton’s Endurance by Mensun Bound (Mariner Books, New York, 2023; 403pp, illus, gloss, appen, biblio, ISBN 978-0-06329740-1; $35hc) The graves are all aligned east-west in the cemetery at the old whaling station at Grytviken, South Georgia Island—except one. Sir Ernest M. Shackleton’s grave faces south, toward Antarctica. As leader of the Imperial TransAntarctic Expedition, 1914–1917, Shackleton, with 26 hand-picked men and one stowaway, proposed to sail their ship Endurance across the Weddell Sea, disembark, and sledge across Antarctica via the South Pole to a prepared camp and waiting vessel on the opposite side of the continent. That overland journey never happened. Endurance got trapped in the ice, drifted with the pack ice for ten months in the Weddell Sea, and finally sank under the crushing pressure of the ice. Shackleton led his men across a morass of ice and sea before sailing to Elephant Island in Endurance’s small boats. It was a refuge on terra firma, but in a location that offered no hope of rescue. Shackleton then determined to sail with five men in a 22.5foot boat named the James Caird, 800 miles across tempestuous seas to South Georgia to secure the rescue of his men. Remarkably they succeeded, and their shipmates were saved. But what about the Endurance? Lost under thick ice at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, the idea of locating the Endurance wreck site was inconceivable until developments in undersea technology made it feasible to consider exploring the seabed under ice at depths to 10,000 feet. By 2019, the technology was in place. That year, the internationally renowned maritime archaeologist Mensun Bound was serving as director of exploration aboard the South African icebreaker S. A. Agulhas II on a scientific expedition that included a ship-

wreck-search component to look for Endurance. Sea and ice conditions proved extremely challenging, equipment failures reduced search time, and the loss of a very expensive AUV effectively ended the search. Undaunted—and obviously well-funded (though the sources of financial support for the expeditions are not fully revealed)—a focused project to find Endurance was

launched in 2022. Agulhas II again served as the platform, with many returning search team members, including expedition leader John Shears. With the use of the new Sabertooth hybrid AUV/ROV submersible equipped with lights, camera, and sonar, the Endurance wreck site was discovered in 9,800 feet of water on 5 March, a month after they left Cape Town. Bound’s account of the 2019 expedition comprises the first half of the book. His account is based on his journal entries, enriched by commentary on Shackleton’s expedition, plus his personal story and his own relationships to the quest, including observations about wildlife and climate change. It is a creative approach that captures the reader’s attention. Sometimes through terse observations: I find it really remarkable that humans have recorded every feature of the moon in tiny detail,

we have a lander on Mars probing the planet’s subsurface; and, as for Voyager 1, it is now out there in interstellar space transmitting data from beyond the Kuiper Belt. We know more about the rings of Saturn than we know about our own Southern Ocean. To me it is painfully paradoxical that although we can peer 32 billion light years across the observable universe, we cannot see to the bottom of the Weddell Sea. Bound relays how Shackleton’s crew fired harpoons with the date inscribed on them into blue whales so that others might record and study their migration patterns. Then, without missing a beat, we learn about Shackleton’s appreciation of music aboard ship as an aid to mental well-being. This included singing and making certain that meteorologist Leonard Hussey’s banjo was aboard. Bound’s own musical reveal is that his defining tune of the 20th century was the Beatles’ “Love Me Do.” These asides should not deflect from the accomplishment achieved by the discovery of Endurance. It is truly remarkable. Equally remarkable are the technologies and scientific methodologies employed. Bound created the search box used to locate a ship that was under ice and 10,000 feet of water in one of the world’s most dangerous—and frozen—seas. Many years of archival research and study of the history, geography, and geology of the area and of the ship were combined to determine the search area. If the Endurance proved not to be within the box, precious time and money would have been wasted. Once the dive was planned, they dived the plan. The appendices help explain how the discovery was accomplished. The third appendix is a manifest of those aboard S. A. Agulhas II on the Endurance22 Expedition. Included are: 11 senior expedition team members, SeaHistory.org

