Naval History - June 2012

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N AVA L H I S T O RY r J U N E 2 0 1 2 1

Our 25th Year!

16 Building on a 200-Year LegacyBy Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, U.S. Navy Two centuries ago, an upstart fleet took the fight to the worlds greatest navythe lessons, and legacy, of that formative conflict live on to this day.

18 The Wars Pervasive Naval DimensionsBy Charles E. Brodine Jr.From casus belli to the arenas of battle, the War of 1812 was imbued with matters of ships and the sea.

24 Contesting the Four OceansBy Kevin D. McCranieThe Royal Navys superior numbers and firepower eventually told, but not before the Americans unexpectedly gave cause for concern.

32 The Constitutions Great EscapeBy Louis Arthur NortonSometimes the most dramatic chase scenes unfold in slow motion; only ingenuity and sweat-equity, not full sails, saved the Constitution in July 1812.

36 Americas Frigate TriumphsBy Margherita M. Desy with Charles E. Brodine Jr.In a trio of celebrated sea fights, American ships and sailors proved their mettle in the opening months of the War of 1812.

46 Mitscher and the Mystery of MidwayBy Craig L. SymondsWhat did the Hornets CO knowand what did he hideabout the legendary flight to nowhere?

54 That Other Air Service CentennialBy Colonel Glen Butler, U.S. Marine Corps2011 was naval aviations year, but 2012 is the time for the Marine Corps to look back on a proud century of airborne Leathernecks.

58 Voyage to TsushimaBy Captain Shannon R. Butler, U.S. Navy (Retired)For the Russian squadron, it was a disastrous defeatone preceded by a hellish journey around the globe.

June 2012 I Volume 26 I Number 3

U.S. Naval Institute I www.usni.org

COVER: Oh, the shortcomings of slow communications. The U.S. frigate Constitution caps off her storied War of 1812 career with the capture of HMS Levant on 20 February 1815 (Old Ironsides also nabbed another British prize, HMS Cyane, in the same engagement). But the peace treaty between England and the United States had been ratified by the U.S. Senate four days earlier. (Patrick OBrien, www.patrickobrienstudio.com)

4 On Our Scope

6 Looking Back

8 In Contact

10 Naval History News

12 Historic Aircraft

14 Historic Fleets

68 Book Reviews

72 Museum Report

DEPARTMENTS

36

Naval History magazine (ISSN 1042-1920) is published bimonthly by the U.S. Naval Institute, 291 Wood Road, Annapolis, MD 21402. To order subscriptions, memberships, books, or selected photographs: 800-233-8764, 410-268-6110; fax 410-571-1703. Subscriptions: Naval Institute members $20 one year; Non-member subscription $30 one year. Editorial offices: U.S. Naval Academy, Beach Hall, 291 Wood Road, Annapolis, MD 21402-5034; 410-268-6110; fax 410-295-1049. Periodicals postage paid at Annapolis, MD, and at additional mailing offices. Copyright 2012 U.S. Naval Institute. Copyright is not claimed for editorial material

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2 U N I T E D S TAT E S N AVA L I N S T I T U T E

ContributorsCharles E. Brodine Jr. is a his-torian with the Naval History and Heritage Command and associate editor of the Commands series The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History. He is also a coauthor of Interpreting Old Ironsides: An I l lustrated Guide to the USS Constitution (Naval Historical Center, 2007) and Against All Odds: U.S. Sailors in the War of 1812 (Naval Historical Center, 2004).

Colonel Glen Butler, U.S. Marine Corps, holds a masters degree in mili-tary studies from the Marine Corps Command and Staff College. A naval aviator, he commanded the Marine Corps Air Station at Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, and served two tours in Iraq with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 169.

Captain Shannon R. Butler retired after 27 years on active duty in the U.S. Navy and completed her Ph.D. in history at the University of Arizona in 2008. She is the author of several articles and book chap-ters dealing with Soviet-American relations during the Cold War, and is currently working on an essay concerning the Port Chicago explo-sion of July 1944 and its effects on desegregation in the U.S. Navy.

Margherita M. Desy is the historian for the Naval History and Heritage Command Detachment Boston, working with the USS Constitution. She has published in the Nautical Research Journal and was a contribu-tor to the Encyclopedia of American Maritime Literature of the Sea and Great Lakes. She currently teaches at Tufts University for the museum studies program in the Graduate and Professional Studies Department.

Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert became the 30th Chief of Naval Operations in September 2011. The 1975 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy spent more than a quarter-century in the submarine service, then commanded the 7th Fleet and later, U.S. Fleet Forces Command. He is the 1992 winner of the Vice Admiral Stockdale Award for inspirational leadership.

Kevin D. McCranie is a professor of strategy and policy at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. He is the author of Utmost Gallantry: The U.S. and Royal Navies at Sea in the War of 1812 (Naval Institute Press, 2011) and Admiral Lord Keith and the Naval War Against Napoleon (University Press of Florida, 2006).

Louis Arthur Norton, University of Connecticut professor emeritus, has published extensively on maritime history. His books include Joshua Barney: Hero of the Revolutionary War and 1812 (Naval Institute Press, 2000) and Captains Contentious: The Dysfunctional Sons of the Brine (University of South Carolina Press, 2009). Two of his articles earned the Gerald E. Morris Prize for maritime historiography and appeared in The Log of Mystic Seaport.

Craig L. Symonds is professor emeritus of history at the U.S. Naval Academy and is the author or editor of 25 books on naval and Civil War history, including Decision at Sea: Five Naval Batt les that Shaped American History (Oxford University Press, 2005), winner of the Theodore and Franklin D. Roosevelt Naval History Prize; and most recently, The Battle of Midway (Oxford University Press, 2011).

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NAVAL HISTORY291 Wood Rd.

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COL+PIO+"CCBUJFMMP64"'CDR Stephen D. Barnett, USN

LCDR Claude G. Berube, USNRSGTMAJ David K. Devaney, USMC

COL Robert W. Lanham, USMCBMCM Kevin P. Leask, USCGMAJ Marcus J. Mainz, USMC-53PCFSU1.D'BMM64/

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CDR John P. Patch, USN (Ret.)

Printed in the USA

U.S. NAVAL INSTIT U TE

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the high seas, is the focus of this issues War of 1812 bicentennial package of articles.)JTUPSJBOTXSJUFST BOE MFBEFST IBWF MPOH TPVHIU UP BWPJE SFQFBUJOHIJTUPSZTNJT-

takes by applying lessons learned to present-day circumstances. Beginning in the early 1880snear the end of the Navys dark agesa small group of navalists turned their BUUFOUJPOUPUIF8BSPGJOQBSUUPBSHVFGPSBTUSPOHFSTFBTFSWJDF-FBEJOHUIFXBZXBTZFBSPME5IFPEPSF3PPTFWFMUXIPTFHSPVOECSFBLJOHThe Naval War of 1812XBTfirst published in 1882.

At present people are beginning to realize that it is folly for the great English-speaking Republic to rely for defence upon a navy composed partly of antiquated hulks,

BOE QBSUMZ PG OFX WFTTFMTSBUIFS NPSF XPSUIMFTTthan the old, Roosevelt XSPUF JO UIF CPPLT QSFG-BDF i*U JTXPSUIXIJMF UPTUVEZXJUI TPNF DBSF UIBUperiod of our history dur-JOHXIJDIPVSOBWZ TUPPEat the highest pitch of its fame.

Although present cir-cumstances are vastly dif-ferent from those of 1882, important lessons still can be gleaned from the /BWZT FYQFSJFODF JO UIFWar of 1812, according to Chief of Naval Operations

Admiral Jonathan Greenert. The CNOs article, Building on a 200-Year Legacy, leads PGGPVSDPWFSBHFCZ UBLJOHBCSPBE MPPLBU JNQPSUBOUFWFOUTEVSJOH UIFOBWBMXBSBOEUIFOFYBNJOJOHUIFFOEVSJOHMFTTPOTUPCFMFBSOFEGSPNUIFN"DDPSEJOHUP"ENJSBM(SFFOFSUUISFFLFZMFTTPOTMJOLUPEBZT/BWZXJUIJUTFYQFSJFODFUXPDFOUVSJFTBHP

Charles Brodine, a historian at the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC), GPMMPXT CZ FYBNJOJOH JO i5IF8BST 1FSWBTJWF/BWBM%JNFOTJPOTu UIFXJEFSBOHJOHFGGFDUTPG UIFDPOGMJDUTOBWBMBOENBSJUJNFGBDUPST'SPNUIF64$BOBEJBOCPSEFSUP/FX0SMFBOTUIPTFGBDUPSTTIBQFEUIFDPOGMJDU#SPEJOFBTTFSUT0VSDPWFSBHFOFYUGPDVTFTPOUIFXBSBUTFBCFHJOOJOHXJUI,FWJO.D$SBOJFT

