1807: Jenkin Ratford, Chesapeake-Leopard affair casualty

(ExecutedToday.com) On this date in 1807, the British navy hanged Jenkin Ratford from the yardarm of the HMS Halifax off the coast of Maryland — an incident destined to become a rallying cry for the United States in the ill-fated War of 1812. Continued

Forgotten US airship crash recalled 80 years later

 

(AP) History buffs will gather this week near the New Jersey coast to commemorate a major airship disaster.
No, not that one.
Newsreel footage and radio announcer Herbert Morrison's plaintive cry, "Oh, the humanity!" made the 1937 explosion of the Hindenburg at the Lakehurst Naval Air Station probably the best-known crash of an airship.
But just four years earlier, a U.S. Navy airship seemingly jinxed from the start and later celebrated in song crashed only about 40 miles away, claiming more than twice as many lives.
The USS Akron, a 785-foot dirigible, was in its third year of flight when a violent storm sent it plunging tail-first into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after midnight on April 4, 1933. Continued

Fatal Cruise of the USS Princeton

 

(Navy History) On a late February day in 1844, a long line of black carriages drew up to the wharf at the Washington Navy Yard and dropped off the city's social elite, nearly 400 ladies and gentlemen in elegant attire and ready to celebrate. Captain Robert F. Stockton of Princeton, New Jersey, had assembled the very cream of the capital, including President John Tyler, for a demonstration cruise on board the pride of the United States Navy, the steam frigate USS Princeton . The festive voyage, however, did not go as planned. Continued

First Barbary War

(Wikipedia) The First Barbary War (1801–1805), also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars fought between the United States of America and the North African Muslim states known collectively as the Barbary States. These were the independent Sultanate of Morocco and Tripoli, which was a quasi-independent entity nominally belonging to the Muslim Ottoman Empire. Continued

Dr. Langley to Discuss War of 1812 Maritime Archaeology at Society on April 13

(WoCCP) Star-Spangled Archaeology: Commemorating the War of 1812 Through Maritime Archaeology, a recently added lecture, will wrap up the inaugural year of the Society’s Winter Speakers Series. Taking place on Saturday, April 13th at 2:00, the speaker, State Underwater Archaeologist Susan Langley, is sponsored by the Maryland Humanities Council and the Maryland War of 1812 Commission.
The waters of the Chesapeake conceal many hidden treasures, and Dr. Langley will help us dive into the subject of those submerged cultural resources. Continued

Live in a lighthouse on Chesapeake Bay

(NBC) Wanted: A homeowner with a dedication to history and lighthouses, willing to do a little renovation and, of course, live in a home set three miles offshore.
Unlike other lighthouses, the Wolf Trap Light Station is not firmly anchored to a rocky shore, but set out in Chesapeake Bay. Built in 1894, the Mathews lighthouse is a "caisson-style" lighthouse, which means it was constructed to withstand ice flows and whatever else the Atlantic Ocean throws that way. Continued

Pirates, in Fallston?

(J. Alexis Shriver, Bel Air Times) Who wants to join me in the fascinating (even though it be futile) building up of a playing card house, about an old tradition concerning a pirate?
Every indication points to the contrary, and yet there must be some reason to explain the constant search for hidden treasure which has continued for a hundred years.
Let us take our playing cards and build our fragile house of romance at "Bon Air", the gem of a French mansion built in 1794 by Claudius Francis Frederick de La Porte near the Gunpowder Falls in Harford County, almost adjoining the old Quaker Meeting House at Fallston. Continued

Photo: Historic American Buildings Survey E. H. Pickering, Photographer October 1936 BUILT 1794 BY CAPTAIN DE LA PORTE OF ROCHAMBEAU ARMY - Bon Air, Laurel Brook Road, Fallston, Harford County, MD

Air Raid on Pearl Harbor

(LoC) On December 7, 1941, Japanese planes attacked the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Territory, killing more than 2,300 Americans. The U.S.S. Arizona was completely destroyed and the U.S.S. Oklahoma capsized. A total of twelve ships sank or were beached in the attack and nine additional vessels were damaged. More than 160 aircraft were destroyed and more than 150 others damaged. Continued

Photo: The U.S. Navy battleship USS Maryland (BB-46) alongside the capsized USS Oklahoma (BB-37) at Pearl Harbor. The USS West Virginia (BB-48) is burning in the background. (National Archives).

 

John Dahlgren

(Wikipedia) John Adolphus Bernard Dahlgren (November 13, 1809 – July 12, 1870) was a United States Navy leader. He headed the Union Navy's ordnance department during the American Civil War and designed several different kinds of guns and cannons that were considered part of the reason the Union won the war. For these achievements, Dahlgren became known as the "father of American naval ordnance." He reached the rank of rear admiral. Continued

Top Photo: Dahlgren Chapel, Turner's Gap, Maryland (Acroterion, some rights reserved).

The Storm That Nearly Lost the War

(NYTimes) During the first week of November 1861 the worst storm in years struck the Atlantic Seaboard. Lacking modern meteorological equipment and techniques to predict its arrival, millions of people were caught unprepared. Floodwaters swamped Newark, Manhattan and Newport, R.I. Violent winds splintered fishing fleets off New England. On Nov. 3, 26 people on board the 990-ton square-rigger Maritana drowned when their ship capsized near Boston Harbor.
As bad as the damage was, though, most Northerners feared the worst news was still to come. Continued

Anchors Aweigh!