including leader John Shears (UK); Mensun Bound (Falklands Islands/ UK), the director of exploration; Nico Vincent (France), the expedition subsea manager; Dr. Lesse Rabenstein (Germany), chief scientist; Capt. Knowledge Bengu; and ice pilot Capt. Freddie Ligtherm (South Africa); 15 scientists and engineers, 13 AUV and subsea; the 13-member aviation team for the helicopter; the White Desert Ice Camp team of 7 (to build an ice camp if needed); and 8 people working on media and outreach. All 67 team members had one goal: find Endurance. Saturday, 5 March 2002, would be the day it all came together. The Endurance was clearly identified in 3,008 meters of water via sonar and later photographic images relayed by the tethered Sabertooth submersible. A few days later, something else surfaced that gave pause to the celebrations. The time of the identification of Endurance was 1604 hours. Someone recognized that Shackleton had been buried on South Georgia exactly 100 years earlier in 1922, at about that same time—1600 hours. The gobsmacked team members promptly decided to divert the ship from its direct route to Cape Town for a stop at South Georgia to pay their respects to “the Boss.” Following approvals, they made it to the cemetery, where poetry was recited, testimonials were made, and an image of the newly discovered Endurance was placed by Capt. Bengu on Shackleton’s grave. Timothy J. Runyan, PhD Greenville, North Carolina Combat Divers: An Illustrated History of Special Forces Divers by Michael G. Welham (Osprey Publishing, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing, Oxford, UK, 2023, 304pp, illus, biblio, index, isbn 978-1-4728-5600-5; $40hc) Those who work undersea as military divers or combat swimmers serve in an elite group. Whether performing 72

undersea missions such as reconnaissance or disarming mines, or using the sea as a means to approach a target with stealth, both skill and courage are required. Many of the world’s militaries

employ divers, some as a primary mission, others as part of their overall capability. These are discussed and displayed in vivid color in Michael Welham’s new book, Combat Divers: An Illustrated History of Special Forces Divers. Welham opens with the history of military diving, starting in World War II. He also discusses many topics related to military diving, such as experimental diving, infiltration methods, and the use of marine mammals and unmanned underwater vehicles. The opening section may be the most informative from a historical perspective. The discussion of the earliest days of military diving to conduct ship attacks, pioneered by the Italian Navy, is an important part of naval history and is a must-read for those interested in the subject. But Combat Divers has much more to offer. As implied by the title, there are a wide variety of photographs. Favorites include the iconic portrait of LT Lionel Kenneth “Buster” Crabb, RNVR, a two-page photo of US Naval Special Warfare Operators conducting a High-

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

Altitude Low Opening (HALO) jump into the sea with a full complement of diving gear, and a US Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) Technician responding to a limpet mine attached to a ship’s hull. All enthusiasts of the history of military diving will especially enjoy “Special Forces Diver Units,” a chapter in which units from across the globe are described in detail with illustrative, high-quality photographs that appear to be captured by official photographers for public affairs purposes. Welham also includes interesting exploits from each unit’s history. The chapter titled “Special Forces Diver Selection and Training” is equally enthralling. It relays the screening process leading to acceptance into a training pipeline, the location of each of these elite units’ schools, and what their training entails. Two of the chapters in Combat Divers focus on specific regions—Scandinavia and the Far East. This adds interesting context to the work, but then one is left wondering if there is more we could learn from Africa, the Americas, or other parts of the globe. Also, Welham’s book is not without error. For example, he relays the story of Petty Officer Michael Thornton’s actions advising the South Vietnamese Navy, suggesting he was the sole United States Navy SEAL in the role. Welham describes actions that include a heroic effort to rescue a “senior officer,” but this was, in fact, Lieutenant Thomas Norris, a SEAL officer who had been recommended—and eventually received—the Medal of Honor for an earlier mission. Thornton received the Medal of Honor, thus becoming the only Medal of Honor recipient to receive the award for rescuing another recipient. It’s puzzling that this important detail was missed. Despite this minor critique, Combat Divers is an informative history book. Fans of military history will find more