BSUJDMF i$POUFTUJOH UIF'PVS0DFBOTu5IF BVUIPSPGUtmost Gallantry: The U.S. and Royal Navies at Sea in the War of 1812/BWBM*OTUJUVUF1SFTT

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fought by the Constitution and one by the United States. But before the former ship could earn her nickname Old Ironsides, she had to elude a British squadron in July 1812, XIJDIJTUIFTVCKFDUPGOBWBMIJTUPSJBO-PVJT"SUIVS/PSUPOTBSUJDMFi5IFConstitutions (SFBU&TDBQFu"OEJOi"NFSJDBT'SJHBUF5SJVNQITu.BSHIFSJUB%FTZIJTUPSJBOBUUIF/))$T%FUBDINFOU#PTUPOXPSLJOHXJUIUIF644Constitution, and Charles Brodine EFTDSJCFUIFUISFFEVFMTUIBUFOTVFEPWFSUIFOFYUGJWFNPOUIT4NBMMFS64XBSTIJQT BMTP HBJOFE GBNF JO UIFXBS *OIJT i)JTUPSJD 'MFFUTu EFQBSU-

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Richard G. LattureEditor-in-Chief

On Our Scope

NAVY ART COLLECTION, NAVAL HISTORY AND HERITAGE COMMAND

The frigates Constitution and HMS Java exchange broadsides during their 29 December 1812 duel.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

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Kevin McCranie takes the refreshing high road to history in this absorbing page turner that makes the War of 1812 exude the immediacy of having happened yesterday.This effort is defi nitely one of the better new books to examine a war of far more signifi cance than history usually accorded it. Sea Classics

Naval Institute PressCommemorates the Bicentennial of the War of 1812

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Looking Back By Paul StillwellIgnominious Ends

Sometimes its the little things that have enormous consequences. An old proverb has it that for want of a nailand intermediate stepsa king-dom was lost.

The proverb came to mind in January of this year, when television screens showed the cruise ship Costa Concordia capsized on the island of Giglio, off the coast of Italy. Reportedly, the ships master diverged from the planned course to give passengers a closer look at the island. Obviously, the look was far too close; the rocky shore tore open the hull, and progressive flooding ensued. For want of following the correct course, the ship was lost.

One can imagine the scene on board as the emergency overtook the 952-foot ship. The lights went out, and the passengers were in the darkboth literally and figuratively, because the ini-tial announcements were reassuring but wildly inac-curate. Fear engulfed the crowd with the swiftness of a highly infectious disease. The ships increasing list made the launching of lifeboats diffi-cult, and for some passengers, rescue never came. What had begun as a dream-vacation voyage ended in nightmare. Indeed, some survivors are probably still experiencing sleep intruded upon by flash-backs to that night of disaster.

Seventy years earlier, almost to the week, another great passenger ship faced enormous consequences as the result of something small that went awry. The 1,029-foot French liner Normandie was among the most famous ships in the world when she made her debut. With her sleek lines and extravagant interior, she was a wonder to behold. She had art deco designs and spacious public roomsopulence embodied as an exhibition of national pride. Her first voyage, which ended in New York on 3 June 1935, earned her the Blue Riband prize for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic to date.

In the years that followed, she regularly plied her trade between New York and Europe. But by 1939, as the drumbeats of

approaching war sounded ever louder, the Normandie took refuge at the huge French Line pier on the West Side of Manhattan. On 3 September, the same day Britain and France declared war on Germany, the United States officially interned the great liner. She remained there with a French crew but no passengers.

In the spring of 1941, with France having fallen to German forces, the U.S. Coast Guard sent a detachment of men to guard the ship against sabotage. The Normandies prolonged limbo came to an end in December of that year, shortly after the United States entered World War II. The Coast Guard, by then offi-cially part of the Navy Department, took possession of the ship and displaced her

French crew. Later that month, the ship was transferred to the Navy and renamed the Lafayette in honor of the Frenchman who aided the American colonists in their 18th-century war of independence.

The Navys plan was to convert the liner to a troopship that could carry thou-sands of American soldiers to Europe. Conversion work got under way in a hurry at the liners pier on the Hudson River. As Robert Cressman has written in an excellent Lafayette article in the online Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, the Navy ordered a commissioning date of 11 February 1942. The first sailing was scheduled for three days later.

On 9 February, with work proceeding at a frantic pace, a workmans welding torch accidentally set afire a bale of kapok life jackets in the vast, open main salon. Wind accelerated the flames, which spread quickly. The New York Fire Department poured water into the ship from pumpers on the starboard side ashore and fireboats to port. Within a few hours, the conflagra-tion was under control, but much of the water used to put out the fire remained in the ship, and more entered through open-ings in the hull.

In the early hours of 10 February, the day before she was scheduled to be com-missioned, the Lafayette capsized to port, rolling through an arc of nearly 80 degrees. Another proverb comes to mind: Haste

makes waste. Eventually the super-structure was removed and the hull turned upright and salvaged in 1943. But the ship was too far gone to be of any military value to the nation that sought to use her.

In the meantime, footage of the would-be troop trans-port made a five-second cameo appearance in the 1942 Alfred Hitchcock suspense movie Saboteur. The film had an implau-sible plot in which a defense worker was falsely accused of burning a California aircraft fac-tory that was actually set on fire by a Nazi agent. The innocent man and his new girlfriend trav-eled across country to New York in search of the German.

Near the end of the film, the saboteur took a cab ride down

Manhattans West Side. The German looked out the taxis window and saw the capsized Lafayette. The next shot revealed him with a slight smirk of sat-isfaction. Hitchcock said of the scene, The Navy raised hell with Universal [Pictures] about these shots because I implied that the Normandie had been sabotaged, which was a reflection of their lack of vigilance in guarding it. Despite the Navys protests, Hitchcock kept the scene in his movie. That brief filmed interlude was among the few contribu-tions the steel leviathan made after com-ing into American hands.

For want of a nail . . .

U.S. NAVAL INSTITUTE PHOTO ARCHIVE

The day before she was to be commissioned as a U.S. Navy troop transport, the Lafayetteformerly the French liner Normandiecapsized at her Manhattan berth. rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


As one former SEAL wrote me: Great weapon! Lightweight, lots of firepower. He added that with a combination of weapons such as Stoners, M-60 machine guns, M-14 and M-16 rifles, and grenade launchers, we could put out the firepower of a company . . . for about 25 [minutes].

Eugene Stoner, who served as an enlisted Marine in World War II, is buried at the Quantico National Cemetery in Triangle, Virginia.

against the weapon and its 5.56-mm ammunition and because Stoners required more maintenance than the Army thought the average combatant could or was willing to perform. SEALs were much more conscientious about weapon maintenance.

Stoners served SEALs well because their high rate of fire produced prodigious firepowerone trademark of the way that SEALs fought and a characteristic that made SEAL teams so deadly.

In ContactSEALs Weapon of Choice

Colonel Charles A. Jones U.S. Marine Corps Reserve (Retired)

The February 2012 issue of Naval History featured an outstanding story about SEALs by Dick Couch (SEALs: 50 Years & Counting, pp. 1623). On the issues cover was a SEAL with a weapon identified inside the magazine as a Stoner M63A1 light machine gun.

The Stoner was the signature weapon for SEALs in Vietnam and was one of two weapon systems invented by Eugene Stoner. Stoners most famous development was the M-16 weapon series. Lesser known is his Stoner 63 weapon system, comprising a basic design around which six weapons were based, including an assault rifle, a fixed machine gun, and the more popular light machine gun pictured on the cover of Naval History.

That particular light machine gun is an example of the model that fed from the left side of the weapon from a drum magazine holding 150 rounds of ammunition. The other Stoner light machine gun fed from the right side, from a box holding 100 rounds of ammunition.

The SEALs liked the Stoners and were the only combat unit to use them in significant numbers; Stoners never were general-issue weapons for the Marine Corps or Army. The Army refused to adopt them for various reasons, including a prejudice

NATIONAL ARCHIVES

A SEAL team member armed with a Stoner light machine gun stands outpost guard duty during a March 1968 operation against Viet Cong on Tan Dinh Island, South Vietnam. The weapons drum magazine held 150 rounds. rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

A Lesson in Leadership

Captain Richard M. Trippe Jr., U.S. Navy (Retired), Master, U.S. Merchant Marine (Retired)

management skills in place of good leadership principles. Their lack of leadership caused frequent personnel changes. Because of terrible leadership on board one Navy destroyer, I thought I was sailing in the USS Caine, and on board several merchant vessels I felt that I was in the Bounty.

When I was sailing master on board various types of commercial vessels, I spent time with the young deck officers while they were standing underway bridge watches. I told them sea stories about my career in order to develop their leadership qualities through example. The new officers noticed that most of the crew was made up of seamen who had sailed with me several times and had returned when they learned I was to captain the ship.