(LoC) On October 10, 1845, fifty midshipmen and seven faculty attended the first term of The United States Naval School. Five years later, the school became the United States Naval Academy. From the Mexican War to the Persian Gulf War, officers trained at the Academy served in every major U.S. war. President Jimmy Carter holds the distinction of being the sole Naval Academy graduate elected president and commander in chief. Continued

Photo: Bancroft Hall, Annapolis Naval Academy c1911. (Library of Congress)

United States Naval Institute

(USNI) The U.S. Naval Institute has been a fixture at the U.S. Naval Academy since its founding in 1873 by a group of 15 naval officers who began meeting to discuss the serious implications of a smaller, post-Civil War Navy and other matters of professional interest. The Naval Institute's headquarters on the grounds of the Naval Academy have a commanding view of the Severn River and the cemetery, where lie some of the most prominent heroes in Navy and Marine Corps lore.
The founding vision was to create a forum for the exchange of ideas, to disseminate and advance the knowledge of sea power, and to preserve our naval and maritime heritage. Continued 

Illustration: Library of Congress

Historic Navy ships dear to US veterans but costly for museums

MOUNT PLEASANT, South Carolina (NBC) The Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum, a popular tourist spot in South Carolina's Charleston Harbor, is facing the same challenge as other U.S. Navy ship museums: keeping retired, once-storied warships afloat.
Its World War Two destroyer, the USS Laffey, just had a nearly $13 million restoration. The almost 70-year-old World War Two aircraft carrier, the USS Yorktown, will need eventual repairs at a cost of tens of millions of dollars.
The USS Clamagore, a 1945 submarine at a dock nearby, could roll over in the next hurricane without extensive work to shore up its hull. While a veterans' group tries to raise enough money to save the sub, museum officials are making plans to have it towed to sea and turned into an artificial reef. Continued

Photo: SS John W. Brown on the Great Lakes in 2000. John W. Brown is one of only two surviving World War II Liberty Ships, the other being the SS Jeremiah O'Brien. (Wikipedia)

Battle of the Chesapeake

(Wikipedia) The Battle of the Chesapeake, also known as the Battle of the Virginia Capes or simply the Battle of the Capes, was a crucial naval battle in the American Revolutionary War which took place near the mouth of Chesapeake Bay on September 5, 1781, between a British fleet led by Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Graves and a French fleet led by Rear-Admiral the Comte de Grasse. Continued

The Wreck of the Faithful Steward

(discoversea.com) The Faithful Steward, bound from Londonderry, Ireland to Philadelphia with 249 passengers, ran aground near Indian River Inlet, Delaware on the night of September 1, 1785. When a sounding was taken, it was found the ship was only in 4 fathoms of water, though there was not the slightest appearance of land. Every exertion was used to run the vessel off shore but all failed.
On the morning of September 2, the ship was near Indian River, about four leagues to the southward of Cape Henlopen. Every effort was made to save the unhappy sufferers, who had remained on the deck during the night. The ship was only 100 yards from the shore. On the evening of Sept. 2, the ship broke to pieces. Continued

The Alabama Escapes

(NYTimes) Shortly before 10 a.m. on July 29, 1862, a “very dark, sallow man with black hair and eyes, whiskers down each cheek but shaved clean off his chin” escorted several well-dressed men and women on a short boat ride from Liverpool, England. The trip, aboard the recently launched Enrica, took them between the harbor bell buoy and a lightship near the Isle of Man. But around 3 p.m. the host announced a last-minute change in plans: the ship was now scheduled for an overnight sea trial, necessitating an abrupt end to the shipboard party. He ushered his guests onto the accompanying steam tug Hercules for a return to Liverpool. The Enrica would never again tie up at the Merseyside quays.
This “dark, sallow man” was Commander James Dunwoody Bulloch, a 15-year veteran of the United States Navy and an uncle to the 4-year-old Theodore Roosevelt. At the outbreak of the war, though, he volunteered to serve the Southern cause. Continued

Searchers find no sign of Amelia Earhart's plane

(NBC/AP) A $2.2 million expedition that hoped to find wreckage from famed aviator Amelia Earhart's final flight is on its way back to Hawaii without the dramatic, conclusive plane images searchers were hoping to attain.
But the group leading the search, The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, or TIGHAR, still believes Earhart and her navigator crashed onto a reef off a remote island in the Pacific Ocean 75 years ago this month, its president told The Associated Press on Monday.
"This is just sort of the way things are in this world," TIGHAR President Pat Thrasher said. "It's not like an Indiana Jones flick where you go through a door and there it is. It's not like that — it's never like that." Continued

Edgewood man restores wooden crab boat to pursue a career as a waterman

(Aegis) David Peacock, an 18-year-old from Edgewood, just graduated from Harford Technical High School two months ago, but he is already preparing to begin commercial crabbing on a wooden boat he restored himself.
Peacock's grandfather purchased a 40-foot long and 10-foot wide 1969 Deltaville boat in 2010 and turned it over to his grandson.
"We knew it needed some work," Peacock said, so in his sophomore year of high school, he began saving the money he earned by working on commercial crab boats and making crab traps to purchase the supplies necessary to refurbish the boat. Continued

Wooden boat school finds home in Cecil

(The Record) The Chesapeake Wooden Boat Builders School has found a new home following last month's severing of ties between the school and its former home, the Havre de Grace Maritime Museum.
The school has moved to the Upper Bay Museum in North East Town Park, http://www.cecildaily.com reported Friday.
"We're excited about it," school co-director Bud Gillis was quoted. "They're happy, and we're happy."
Last month, the board of directors of the Havre de Grace Maritime Museum voted to end the museum's 10-year relationship with the school. According to the museum's executive director, the board felt the school's activities did not meet the mission of the museum. Continued

Condo has waterfront view of history

(Baltimore Sun) In July, Joe Zuccaro will celebrate one year of living in a condo in a historic Fells Point tobacco warehouse that he refers to as "a Renaissance bachelor's pad with a million-dollar view."

"I have always wanted to live in Baltimore," said the Montgomery County native. "I wanted to be somewhere neat and right on the water." Continued