information on any given diving unit in its pages than is available in a simple internet search. Beyond the text, the wide range of photos alone makes Combat Divers worthy of any military book collection. Stephen Phillips Millersville, Maryland SS United States: An Operational Guide to America’s Flagship by James K. Rindfleisch, F. Samuel Bauer, and Stanton R. Daywalt (Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 2023, 216pp, illus, notes, index, ISBN 978-0-76436-655-0 $45hc) The ocean liner SS United States became a symbol of the post-war emergence of the United States as preeminent on the world stage. During this time, the transAtlantic passenger trade was largely in the hands of the British, with lesser roles played by the French, the Germans, and others. The flagship of the United States Lines was built by the Newport News Shipbuilders (now Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc.). When it was launched in 1951, it immediately became the pride of the American passenger fleet. The authors note the speed records set by the vessel and the fact that it took the Blue Riband, an unofficial title bestowed upon the fastest transAtlantic passenger ship, from its European rivals. In this latest book on the famous liner, the authors identify which technical elements enabled this vessel to achieve this title. It is geared to an audience interested in the way that the ship was operated, especially because, while there is no shortage of books telling this ship’s story, few focus on the day-to-day operations or on the technical aspects. As an “operational guide,” this book chronicles the design and construction of SS United States, plus the technical details and daily operations of the ship. It fills a gap left by prior books about the liner; most are concerned primarily with the person-

alities, history, and legacy of its service as a passenger liner. There is one other book about operations, SS United States: The View from Down Below by Robert Sturm (2015), which examines the personal experiences that the author had as one of the ship’s engineers, but the scope of this new tome is much broader and more comprehensive. SS United States always had an air of mystery about her. Designed by naval architect William Francis Gibbs, the record-breaking ocean liner incorporated many design features from military vessels designed by Gibbs and Cox. For example, components of the propulsion system were similar to those used in the newly constructed Forrestalclass aircraft carriers. The blueprints and construction details were kept secret due to the government stipulation that, in return for the government funding two-thirds of the $78 million cost (1951 dollars), she could be readily converted into a military transport in the event of war overseas. The details of such a conversion are particularly interesting. Wartime modifications would include, but not be limited to, the installation of ten 3” anti-aircraft guns (55-caliber) and associated fire control systems, renovation of the pool area for storage, and the replacement of regular beds with bunk beds in the passenger cabins. In addition, four fog-generating machines were to be placed at the rear of the ship and all exterior lights and windows were to be covered up. The bridge could be armored against shell splinters, while two lifeboats were to be removed for a clear arc of anti-aircraft fire. In the interior spaces, all artwork and furniture would be removed. In their place, an armory, an auxiliary radio room, a combat information center, an expanded galley, and additional toilets would be installed. Two motor whaleboats, two motor launches, and a landing craft were to be carried onboard. SeaHistory.org

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This book is a product of the personal connections that the authors each have with the vessel. As a child in his father’s skiff on the James River, James Rindfleisch observed the ship at her launching and during subsequent visits. He started work on the book in 1992 after hearing the news that the United States was to be towed to Turkey for removal of hazardous materials, but he died before the book was completed. Co-authors F. Sam Baur and Rindfleisch were, respectively, professor and student at Christopher Newport College in Newport News, Virginia (now Christopher Newport University). Both were involved with the efforts to conserve the ship through the SS United States Conservancy as was the third author, long-time SS United States admirer and supporter Stanton Daywalt. In recent years there has been an ongoing debate over the future of the vessel, currently owned by the SS United States Conservancy (SSUSC) and docked in Philadelphia. There are many who advocate for saving the ship. Despite the ship’s age and exposure to the elements, the hull is in relatively good condition. This is partly due to the highquality materials used in her construction and that the ship has long been moored in fresh water and less subject to corrosion. The materials were originally slated for the construction of a planned aircraft carrier that would bear the same name. When the carrier project was canceled, the materials were already at the shipyard. This subsequent use of carrier-caliber steel has played a big factor in the survival of the ocean liner over the decades. At present, the mechanical elements of the ship are still in place, but the interior spaces have been stripped. Plans for her future have ranged from creating a library ship to conversion to a static hotel to a cruise ship. Any of these options would cost hundreds of millions of dollars. Naturally, there are

SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

plenty of others who would like to see the ship sold off, as they consider her a white elephant. Anyone interested in this storied ship will enjoy this book. Aspiring marine engineers or those who have an interest in the hospitality industry will be particularly interested, as the book offers insights into both the engineering and hospitality aspects of the vessel and the general practices of the twilight era of the great liners. Eitan J. Rosen Scarsdale, New York The Fighting Coast Guard: America’s Maritime Guardians at War in the Twentieth Century, edited by Mark A. Snell (University Press of Kansas, Lawrence, 2023, 431pp, notes, index, ISBN 978-0-7006-3394-4; $34.95hc) As the canon of its published history expands, it is becoming increasingly harder to call the Coast Guard the forgotten service. Books like this one contribute mightily to rightfully recognizing its contributions in service to the United States and its citizens. For this work in particular, editor Mark Snell chose to focus on just the military responsibilities and actions of the Coast Guard in the 20th century. Past works in the field have taken a broader approach, encapsulating all of the service’s—and its many predecessor agencies’—military stories into single compendia. Conversely, a handful of books have covered individual wars and the Coast Guard’s roles in them. Snell pulled together an all-star roster of writers, a talented group of researchers and historians who will stand as this generation’s greatest interpreters of Coast Guard history, including many who work or have worked in the Coast Guard Historian’s Office, tasked with preserving the service’s history. The book opens with a survey of pre-20th-century US Coast Guard military history, primarily focused on

the Revenue Cutter Service (the Coast Guard, as we know it, formed in 1915), before moving into three sections comprising World War I, World War II, and the Cold War and beyond. Rather than approach the topic of each conflict wholly, the authors cover specific actions or operations and follow the careers of individual cutters. For instance, World War II is told through the USCG Cutter Taney, from Pearl Harbor to V-J Day; Atlantic convoy escort duties; the Greenland patrol; the Battle of Guadalcanal; and D-Day. Robert M. Browning Jr., retired US Coast Guard historian, offers a broader examination of “The US Coast Guard and the Pacific War,” and John A. Tilley, retired history professor at East Carolina University, contributed “The Auxiliary at War, 1941–1945.” Perhaps the most important section of the book, the one at which future historians will need to look most closely, is the third, on the latter half of the 20th century. World Wars I and II have always held a certain luster for historians in many fields. Americans questioned the Korean War, protested the Vietnam War. The Coast Guard, as usual, played its roles in these conflicts, but their stories have not been as widely studied as the earlier wars. In these chapters, USCG historian Scott Price brings us through the Korean War, and Paul C. Scotti, retired Chief Warrant Officer and historian for the Coast Guard Combat Veterans Association, takes us on inshore patrol in the DMZ in Vietnam, while the USCG cutter Taney returns for yet another combat run. The book does not cover the Persian Gulf conflicts of the 1990s, but perhaps will in another, future edition. Works like this one change the narrative of Coast Guard history. In the past, authors working in the field tried their best to prove that no matter what conflict the United States had entered, not only were the Navy, Army, Marines

and eventually the Air Force there, the Coast Guard participated as well. This book proves simply that no matter the conflict, the Coast Guard was there. John Galluzzo Hanover, Massachusetts The Boxer Rebellion: Bluejackets and Marines in China, 1900–1901 by Emily Abdow (Naval History & Heritage Command, Washington, DC, 2023, 134pp, notes, biblio, ISBN 9781-943604-83-8; publication is available for free as a pdf via history.navy.mil) Emily Abdow provides readers with a well-done, yet brief, explanation of a

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complicated military situation at the turn of the 20th century in China in what became known as the Boxer Rebellion. She focuses on the impact and role of the United States Navy and Marines in the conflict. The Boxer Rebellion included a Chinese secret society known as the Boxers on one side and the British, Germans, French, Italians, Japanese, Russians, and Americans on the other. The American Navy possessed no Chinese language expertise or cultural knowledge, while at the same time it had to deal with six foreign powers, who aimed to create concessions in China. In addition, the Navy had to The time was October 1991. The ship was Anne Kristine, the oldest continuously sailing vessel in the world. What awaited them was Hurricane Grace, the southern end of what came to be known as “The Perfect Storm.” “Nelson Simon’s memoir… is the kind of character-driven, stormbattered, seafaring yarn Joseph Conrad would have loved. Or written.” – Alice McDermott, winner of the National Book Award Available from most online booksellers For a dedicated, autographed copy, go to SouloftheHurricane.com