In addition to telling sea stories, I required the new third mates and engineering officers to watch the ships video copy of the movie Mister Roberts and observe the differences in leadership between Captain Morton and Mister Roberts. Except for personal example, this was the best training aid I had on the vessels I commanded.

Mister Roberts (Happy 65th Birthday, Mister Roberts, December 2011, pp. 5457) is a great fictional story by Thomas Heggen about the personnel on board a Navy auxiliary vessel during World War II. I have read or seen very few tales about the ships that supported the Fleet and our combat forces during wars. Meanwhile, readers and movie-goers have been flooded with stories about the battle actions of surface combatants and submarines.

If Mr. Heggen had lived longer, he might have overcome his depression and writers block to create more sea stories, perhaps interesting, historical short stories about life on board a cargo ship during wartime.

I agree with Commander Paul Stillwells statement (In Contact, April, p. 8) that Mister Roberts is a study of leadership, illustrated by Captain Mortons bad leadership qualities and Mister Roberts good ones. During my five years on board Navy combatants and 41 years in U.S. Merchant Marine vessels, I sailed with several tyrants who claimed that they were using good


bottom and made to slope downward to a point. When the ship was launched, he was indignant because the lower edge or eaves of her armor-clad

Not in the Manuals

Lieutenant Colonel Jim Hruska, Special Forces, U.S. Army Reserve (Retired)

Your article by Retired Captain Dick Couch, SEALs: 50 Years & Counting (February, pp. 1623), featured a section titled, Special Ops Forces, SEALs, and the bin Laden Takedown.

Try as I might, there are no references in any of my Special Operations training manuals for the military option takedown.

Our politicians have already spoken of taking out military targets such as Osama bin Laden. When did these wrestling and Mafioso terms enter the lexicon of accepted military terms or practice? Whats next? Shakedowns? Are we gonna whack or make somebody?

The closest military action is a raid, which has a military purpose and is within the rules and practices of warfare. But raids are not conducted in the bedrooms of

castled kings, even if they are terrorists. The OBL mission was pure theater and political in nature. If takedown equals simple assassination, then yes, it was a takedownone that violated the sovereignty of Pakistan and accomplished little or nothing to the benefit of increased security in the United States.

USNI has compromised its integrity when it runs articles that use the terms of thuggery to describe military actions.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Henry A. Wise, a powerful Virginia politician who became a mediocre-at-best Confederate general, had a strong opinion about the conversion of the U.S. frigate Merrimack into the ironclad CSS Virginia.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

More on the Sea King

Norman Polmar

I am grateful for Sam Griffins additional material on the long-serving HSS-2/SH-3 Sea King helicopter (In Contact, April, pp. 9, 66; Historic Aircraft, February, pp. 1213).

In service, rescue hoists often were removed from the early Sea Kings, hence their reintroduction in the later HH-3Amodel was

Sloppy Virginia Conversion?

Nolan Nelson

The statement in John Quarsteins article (Proving the Power of Iron over Wood, April, pp. 2632) that Confederate Naval Constructor John L. Porter had miscalculated the CSS Virginias displacement prompted my memory about a passage from John S. Wises Civil War book, The End of an Era (Houghton Mifflin, 1899). Before the war his father, Henry Alexander Wise, had served in Congress and as ambassador to Brazil. He also had a strong interest in and an extensive laymans knowledge of warships. His political prominence enabled personal friendships with Lieutenant John M. Brooke, who helped direct the conversion of the Merrimack into the Virginia, and Flag Officer Franklin Buchanan, who commanded the ironclad. The applicable passage is as follows:

[My father] repeatedly expressed the opinion that she [the Virginia] was being built to draw too much water, and that her beak or ramming prow was improperly constructed in this, that it was horizontal at the top and sloped upward from the bottom, whereas it should have been horizontal on the

noteworthy. Also, the definitive source for Sea King datathe Standard Aircraft Characteristicsfor the SH-3A model (1 July 1967) lists 4 MK 44 (Mod. 0) torpedoes among its armament options.

And, of course, the Sea King story could not be fully told nor illustrated in only two magazine pages.It was in many respects the king of helicopters.

covering stood several feet out of the water, and it was necessary to ballast her heavily to bring her sheathing below the water line. This increased her draught to eighteen feet, which was, as he declared, entirely unnecessary. He insisted that this condition was due to the failure of the naval architects (in calculating the water which she would draw when sheathed with iron) to deduct from the weight of her sheathing the weight of masts, spars, rigging, and sails, which were dispensed with.

In the same chapter the author relates his observations on the two days of battle at Hampton Roads. At the time Mr. Wise was 15. He was later one of the cadets from Virginia Military Institute who fought at the Battle of New Market. He obtained a Confederate Army lieutenants commission during the wars final year.

Editors note: Henry A. Wise was also governor of Virginia from 1856 to 1860 and a brigadier general in the Confederate Army. His forces were defeated at the 78 February 1862 Battle of Roanoke Island, and he was at his home near Norfolk recuperating from illness when the Virginia was launched on 17 February.

Port-Side Carrier Bridges

Frank Mantle

Further to U.S. Navys Multicarrier Experience in the February issue (In Contact, pp. 89; Pearl Harbors Overlooked Answer, December 2011, pp. 1621), during the 1970s I asked the late Japanese naval constructor Lieutenant Commander Shizuo Fukui why the Akagi and Hiryu had their bridges sited on their port

sides. He told me that Japan intended to operate four carriers in a box formation and that this was found unsuccessful and dropped before the Pearl Harbor attack.

He also lifted a trapdoor in his studio floor and pulled out a complete set of sketch drawings of later Katsuragi-class carriers to be built entirely out of flat plates in a few months. He told me they calculated only a little loss of speed. I mention this because I have never since seen any reference to this project.


placed markers on 20 locations of each skull to get the desired effect. Its a mixture of science and art, del Harris noted. You have to use some artistic license. The hope is that someone will recognize the faces, and the remains will be buried with full military honors, perhaps at Arlington National Cemetery. We want someone to see a face and say, that kind of looks like my fill in the blank.

Fred Schultz and Sam LaGrone

Naval History NewsMonitor Faces Revealed

Haunting. Eerie. Poignant. These are just three of the words whispered to describe what those assembled were witnessing in the Arleigh Burke Auditorium at the U.S. Navy Memorial in Washington, D.C., on 6 March. The crowd included a veritable whos-who of naval history and underwater archaeology. The ceremony and plaque dedication honored the 16 crew members who perished when the Union Civil War ironclad Monitorknown best for her clash with the Confederate ironclad CSS Virginia at the 89 March 1862 Battle of Hampton Roads, Virginiawent down in heavy seas off Cape Hatteras on New Years Eve later that year.

The focal point this day, on the eve of the battles 150th anniversary, was a display of the reconstructed clay-cast heads and computer-generated photographic likenesses of the two crewmen whose remains were recovered after a team from the U.S. Navy and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) raised the ships turret ten years ago this summer. In attendance were now-retired Navy Captain Barbara Bobbie Scholley, on-scene commander of the turret expedition, and John Broadwater, NOAAs chief scientist for the turret-raising.

Since that time, the sailors remains have essentially been under wraps at the Joint Prisoner of War Missing in Action Command at Joint Base Pearl HarborHickam, Hawaii. An anthropological analysis there determined that both were Caucasian, one in his 30s, the other in the 17- to 24-year-old range. Late last year, NOAA officials decided to turn to experts at the Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services (FACES) laboratory at Louisiana State University for further analyses and to gauge the possibility of identifying the two men and having the remains interred.

According to Nicole del Harris, a research associate at the lab, scientists can determine a persons age at death from the skeleton, especially the hips and ribs. I can look at the hips, and I can see these changes that have taken place, she said. The rate of bone growth is also a tip-off to the persons age. Among the last bones to completely fuse in the human body is the clavicle. Based on this information, analysts at the FACES lab determined that the younger sailor had not yet reached age 25.

As for the sailors reconstructed faces, lab technicians used clay to re-create the features, based on average tissue-depth data. They

JEN MABE

From skeletal remains discovered in the ironclad Monitors turret, forensics experts have re-created the faces of two Civil War sailors in stunning detail. (The top skull goes with the top reconstruction.) Now the real detective work begins: Who were they?rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Navy Launches War of 1812 Bicentennial

The U.S. Navy staged the formal kickoff of its War of 1812 bicentennial commemoration with a March ceremony at the Library of Congress. The event was hosted by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus. Representatives from the Naval Historical Foundation, the Navy League of the United States, Operation Sail (OpSail), and the National Maritime Historical Society were on hand.