This triple-expansion epic is set in 1913 Shanghai, where four cultures are about to collide: China, Korea, Japan, and the US. The point of collision is three tons of Japanese gold ingots meant to undermine an already collapsing China. “The Abalone Ukulele is a master class in historical fiction. With painstaking research and a gift for story spinning, Crossland brings to brilliant life a sprawling epic of greed, gold, and redemption.” —Joseph A. Williams, author of Seventeen Fathoms Deep and The Sunken Gold

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Looking for Vessel Information? Go to: internationalmaritimelibrary.org 7KLV YHVVHO GDWDEDVH FRQWDLQV DOPRVW YHVVHOV ZLWK PDQ\ ¿HOGV RI information. This list is primarily compiled from the “List of Merchant Vessels of the United States” and Custom House records. Other annuals are also used. This database not only contains American vessels, but foreign ones too. Whether you are looking for commercial, pleasure, sail, power, warships, unrigged and undocumented we just might have what you are looking for and always inputting more! If what you are looking for is not there let me know also feedback welcomed.

See also the Shipwreck Index with Chronological listing.

Transatlantic Train The Untold Story of the Boston Merchant Who Launched Donald McKay to Fame by Vincent J. Miles Donald McKay

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Ocean Bestiary Meeting Marine Life from Abalone to Orca to Zooplankton Written and illustrated by

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SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

contend with a conflict that was largely a riverine and land war, far away from the standard operating area of the Marines and sailors. Abdow claims that the Navy’s participation in the conflict was “a true test of the American sailor.” The first chapter explains 19thcentury Western-Chinese relations that included the two Opium Wars (1839– 1842 and 1856–1860) and the Treaty of Tianjin, which permitted foreign representatives to live in Beijing and Christian missionaries to move freely around China. While the United States did not seek concessions in China, it hoped that the American Open Door policy between the two nations would permit the United States to have trade access in China. Abdow gives a brief explanation of who the Boxers were and why the Empress Dowager, Cixi, decided to side with the Boxers instead of the foreigners. The United States Navy had operated in Asia and the Pacific since the 1840s and even patrolled the Yangtze River. It possessed several vessels, including the sidewheel gunboats Monocacy and Ashuelot. After the SpanishAmerican War ended in 1899, the Philippines provided the Navy with a strategic naval base, yet it was continually short of ammunition and supplies in the Boxer Rebellion, perhaps due to the conflict the United States had with the Filipinos after the Spanish-American War ended. After detailing the number of marines, sailors, ships, and guns in the American units, the author shifts focus to the combined battles that Americans waged alongside foreign powers against the Boxers and Imperial forces. Several of the American officers, such as Naval Cadet Joseph K. Taussig and Capt. Bowman McCalla, had fought in the Spanish-American War, which undoubtedly enhanced their abilities in the China conflict.

The author devotes as much attention to the foreign militaries as she does to the American units. This is likely because she had little choice, as the battles in the conflict—including the battle of Dagu Forts, the Seymour Expedition, the battle of Tianjin, and the China Relief Expedition—were fought by the various foreign powers working together. It would have been impossible to focus only on the US Navy and Marines, as their actions depended on what the other foreigners were doing at the same time. Among the unusual tasks the sailors and marines faced were repairing railroad tracks, as the Chinese forces destroyed some of them, causing delays in the Americans reaching Beijing and the Legation quarters. The encounters between the foreign, including American, military units and their battles with the Chinese are well described and easily followed. The cooperation between the different nations proved interesting, and it would have been helpful to see more about the reactions of the various foreign leaders to each other. Language must have been a barrier between the nations, especially with the Russian and Japanese units. Why some Chinese sided with the foreign military units is unclear. The Boxer Rebellion, Abdow states, was the “American military’s first taste of coalition warfare.” As a result, did the United States anticipate going into conflict with others during this time, or was the action simply an opportunity for the nation to expand its power outside of North America and a few islands in the Pacific, especially considering the results of the Spanish-American War? What impact did the passage of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act have on the Americans fighting the Chinese? What views did the American sailors and officers possess regarding the Chinese, regardless of whether they were Boxers or Imperial troops? Did the cheap labor argument or opium-smok-

ing habit of a few of the Chinese influence the American military’s actions in the Boxer Rebellion? Ultimately, 59 sailors, marines, and soldiers earned the Medal of Honor in the conflict, and the China Relief Expedition Medal was bestowed on the Navy and Marine Corps personnel who served in China. The book provides a wonderful overview of the conflict. The photographs and maps are an excellent addition to the monograph. Abdow’s publication would be a good place for people interested in the Boxer Rebellion to begin their studies, as it would give the reader a basic understanding of the military side of the conflict, not just the diplomatic one. Diana L. Ahmad, PhD Milwaukee, Wisconsin The Extraordinary Journey of David Ingram: An Elizabethan Sailor in Native North America by Dean Snow (Oxford, New York, 2023, 328pp, illus, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 9780197648001; $29.95hc) David Ingram told an incredible story. Marooned on the Mexican coast by the English privateer and slaver John Hawkins in the autumn of 1568, he and two companions walked along the Gulf Coast and up the Eastern Seaboard to Canada, a distance of roughly 3,600 miles, in less than 11 months. A French ship rescued them there. Famed geographer Richard Hakluyt heard the tale, most likely from participating in the official panel that interrogated Ingram seven years after the rescue, and included it in his 1589 book, The Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveries of the English Nation. Unfortunately, Hakluyt misunderstood and scrambled the testimony, then doubted its veracity and withdrew it from his book’s second edition. Thus David Ingram, a plain, illiterate man with a seabag full of experience, went down in history as a notorious travel liar.

Dean Snow, professor emeritus of anthropology at Pennsylvania State University and past president for the Society for American Archaeology, aims to salvage Ingram’s credibility in this absorbing book. For his research, Snow consulted the original transcripts of the interrogation rather than relying on Hakluyt’s version, as most historians have done. “Few have looked at the manuscript evidence,” he explains, “and scholars are reluctant to impugn the work of Richard Hakluyt.” Penned in so-called “secretary hand,” a highly stylized 16th-century script that is difficult for an untrained eye to read, these early documents reveal that the untruths and inconsistencies attributed to Ingram were in fact the fault of his interpreter. During the interrogation Ingram recounted his journey in chronological order. He sailed with Hawkins on a slaving voyage out of Plymouth,

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England, in 1567, first to Africa, then to the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico, where a hurricane battered their small fleet. Hawkins steered them into Veracruz seeking shelter, where they fought a desperate battle with the Spaniards. Driven out and unable to carry all his men safely home on his last remaining ship, Hawkins offered them a stark choice: a long Atlantic voyage on short rations, or abandonment on the Mexican coast. More than 100 men, including Ingram, chose the latter. Many subsequently perished or turned themselves over to the Spanish. Only Ingram and his companions reached Canada. Because England meant to colonize North America, the interrogation panel’s primary interests concerned the resources and peoples there, specifically “whether there is any quantity of gold, silver, and pearl and or other jewels in that country.” Ingram’s interlocutors

had no New World experience by which to judge his answers, and they impatiently conflated what he said about Africa and the Caribbean with the Americas. Hakluyt’s account cemented the confusion in easy-to-read print. Snow does a real service by including the early transcriptions in an appendix, clearly demarcating the African, Caribbean, and North American sections. In the body of the book, he presents the relevant historical context, as well as an intelligent reconstruction of Ingram’s probable route, complete with maps and likely waypoints and junctions based on a close reading of the primary material. Snow calculates that the men traveled on average 15 miles per day, many of them on well-marked indigenous trails through open forests dotted by frequent villages. Though many of the Indian tribes Ingram encountered were at war with

one another, he and his comrades moved freely and safely as “exotic strangers,” who carried highly desirable trade goods from one region to the next. Among these were bolts of cloth given

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SEA HISTORY 185 | WINTER 2023–24