After presentation of the colors by a color guard from War of 1812 veteran USS Constitution, and a rendition of the War of 1812spawned Star-Spangled Banner by a U.S. Navy Band vocalist, the 600 guests heard from the hosts. Billington reminded guests of the impact of the War of 1812 on the Library of Congress, with the destruction of its entire collection when the Capitol was burned in 1814. The subsequent congressionally authorized

purchase of Thomas Jeffersons library became the foundation of the largest such collection in the Western Hemisphere at the time, and set the Library of Congress on the road to becoming the world-renowned repository it is today. Secretary Mabus described the legacy of valor, determination, and readiness to fight that the young U.S. Navy of that long-ago conflict bequeathed to the present-day Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard.


ping in the Atlantic at the outset of World War II. Combining heavy antisubmarine and antiaircraft weapons with the latest electronic equipment for detecting enemy vessels, destroyer escorts were designed to be maneuverable, high-speed, long-range vessels that could be built quickly because of their all-welded construction.

The destroyer escorts were a vital component of the Allied strategy for

victory in the Atlantic. They escorted the convoys of supply ships that carried the matriel and forces needed to win the war in Europe. Destroyer escorts also served in some of the most dangerous areas of the Pacific theater. They escorted convoys, conducted shore bombardments, and served as radar picket ships toward the end of the war.

The Slater served in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters during and immediately after the war. Following her World War II service, the ship was deacti-vated until 1951, when she was transferred to the Hellenic Navy. Renamed the Aetos, she remained in Greek service until 1991, when she was transferred back to the United States under the care of the Destroyer Escort Historical Foundation, which began a painstaking restoration of the ship. Now, after years of effort, she has been restored to her 1945 configuration.

Naval History News continued on page 66

The Sea Services commemoration of the bicentennial will continue through 2015. The Navy has partnered with the International Council of Air Shows, the Navy League, the Naval Historical Foundation, and OpSail to create special activities around the country, with signature events in New York, Baltimore, Norfolk, New Orleans, Boston, Chicago, and Cleveland, and smaller events in other cities.

The festivities will include Blue Angels air shows, visits by ships of the U.S. Navy and international navies, parades of tall ships, and Galley Wars cook-off events.

To learn more, visit www.ourflagwas-stillthere.org.

USS Slater Slated for National Historic Landmark Status

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) announced in March that the U.S. Department of the Interior is set to designate the USS Slater (DE-766) a National Historic Landmark. Berthed in the Hudson River at Albany, New York, the Slater is the only World War IIera destroy-er escort afloat in the United States.

This is an exciting milestone for all of us, said Tim Rizzuto, execu-tive director of the Destroyer Escort Historical Museum. It represents the ultimate recognition for our volunteers who have put in 19 years and thou-sands of hours of working to preserve this historic ship.

The USS Slater played a promi-nent role in American naval strat-egy and operations during World War II and is the most well-preserved example of a destroyer escort in the world today, Gillibrand wrote in her appeal to Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. Restored officers quar-ters, artifacts, uniforms, and a com-plete set of signal flags help visitors to the ship gain a thorough and realis-tic understanding of what serving on this ship was like, as well as a better

appreciation for the USS Slaters enormous contributions to the victory of the Allied forces.

The ship was nominated by the National Park System Advisory Board Landmarks Committee, leaving Salazars approval the last step for the ship to be designated a National Historic Landmark.

Destroyer escorts were built to coun-ter U-boat depradations of Allied ship-

U.S. NAVY

At the Navys War of 1812 bicentennial kickoff, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus (second from left) received a silver commemorative medal from Naval Historical Foundation leaders (left to right) Admiral Bruce DeMars, USN (Ret.); Vice Admiral Robert Dunn, USN (Ret.); and Captain Jack London, USN (Ret.).rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

U.S. NAVY

13 February 1944: The USS Slater is launched in Tampa, Florida. One of more than 500 destroyer escorts built during World War II, today the Slater is the last remaining DE afloat in the United States.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


Great but Impractical Aircraft

Historic Aircraft By Norman PolmarAuthor, SHIPS AND AIRCRAFT OF THE U.S. FLEET After World War II, aeronautical engineers in several countries sought to combine a very new aviation technology with a very old one. The former was the turbine (jet) engine; the latter was the seaplane.

In the United States the Navy sought to merge the technologies in jet-propelled flying boats for the maritime patrol and transport roles. Supported by seaplane tenders, such aircraft were envisioned as operating over vast areas without dependence on land bases. In 1945 the Navy invited aircraft manufacturers to propose flying-boat designs that would incorporate emerging technologies.

The high speeds provided by jet engines were not vital to the maritime patrol role, thus Convair engineers adopted the turboprop engine for their next generation designs. The engine was essentially a turbine driving a propeller shaft to provide greater fuel economy, hence longer range, than a pure jet.

The Navy selected Convair to develop the next generation maritime patrol flying boat, ordering two prototype XP5Y-1 aircraft on 19 June 1946. Formed in 1943 by the merger of Vultee Aircraft and Consolidated Aircraft firms, Convair had produced a variety of large,

multiengine aircraft, among them the PBY Catalina and PB2Y Coronado flying boats. (Consolidated also built the Army Air Forces B-24 and navalized PB4Y-1 Liberator and its maritime patrol derivative, the PB4Y-2 Privateer; more Liberators were producedmore than 18,000than any other U.S. military aircraft.)

The Convair team, led by Herbert Sharp, developed a radical fuselage design with a length-to-beam ratio of 10:1 or double that of the famed PBY Catalina. A multicellular fuselage construction was used, eliminating internal bulkheads to facilitate the design being used in a transport role.1

The high-mounted wing carried four large engine nacelles enclosing Allison XT40-A-4 turbopropsactually a pair of T38 engines coupled with a

reduction geardriving contrarotating, six-blade propellers. Each T40 was rated at 5,100-shaft horsepower.

The aircraft was attractive, with a tall tail fin and a thin wing with fixed underwing floats. In the combat configuration, a P5Y would carry up to 8,000 pounds of ordnance in nacelle bays and on wing racks. Defensive armament would consist of ten 20-mm cannon in twin remote-control turretstwo on each side of the fuselage and one in the tail position.

The first XP5Y-1 flew at San Diego on 18 April 1950. That summerdespite continued problems with the T40 enginesthe aircraft established a turboprop endurance record of

8 hours, 6 minutes. The first prototype flew until it crashed when elevator control was lost during a high-speed dive on 15 July 1953. The second XP5Y-1 never flew.

The Navy decided not to pursue the maritime patrol variant of the Convair design, but gave the go-ahead for the

J. M. CAIELLA

Seven of the 11 production Tradewinds were named for major bodies of water. This R3Y-2, BuNo 131723, the next to last of those built, was named after the Caribbean Sea. The inset shows the aircraft delivering a jeep to a floating pier.rrrrrrrrrrrr

Convair P5Y / R3Y Tradewind P5Y-1 R3Y-2

Type: Maritime patrol Transport

Engine: 4 Allison T40-A-4 4 Allison T40-A-10

turboprop; 5,100 shp turboprop; 5,332 shp

Length: 127 feet, 11 inches 139 feet, 8 inches

Wingspan: 145 feet, 10 inches 145 feet, 11 inches

Height: 46 feet, 2 inches (afloat) 51 feet, 5 inches

(on beaching gear)

Max. Speed: 388 mph at 10,000 ft 354 mph at 23,000 ft

Crew: Approx. 8 to 10 5 and 100+ passengers

Armament: 8,000 pounds bombs nil

10 20-mm cannon

(8 x 300 rounds)

(2 x 500 rounds)


R3Y transport, given the name Tradewind. Major differences were that the transport was lengthened; all armament provision was removed; the tail fin was modified; a ten-foot, portside access hatch was added; and the engine nacelles were placed atop the wing, instead of being mounted within the structure, with provision for the T40-A-10 engine. Its payload could be 100-plus passengers or 92 stretchers or 24 tons of cargo in a pressurized cabin. The R3Ys had a maximum takeoff weight, with 103 passengers, of 165,000 pounds.

Five aircraft were built to this R3Y-1 configuration, the first flying on 25 February 1954. The next six aircraft dubbed flying LSTshad the radical R3Y-2 design with a nose structure that lifted to open the fuselage cargo space for loading/unloading troops, vehicles, and cargo. The -2 could carry four 155-mm towed howitzers or six jeeps or three 6x6 2-ton trucks. While an attractive concept, in reality there was great difficulty in holding the aircraft steady at the waters edge or even to a pier to permit loading and unloading.

In a further demonstration of the designs versatility, one R3Y-1 and three -2 aircraft were modified to the aerial tanker role. Fuel tanks were installed within the fuselage and four probe-and-drogue refueling stations were fitted to the wings, with up to four fighters being refueled at a single time in tests. This marked the first time that four aircraft simultaneously could be refueled by a single tanker.

Beginning in 1956, the Tradewinds operated in transport squadron VR-2, mostly flying between San Diego and Hawaii. They continued to establish performance records. The fourth R3Y-1, later named Coral Sea Tradewind, set a speed record flying from San Diego to Patuxent

River, Maryland, in six hours at an average speed of 403 miles per hour.2 However, the aircraft were rapidly discarded, primarily because of technical problems with their T40 turboprop engines. (The T40 engine was also being

employed in the short-lived North American A2J Savage and Douglas A2D Skyshark attack planes.)

The last of the nine surviving Tradewinds were retired in 1958. (Two aircraft had crashed.)

The P5Y/R3Y was the largest U.S. Navy flying boat except for the Martin JRM Mars transport series and the aborted jet-powered Martin P6M Seamaster seaplane strike aircraft. The P5Y/R3Y project was another fascinating but impractical naval aviation program.

1. See John Wegg, General Dynamics Aircraft and their Predecessors (Annapo-lis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1990), pp. 18486.2. Seven Tradewinds were named for bodies of water: the South Pacific, Indian Ocean, Coral Sea, China Sea, South Atlantic, Arabian Sea, and Ca-ribbean Sea. See Steve Ginter, Convair XP5Y-1 & R3Y-1/-2 Tradewind (Simi Valley, CA: Naval Fighters, 1996), p. 43.

Mr. Polmar, a columnist for Pro-ceedings and Naval History, is au-thor of the definitive two-volume Aircraft Carriers: A History of Carrier Aviation and Its Influence on World Events (2004, 2008).

U.S. NAVY

The graceful prototype XP5Y-1 displays its long, thin high-aspect ratio fuselage in flight. Prominent on the side of the aircraft are its defensive 20-mm gun turrets.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

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U.S. NAVY

One of four Tradewinds modified for the air refueling role, the R3Y-2 refuels four Grumman F9F Cougars simultaneously.


Historic Fleets By Robert J. CressmanAs Fine a Sea-Boat as We Have in the Service

As the U.S. sloop Hornet skirted the Corobana Bank to approach the British brig-of-war Espiegle at 1530 on 24 February 1813, Master-Commandant James Lawrence sighted another sail on his weather quarter, edging down upon us. Lawrence had just given up pursuit of another brig to avoid running into shallow water. The Hornets command-er, who had been appointed a midship-man at 16, was described as possessing the temperament of a highly bred race horse, sensitive, quick, and impulsive. Now 31, he had been well taught . . . in that rough school of war [that] inevitably produces the best and most skillful offi-cers, having distinguished himself in the Tripolitan War.

The approaching ship Lawrence had spied proved to be the British brig-of-war Peacock, Captain William Peake commanding, which had spotted the Hornet almost simultaneously and bent on all sail to give chase. As the distance between the two ships closed, Peake cor-rectly observed the Hornet to have the appearance of a Man of War and ran up the challenge Strange Sail. Lawrence

saw the brig raise British colors at 1620. The Peacock had thrown down the gauntlet; Lawrence immediately ordered beat to quarters, with Drummer Henry McGrath and Fifer Jacob Stephens of the Hornets Marine Detachment doubt-less providing the necessary music. The Hornet cleared for action.

Authorized by Congress on 26 March 1804, the Hornet was designed as a brig by Josiah Fox and built at the Baltimore yard of William Price. She was christened on 30 May 1805 and launched with appropriate pomp on 28 July 1805, being placed in commission by 18 October 1805, with Master-Commandant Isaac Chauncey in command. Constructed at a cost of $52,603, the Hornet served in the Atlantic, then in the Mediterranean; and

transported distinguished passengers. The re-rigging of her sister ship Wasp from brig (two masts) to sloop (three masts) at the Washington Navy Yard resulted in the Hornet being likewise modified there.

Lawrence assumed command of the newly refitted Hornet at Norfolk, Virginia, on 25 October 1811. Lieutenant Edward J. Ballard, who commanded her on the passage down from Washington, touted

her . . . much improved [sailing quali-ties] . . . he passed everything he met with great ease. A little more than a fortnight later, Lawrence wrote: I am happy as hav-ing it in my power to state . . . that she sails remarkably fast, and is in my opinion as fine a sea-boat as we have in the ser-vice. Soon thereafter, the Hornet carried diplomats and dispatches to France and England as tensions deepened between the United States and Great Britain. She returned home just ahead of the open break between the two countries, and the U.S. declaration of war on 18 June 1812. Assigned to the squadron under Commodore John Rodgers, the Hornet made one cruise into the Atlantic, cap-tured one prize, and returned home.

The Hornet sailed in company with the celebrated frigate Constitution on 27 October 1812, auspiciously enjoy-ing fair winds upon departure, bound for a rendezvous with the frigate Essex. Ultimately, however, the Constitution sailed home after her victory over the British frigate Java, and the Hornet alone blockaded the coast of Brazil. She took a prizea dull sailer that Lawrence ordered burned.

Now, facing the Peacock, Lawrence kept the Hornet close by the wind, seeking the weather gage. Achieving that, the Hornet hoisted the Stars and Stripes at 1710, and closed the enemy. Fifteen minutes later, the two ships trad-ed broadsides within half a pistol shot.

Observing the enemy to be wearing, Lawrence later reported, received his starboard broadside [and] run him close on board on the starboard quarter. The Hornets well-drilled gunners fired rapidly, employing buckets of water to cool the hot guns, handling their 32-pounder car-ronades skillfully: firing on the downward roll to deliver punishing body blows to the Peacocks hull, and on the upward to wreck her rigging. Lawrence, knowing of his ships exceptional speed, ordered the Hornet positioned on the Peacocks starboard quarter, limiting the enemys ability to respond. The Hornets inces-sant discharge of Grape[shot] from her great guns, combined with the fire from the swivels and muskets in the topsthe latter most likely the work of First

U.S. NAVAL ACADEMY MUSEUM/BEVERLEY R. ROBINSON COLLECTION

After British brig-of-war Peacocks mainmast fell close aboard, her senior surviving officer con-sidered the ship an unmanageable and sinking Wreck. This watercolor shows the state of the action at that moment in her battle with the U.S. sloop Hornet. rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


surviving Peacock boat and, using wreck-age as oars, paddled to its ship.

With 277 men now on board, Lawrence strictly rationed water and provisions and set course for the United Statesand a tumultuous reception. Such was the Americans magnanimity toward their former foes that a number of the Peacocks officers signed a letter of gratitude for their treatment. Lawrence, feted as a hero, was given command of the frigate Chesapeake soon thereafter. He died of wounds suf-fered on 1 June that same year in com-bat with the frigate HMS Shannon. The Hornet survived the War of 1812, and then fought pirates in the West Indies.

On 5 February 1829, the Hornet cleared New York, bound, ultimately, for Tampico, Mexico. Receiving no further intelligence for some time, the Navy Department investigated and learned that a gale had driven the sloop from her Tampico moor-ings on 10 September 1829. Commodore Jesse Elliott, U.S. squadron command-er in the West Indies, concluded on 5 December that the magnificent Hornet had from some cause which will probably never be reached, foundered and all on board sunk to an untimely and lamented grave. Natural forces had done what ships from the mightiest navy in the world had not been able to do.

Lieutenant Robert Mosbys Marines sta-tioned therekilled or wounded every man serving the Peacocks after guns. As one Briton lamented, that deadly mus-ketry from the closeness of the ships . . . made every person on the Quarterdeck a Distinct Object.

Such distinct objects included the Peacocks commanding officerthe son of Sir Henry Peake, surveyor of the Royal Navy. Struck by a musket ball, then by a wood splinter, William Peakereaching 33 years of age on the day of the bat-tledied instantly moments later when cannon shot struck him. Lieutenant Frederick A. Wright assumed command and continued the battle with his tars carrying on with an ardour characteristic of British seamen. At 1740, however, Carpenter George Marr reported six feet of water in the ships hold. Wright soon waved his hat over his head and ordered

the colors hoisted upside down. The battle ended in less than 15 minutes.

Lawrence sent Lieutenant John T. Shubrickone of four brothers in the Navyover to the Peacock. He returned with Lieutenant Wright, who identi-fied the Hornets adversary but also told of many killed and wounded on boardand report-ed that the ship was sinking fast. Without delay, Lawrence solici-tously sent the Hornets boats

to bring off the wounded; both vessels anchored in five fathoms in the lengthen-ing shadows. Although former adversaries desperately worked together plugging shot holes, throwing cannon overboard, pump-ing and bailing to keep the Peacock afloat with every possible exertion to save the wounded, she plunged to the bottom, tak-ing with her, as Lawrence noted sadly, three of my brave fellowsSeaman John Hart, Ordinary Seaman Joseph Williams, and Cook Hannibal Boydand seven British sailors and a Royal Marine private. Four Britons managed to scramble to the top of the foremast, whence they were rescued, while four others took the damaged stern boat and managed to reach shore. The Hornets party manned another

Hornet-class sloop-of-warTonnage: 440 tons

Length: 106 feet, 9 inches

Breadth: 31 feet, 5 inches

Depth of hold: 14 feet

Armament: Eighteen 32pounder carronades

Two long 12-pounders

Complement: 152 officers and men, and Marines

(24 February 1813)

J. M. CAIELLA

The Hornet following her conversion from a brig to a sloop, work carried out at the Washington, D.C., Navy Yard. This drawing is adapted from similar plans for her sister ship, the Wasp.