New & Noted them by Hawkins, and shell beads from southern beaches, which increased in value the further north they traveled. Snow credits the men’s “naval training” for enhancing their odds. “Sailors had feet toughened by barefoot labor on deck and in rigging in all seasons,” he writes, “and minds accustomed to routine.” By far this book’s most interesting portions are those where the reader can discern Ingram’s own voice. For example, he described the manatee that he encountered in Florida as a “strange beast bigger than a bear. It had neither head nor neck. His eyes and mouth were in his breast. This beast is very ugly to behold, and cowardly by nature.” Never having encountered one, Ingram’s questioners hardly knew what to make of this, and an artist’s attempt resulted in a clumsy rendition of a headless man with a bearded countenance on its chest. Snow concludes that, accurately appreciated, Ingram’s account improves our understanding of native North America before the devastating epidemics that irrevocably altered it. To cite only a few examples, the reader learns of Indian trails and travel customs, cultural practices like tattooing versus body-painting, and the Iroquoian masked curing ceremony meant to heal the sick. The account also provides wonderful descriptions of both African and American flora and fauna by a sensitive and perceptive observer. Snow writes frankly about the ugliest aspect of Ingram’s legacy, his participation in the slave trade. Nonetheless, he cautions, “our moral judgements about what went on in that context should not be allowed to cloud our understanding of it.” Thanks to Dean Snow’s impressive sleuthing, David Ingram’s account can at last resume its proper place as an astonishing and true story. John S. Sledge Fairhope, Alabama

Adventurers: The Improbable Rise of the East India Company: 1550–1650 by David Howarth (Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 2023, 480pp, illus, maps, ISBN 978-0-30025-072-5; $35hc) China as a Twenty-First Century Naval Power: Theory, Practice, and Implications by Michael A. McDevitt (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2023, 320pp, maps, illus, tables, notes, ISBN 978-1-55750-113-4; $37.95pb) A Civil War Gunboat in Pacific Waters: Life On Board USS Saginaw by Hans Konrad Van Tilburg, PhD, (University Press of Florida, Gainesville, 2023, 380pp, illus, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-0-81308-017-8; $28pb) The Civil War on the Water: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War, edited by Dwight Sturtevant Hughes and Chris Mackowski (Savas Beatie, El Dorado Hills, CA, 2023, 336pp, maps, illus, notes, index, ISBN 978-1-61121-629-5; $32.95hc) Exploring Maritime Washington: A History and Guide by Erich R. Ebel (The History Press, Charleston, SC, 2023, 240pp, illus, biblio, index, ISBN 978-1-46715-057-6; $23.99pb) Fighting in the Dark: Naval Combat at Night, 1904–1944, edited by Vincent P. O’Hara and Trent Hone (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 2023, 368pp, illus, maps, tables, notes, appen, index, ISBN 978-1-68247-780-9; $39.95hc) From Whaling Ship to Clipper Ship — Henry Gillespie, Down East Captain by Michael Jay Mjelde, foreword by James P. Delgado (Texas A&M University Press, College Station, 2023; 406pp, illus, maps, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-1-64843-112-8; $80hc)

The Last Ships from Hamburg: Business, Rivalry, and the Race to Save Russia’s Jews on the Eve of World War I by Steven Ujifusa (Harper Collins Publishers, New York, 2023, 384pp, illus, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-006297-187-6; $32hc) Mapping Christopher Columbus: An Historical Geography of His Early Life to 1492 by Al M. Rocca (McFarland & Company, Jefferson, NC, 2023, 248pp, maps, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-1-47668-755-1; $49.95pb) On the Waves of Empire: US Imperialism and Merchant Sailors, 1872– 1924 by William D. Riddell (University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 2023, 217pp, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 9780-252-08730-1; $26pb) Sailing the Graveyard Sea: The Deathly Voyage of the Somers, the US Navy’s Only Mutiny, and the Trial That Gripped the Nation by Richard Snow (Scribner, New York, 2023, 978198218-544-2; $29hc) Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, BlockadeRunning, and the Slave Trade by Jonathan W. White (Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham, MD, 2023, 317pp, illus, appen, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 9781-5381-7501-9; $29.95hc) Tempest: The Royal Navy and the Age of Revolutions by James Davey (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2023, 426pp, illus, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-0-300-23827-3; $35hc) Tracking the Franklin Expedition of 1845: The Facts and Mysteries of the Failed Northwest Passage by Stephen Zorn (McFarland & Company, Publishers, Jefferson, NC, 2023, 201pp, illus, maps, appen, notes, biblio, index, ISBN 978-1-476-69219-7; $39.95pb) SeaHistory.org

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