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NAVAL HISTORY AND HERITAGE COMMAND

We shall sail in two or three weeks, Lieutenant Jesse Smith III wrote to his father two days after Christmas 1828, I presume our cruize [sic] will be a short one. Sadly, Smith and every other soul on board the Hornet perished in a hurricane off Tampico, depicted here in the Supposed Situation of the Sloop of War Hornet When Lost, a lithograph by Imbert published in The Sailors Magazine, March 1830.


Todays U.S. Navy was born (or perhaps reborn) in the War of 1812. Though the Fleet was founded during the first year of the American Revolution, by 1812 it was still a small coastal navy with a limited ability to project power,

protect ports, or control the sea. Those shortfalls hurt the United States in the War of 1812 and showed Americans very clearly the importance of a capable navy to protect the nations security and economic prosperity. At the same time, the characteristics that eventually carried the small U.S. Fleet to victories against the Britishtactical proficiency, forward operations, and warfighting readinessbecame hall-marks of our Navy that endure to this day.

The U.S. Navy was not ready for the War of 1812 be-cause Americas early leaders were not convinced the coun-try even needed an ocean-going force. Presidents George Washington and John Adams initially planned to build up the Fleet to protect the nations growing economy. But Presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison later slowed naval construction because they were wary of either increasing the national debt or raising taxes. In the lead-up to war, many in the Madison administration, recogniz-ing the disparity against the British, argued that the Fleet would best be kept in port to focus on harbor defense.

Small Fleet, Large Impact

As a result, the American Navy that sailed into the War of 1812 consisted of just 20-odd shipswith seven of those undergoing or in need of repair. Despite its size, however, that small Fleet made a big difference. Before Britain completed its blockade of Americas coast, most U.S. frigates and other warships were able to get to sea and remain under way throughout the war to challenge the

Royal Navy. Those ships and their crews won a series of individual engagements in the Atlantic and on the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain, surprising many observers in both countries and boosting morale in the United States.

Once it was able to mobilize in North America, the larger and more experienced Royal Navy blockaded U.S. merchants and some warships in port and eventually sup-ported an invasion of Washington, D.C. The impact of the British offensive was significant. Insurance rates soared and imports dropped, dramatically raising the price of finished goods from Europe needed in Americas homes and facto-ries. Meanwhile, commodity exports fell by more than 80 percent, denying American businesses and the government badly needed revenue.1 Britain eventually lifted the block-ade and negotiated for peace because of the financial drain of the war, the persistent challenge from American warships that evaded the blockade, and a continued threat from France. But the cost of the blockade to the U.S. economy and the Navys limited effectiveness in ending it forged a consensus after the war that America needed a strong Navy to assure the nations security and prosperity.2

A Young Navys Enduring Traits

The young American Fleet was able to defeat the pre-eminent Royal Navy in individual battles because it evi-denced traits that continue to be essential today. First, U.S. commanders were bold and innovative, having developed a

on a 200-Year

Three bedrock lessons from the War of 1812 remain the basis for U.S. Navy operations in the 21st century.

By Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, U.S. Navy

LEGACY

BUILDING


crews, and were outfitted with more guns than the standard frigates of the day. They made such an impression on the British that the Royal Navy began to question their classifi-cation. Though they may be called Frigates, read a secret order from the Admiralty to all station commanders, they are of a size, Complem[e]nt and weight of Metal much beyond that Class, and more resembling Line of Battle Ships.3 The Constitution, in fact, was given the nickname Old Ironsides by her crew after witnessing enemy shot bounce off the oak timbers that made up her hull.

Looking to the Past for the Future

Our Navys experience in the War of 1812 provides lessons we should apply today. Two hundred years ago our burgeon-ing industrial base built a Fleet with a focus on warfighting capability, ensuring that our frigates would deliver over-whelming fires while withstanding attacks. Our commanders, in turn, kept their crews attention on combat in the lead-up to conflict. Today we must continue applying that tenet of warfighting firstdelivering durable, effective capabilities to the Fleet so it can overcome present-day threats.

The War of 1812 showed the vulnerability of our econ-omy to disruptions in overseas trade. Today, globally inter-connected supply and production chains make it even more imperative that we operate forward to protect the free-dom of navigation at strategic maritime crossroads where shipping lanes and our security interests intersect. Those locationssuch as the Gibraltar, Malacca, and Hormuz straitswill only grow in importance as production chains become more global and dependent on reliable trade routes.

Americas second war with Great Britain also made clear that confident and well-trained sailors provide a warfighting edge no amount of technology can duplicate. In 1812 Ameri-can naval victories helped persuade Britain to negotiate peace. Today our forces must be ready to fight every day to promptly counter aggression or dissuade aggressors from their objectives.

Warfighting First. Operate Forward. Be Ready. Those are the key lessons from the U.S. Navys first sustained trial by fire. Those three tenets are the foundation of my Sailing Directions and keep us linked to our rich heritage.

1. Ian W. Toll, Six Frigates (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2006) p. 429.2. Ibid., pp. 4567.3. First Secretary of the Admiralty to station commanders-in-chief, 10 July 1813, in William S. Dudley and Michael J. Crawford, eds., The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History, 3 vols. to date (Washington, DC: Naval Historical Center, 1985) 2:183.

strong culture of command and independence through the Quasi-War with France and conflict with the Barbary pirates. In the earliest example, Commodore John Rodgers put to sea within hours of learning of the outbreak of war to go in search of British convoys, stretching the limits of his orders and quickly showing the Royal Navy that America was will-ing to fight. Master Commandant Thomas Macdonough, after twice being knocked unconscious in the Battle of Lake Champlain, was able to maneuver his flagship, the Saratoga, around to bring a fresh broadside to bear and ultimately win a decisive victory. And, in one of the first examples of trans-oceanic U.S. power projection, Captain David Porter took the frigate Essex around Cape Horn in 1813 and successfully disrupted British whaling and trade.

Second, U.S. Navy crews were confident and proficient. American sailors drilled daily at their guns, and were able to shoot more accurately and more rapidly than the Brit-ish. Through multiple engagements, the Americans dem-onstrated superior gunnery skills and seamanship, such as when the Constitution evaded a more powerful force because her crew towed and winched the ship away when winds had calmed (see story, p. 32). Events like those during the War of 1812 reinforced John Paul Jones earlier conclusion that men mean more than guns in the rating of a ship.

Third, U.S. ships were well built and resilient, surpris-ing the British with their agility and firepower. American 44-gun frigates were bigger, had thicker hulls, carried larger

U.S. NAVY (CLAY WEIS)

Sailors serving on board the USS Constitution stand at attention during a 2009 commemoration of the frigates 19 August 1812 victory over HMS Guerriere. While some of todays U.S. sailors serve tours of duty in a ship made famous during the War of 1812, that conflict provides lessons applicable to the present-day Navy.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


The Wars PervasiveNAVAL DIMENSIONS

By Charles E. Brodine Jr.


In 1882 Theodore Roosevelt published The Naval War of 1812. It was an impressive piece of historical writing by the 23-year-old Harvard graduate, note-worthy for its use of primary source documents, its careful analysis of ship engagements, and its attempt

to provide an accurate, unbiased narrative of the war at sea. Roosevelts book also was notable for its choice of subject matter, because, until its appearance, American writers had largely ignored the role of the U.S. Navy in the War of 1812, focusing instead on the political and military events of that conflict. The future presidents book represented the first in a series of new historical studies that aimed to provide an in-depth treatment of the men, ships, and operations of the 1812 Navy. It is a testament to Roosevelts scholarship that The Naval War of 1812 remains a standard reference work for naval historians 130 years after its publication.1

In writing his book, Roosevelt sought to portray the Navys wartime activities in bold relief. Had he chosen to expand his focus, however, employing a more wide-angled historical lens on his subject, he might have shown how the naval war of 1812 was more than a story about the operational histories of the U.S. and Royal navies. Indeed few aspects of Mr. Madisons warpolitical, diplomatic, economic, militarywere unaffected by naval and mari-time issues. What follows highlights some of these impor-tant connections.

Origins

Conflict over maritime issues was central to the origins of the War of 1812. No phrase better sums up the reasons the United States declared war against Great Britain in 1812 than the contemporary rallying cry Free Trade and Sailors Rights. In his war message to Congress, President James Madison catalogued a long list of insults and ille-galities the British committed against the men and ships involved in Americas neutral carrying trade. The most egregious of these was the Royal Navys seizure of U.S. merchantmen and the impressment of their crews on the high seas. In Madisons estimation, such practices amounted to nothing less than economic warfare designed to crush Britannias commercial rival.2

Clashes between opposing U.S. and Royal Navy warships also contributed to the deterio-ration in Anglo-American re-lations. The forcible seizure of four sailors from the U.S. frigate

Chesapeake by a boarding party from HMS Leopard in June 1807, an action that left 23 of the Chesapeakes crew killed or wounded, nearly resulted in an American declaration of war against Britain. Four years later, the American frigate President and the smaller, sixth-rate HMS Little Belt exchanged broad-sides in a nighttime encounter that severely damaged the Brit-ish warships hull and rigging and left her with 32 casualties.3

While Madisons war message indicted the British for promoting Indian attacks in the western backcountry, the majority of his text dealt with violations of Americas mari-time rights. It is difficult to imagine how these two coun-tries could have come to blows in 1812, then, had it not been for Americans passionate desire to defend free trade and sailors rights.

Strategies

The invasion of Canada formed the centerpiece of U.S. strategy during the War of 1812. In the minds of some Amer-ican leaders, the British province would prove to be an easy conquest. The acquisition of Canada, predicted former President Thomas Jefferson, . . . will be a mere matter of marching.4 Jeffersons breezy estimation of the ease with which Canada would fall failed to take into account the naval dimension of operations along the northern frontier, for no army (American or British) could expect to operate across the U.S.-Canadian border without first establishing naval dominance on the inland lakes that formed much of the regions boundary line. These lakesErie, Ontario, and Champlainoffered the only means by which large armies and their logistical trains might be moved with speed and efficiency in a wilderness theater spanning vast distances.

The Madison administrations failure to grasp the impor-tance of this strategic reality before declaring war resulted in Brigadier General William Hulls surrender of Fort Detroit on 16 August 1812, an event that yielded initial naval mastery on Lake Erie to the British. Aroused from their lethargy by the news of Detroits capture, Madison and his advisers took immediate steps to counter the British threat on the north-ern lakes.5 Before the month was out Navy Secretary Paul Hamilton had ordered Captain Isaac Chauncey to build and organize a naval force powerful enough to obtain command of . . . Lakes Ontario & Erie. One month later Lieutenant Thomas Macdonough received his own orders to assume command of a nascent U.S. fleet on Champlain.6 Until the cessation of hostilities in February 1815, establishing naval supremacy on the northern lakes became the lodestone of the Madison administrations Canadian strategy.

Viewing the War of 1812 through a wide-angle lens reveals that few aspects of the conflict were unaffected by naval and maritime factors.

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SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION

A War of 1812era patriotic painting highlights the fact that British violations of U.S. maritime rights, including the Royal Navys impressment of sailors from American merchant ships, largely underlay the causes of the conflict.


The administration had not begun to seriously consider how its small, oceangoing fleet of vessels might be deployed against the British until shortly before hostilities broke out. This may have owed to the fact that not much was expected of it in the face of the Royal Navys overwhelming numerical superiority and reputation for combat invincibility. Initially, Secretary Hamilton sought to limit the fleets cruising opera-tions to American coastal waters. The Constitutions victory over HMS Guerriere (see story, p. 36), in waters southeast of Halifax, prompted the Navy secretary to allow his ships to cruise in distant seas, though he directed they sail in two- to three-ship squadrons. Hamiltons successor, William Jones, preferred deploying individual ships on blue-water cruises aimed at the destruction of British commerce.7

The American government believed a more telling blow might be landed against Britains maritime trade, not by the U.S. Navy, but by large numbers of armed privateers-men. The Royal Navy might annihilate our public force on the water, Thomas Jefferson informed a correspondent, but our privateers will eat out the vitals of their com-merce.8 The U.S. government commissioned more than 500 privateers during the War of 1812. The damage these commerce raiders inflicted on the British merchant marine was considerable, totaling more than 1,300 prizes.9

Despite this success, there were some drawbacks to the large-scale commissioning of privateers. For one thing, the Navy Department lacked the authority to direct such vessels against particular military or naval objectives or to order them on government missions. As private com-mercial enterprises, privateers selected their own cruising grounds and targets based on the possibilities of profit, not

glory or national interest. A more significant problem with privateers was that they competed with public vessels for supplies of men, armaments, and naval stores, thereby driv-ing up the costs of outfitting Navy warships and, at times, delaying their departures from port.

For the British, the war with America was very much a side-show, the real threat being the armies of Napoleon Bonaparte. This meant that few troops or ships could be spared for the North American theater until the French emperors defeat. The security of Canada thus depended on the ability of the provinces land and naval forces to fight a successful defen-sive war until reinforcements could be spared from the Eu-ropean continent for large-scale offensive operations against the United States. To bring the war home to the Americans,

the Royal Navy instituted a blockade of the U.S. coast that increased in strength and effectiveness each year, choking off Yankee trade and disrupting American naval operations.

British naval forces also launched a campaign of am-phibious raids that grew in scope, tempo, and destructive-ness under the direction of Vice Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane. The Scottish-born commander-in-chief sought to use fire, sword, and terror to break the American publics will to fight.10 According to Cochrane, the Americans were like spaniels. They must be treated with great severity before you ever make them tractable.11

The Northern Lakes

The United States committed enormous resources to achieve a war-winning stroke in Canada. As noted earlier, naval mastery of the lakes along which U.S. land forces operated was an essential preliminary to any offensive cam-

NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM

The American privateer Rossie, captained by later U.S. Navy commodore Joshua Barney, bears down on the mail packet Princess Amelia in the West Indies on 16 September 1812. The government encouraged privateering as a way to attack British commerce, but the effort had drawbacks for the Navy. rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


paign. Thus the story of the War of 1812 on the northern lakes is a tale centered on shipbuilding, of great fleets being raised up in the wilderness, and of the daunting logistical hurdles overcome to assemble those fleets. On Lake Erie, the efforts of Master Commandant Oliver Hazard Perry and his men resulted in victory on 10 September 1813 in the Battle of Lake Erie, a triumph that restored naval mastery of that lake to the United States. One year later nearly to the day, Master Commandant Thomas Macdonough gained the second of the Navys fleet victories over the Royal Navy at the Battle of Plattsburgh Bay, on Lake Champlain, compelling a large invasion force under Lieutenant General George Prevost to withdraw into Canada.

Only on Lake Ontario were American efforts to gain naval supremacy frustrated. This was because Commodore James Lucas Yeo, Isaac Chaunceys counterpart at the British naval base at Kingston, was every bit his match as a naval administrator and builder of ships. For two years Yeo and Chauncey carried on what one historian has called a ship-builders war, each officer constructing and adding ships to his fleet in order to gain the upper hand on Lake Ontario.12

Despite the enormous expense this naval arms race entailed, President Madison vigorously supported Chaunceys efforts.

The Enemy, he wrote Major General Henry Dearborn, whose command stretched from the Niagara River to the New England coast, are making transcendent exertions to equip a naval force that will command the Lakes. Whatever theirs may be, ours ought to go beyond them. Nothing ought to be left to hazard on this subject. If they build two ships, we should build four. If they build thirty or 40 gun ships, we should build them of 50 or 60 Guns. The com-mand of those waters is the hinge on which the war will essentially turn, according to the probable course of it.13

Having built these wonderful instruments of naval war-fare, however, neither Chauncey nor Yeo was willing to risk them in battle without enjoying a numerical advantage

over the other. Ridiculing what he called the Equipoise of Imbecility on Lake Ontario, Lieutenant General Winfield Scott, a veteran of campaigns along the Niagara frontier, offered the following description of the competition be-tween Chauncey and Yeo in his memoir:

Early in 1813, the great contest on Lake Ontario com-menced between the ship carpenters at Kingston, under Sir James Yeo, and the ship carpenters, under Commodore Chauncey, at Sacketts Harbor. He that launched the last ship sailed in triumph up and down the lake, while his opponent lay snug, but not inactive, in harbor. This was (say) Chaunceys week of glory. Sir Jamess was sure to follow, and Chauncey, in turn, had to chafe in harbor, while preparing another launch for recovering the mastery of the lake. . . . Thus the two naval heroes of defeat held each other a little more than at arms-lengthneither being willing to risk a battle without a decided superiority in guns and men.14

The reluctance of Chauncey and Yeo to bring the other to battle stalemated military affairs on Lake Ontario.

The American Maritime Frontier

Considering the Atlantic coast, Chesapeake Bay, and Gulf coast as one extended maritime frontier, the challenges for de-fending this area were formidable. From the outset, American port towns on the Atlantic were subject to raids and increas-ing economic pressure from British blockaders and amphibious assaults. The problem faced by the Navy Department was that it lacked the resources to provide even modest protection to coastal communities. When Master Commandant Daniel T. Patterson, commander of the New Orleans Station, requested additional sailors to man his idle gunboats in order to cruise the Gulf coast, Secretary Jones told him that he would have to make do with the men that he had, noting:

NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM

American forces were victorious on two northern lakes, Erie and Champlain. But on the third, Ontario, U.S. Commodore Isaac Chauncey was unwilling to risk his warshipspictured at their Sacketts Harbor, New York, baseunless he had an overwhelming superiority against his British counterpart, which he never attained.rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


The Inhabitants, as well as the commanders, of every district, or place, in the Union, in any degree exposed to the annoyance of the enemy, are too prone to imag-ine the power and resources of the Government of the Union, inexhaustible, and without taking a sufficiently enlarged view of the immense extent of the Sea-Frontier (indented with innumerable Bays and Rivers, the Shores, towns and villages of which are constantly exposed to the predatory incursions of the enemy, with-out the possibility of defending more than a few of the most important points,) call upon the Government for a force competent to protect each point.15

Secretary Jones replied to Captain Isaac Hull in a similar vein when that officer requested more men to help defend the ship-of-the-line whose construction he was supervising at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Jones stated that it would be better to burn the ship on her stocks, thereby remov-ing her as target of attack, rather than diverting precious manpower from the northern lakes, where sailors were des-perately needed to man newly built ships.16

Some communities were able to contribute to their own naval defense by building or purchasing ships for the Navys use. The city of Philadelphia built several barges, a gun-boat, and a schooner that it then sold to the government for use in the Navys Delaware Flotilla, while Baltimore leased schooners to the Navy for patrolling the waters between that

city and the entrance of the Chesapeake.17 Sometimes the defensive measures proposed by public officials put them at odds with local Navy commanders. In the summer of 1814, William Bainbridge feared that U.S. warships would be blockaded in Boston Harbornot by British warships cruis-ing outside the harbor but by derelict ships, or hulks, sunk inside the harbor at the order of the city fathers.18

A few naval officers faced indifference, if not downright hostility, from governmental authorities in matters of local defense. Such was the case of Isaac Hull whose Portsmouth command was situated on the border between two Federalist states. I see no disposition on the part of the people to secure their harbour, a discouraged Hull informed Jones. We must therefore endeavour to defend ourselves.19

Beginning in 1813 with raids on Hampton Roads, Vir-ginia, and the North Carolina coast, the Royal Navy began to execute a series of hit-and-run amphibious operations against which the federal government had no answer. British raids in 1814 targeted the length of the eastern seaboard, ranging as far south as Cumberland Island, Geor-gia, to Passamaquoddy Bay, Maine, in the north. The most destructive of these campaigns took place in the summer of 1814 in the Chesapeake Bay, culminating with the capture and burning of Washington, D.C., on 24 August.

The British closed out the year with an attempt to seize New Orleans. The joint expeditionary force gathered for this undertaking represented the mightiest British assemblage of

ships, guns, and men during the war, one that was ex-pected to achieve a decisive victory over the Crescent Citys American defenders. Instead it met with igno-minious defeat before Major General Andrew Jacksons battle lines on 8 January 1815, suffering more than 2,000 casualties.

Echoes of 1812

Just as the maritime character of the nations frontiers had shaped how and where the War of 1812 was fought, likewise did it shape how the country would prepare for its next conflict. Given that Great Britain was expected to be the most likely antagonist in another war, the focus of those charged with improv-ing the countrys defenses

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

A Philadelphia cartoon mocking Alexandria, Virginia, for capitulating to a British naval force in August 1814 depicts Johnny Bull, dressed in seamans clothing, presenting kneeling city fathers with a list of demands while a British soldier and sailor make off with confiscated provisions. Despite the cartoons exaggerated tone, the U.S. government was virtually powerless to counter British naval raids. rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr


necessarily looked seaward. Gov-ernmental leaders moved on two fronts in this regard. First, Con-gress directed the Navy and War departments to survey the nations coastlines, bays, and harbors to determine the best sites for a net-work of naval arsenals and large, shore-based fortifications. The powerful stone-masonry forts that were built as a result of this sur-vey were designed and sited based on lessons learned in defending against British amphibious opera-tions in the War of 1812. These new, post-1812 forts became part of the Third System of Ameri-can coastal defense forts.20

Second, having seen how naval unpreparedness had left the nation vulnerable to a powerful maritime enemy, Congress now acted to im-prove the Navys odds in any future clash at sea by passing an aggressive program to expand the fleet. In a landmark piece of legislation, federal lawmakers authorized the con-struction of nine 74-gun ships-of-the-line, twelve 44-gun frigates, and three experimental steam-driven batteries for harbor defense.21 Congress funded the new ship construc-tion with an annual appropriation of $1 million over an eight-year period. For a variety of political and economic reasons, this ambitious scheme of naval expansion was ul-timately called into question and scaled back.

Despite this setback, the Navy remained high in the American publics esteem. Congress might continue to debate the Navys size and funding, but it no longer ques-tioned that services legitimacy as an instrument of national defense, as some members had in the 1790s and early 1800s. The Navys officers and sailors had settled that question for good by their heroic performance in the War of 1812.

1. On the importance of Roosevelts work in shifting the focus of 1812 scholar-ship, see Mark Russell Shulman, The Influence of History upon Sea Power: The Navalist Reinterpretation of the War of 1812, Journal of Military History 56 (April 1992):183206.2. For the text of Madisons war message, see Madison to Congress, 1 June 1812, in William S. Dudley and Michael J. Crawford, eds., The Naval War of 1812: A Documentary History, 3 vols. to date (Washington, DC: Naval Historical Center, 1985), 1:7381.3. For documents relating to the Chesapeake-Leopard affair and the PresidentLittle Belt affair, see Dudley and Crawford, Naval War of 1812, 1: 2734, 4150.4. Jefferson to William Duane, 4 August 1812, in The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Retirement Series, ed. J. Jefferson Looney, vol. 5 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Uni-versity Press, 2008), p. 293.5. For an excellent analysis of how the Great Lakes figured in American stra-tegic thinking before and during the War of 1812, see Jeff Seiken, To Obtain Command of the Lakes: The United States and the Contest for Lakes Erie and Ontario, 18121815, in David Curtis Skaggs and Larry L. Nelson, eds., The Sixty Years War for the Great Lakes, 17541814 (East Lansing: Michigan State Univer-sity Press, 2001), pp. 35371. General Hulls nephew, Captain Isaac Hull, com-

manded the U.S. frigate Constitution in her victory over HMS Guerriere.6. See Hamilton to Chauncey, 31 August 1812, and Hamilton to Macdonough, 28 September 1812, in Dudley and Crawford, Naval War of 1812, 1:297301, 31920.7. For a treatment of Hamiltons and Jones views on naval strategy and the deploy-ment of the American fleet, see Linda Maloney, The War of 1812: What Role for Sea Power? in Kenneth J. Hagan, ed., In Peace and War: Interpretations of American Naval History, 17751978 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1978), pp. 4662.8. Jefferson to Duane, 4 August 1812, Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 5:293.9. Statistics on U.S. privateers draw upon Faye Kert, Cruising in Colonial Wa-ters: The Organization of North American Privateering in the War of 1812, in David J. Starkey, E. S. van Eyck van Heslinga, and J. A. de Moor, eds., Pirates and Privateers: New Perspectives on the War on Trade in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (Exeter, Devon, UK: University of Exeter Press, 1997), pp. 145, 148.10. See C. J. Bartlett and Gene A. Smith, A Species of Milito-Nautico-Guerilla-Plundering Warfare: Admiral Alexander Cochranes Naval Campaign against the United States, 18141815, in Julie Flavell and Stephen Conway, eds., Britain and America Go to War: The Impact of War and Warfare in Anglo-America, 17541815 (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004), pp. 173204. 11. Cochrane to Robert Saunders Dundas Melville, 3 September 1814, in Dudley and Crawford, Naval War of 1812, 3:270.12. C. Winton-Clare, A Shipbuilders War, Mariners Mirror 29 (July 1943):13948.13. Madison to Dearborn, 6 February 1813, in J. C. A. Stagg et al., eds., The Pa-pers of James Madison, Presidential Series, vol. 5 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2004), p. 646.14. Winfield Scott, Memoirs of Lieut.-General Scott, LL.D. Written by Himself, 2 vols. (New York: Sheldon & Company, 1864), 1:113.15. Jones to Patterson, 7 March 1814, National Archives and Records Adminis-tration (Hereafter NARA), M149, Roll 11, pp. 23435.16. William Jones to Isaac Hull, 17 June 1814, NARA, M441, Roll 1, vol. 2, pp. 1078.17. For documents on Philadelphias contribution to the Delaware Flotilla and Baltimores lease of schooners to the Navy, see Dudley and Crawford, Naval War of 1812, 2:23132, 34854.18. For example, see Bainbridge to Jones, 7 July 1814, NARA, M125, Roll 37, No. 137; and, Bainbridge to Jones, 13 September 1814, NARA, M125, Roll 39, No. 50.19. Hull to Jones, 5 June 1813, quoted in Linda M. Maloney, The Captain from Connecticut: The Life and Naval Times of I

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Naval History - June 2012