Commodore John Rodgers (July 11, 1772 – August 1, 1838) was a United States Navy officer who served during the Navy's formative years from the 1790s through to the late 1830s. He served under six presidents and for nearly four decades. His service took him through numerous military engagements of the Quasi-War, both Barbary Wars, and the War of 1812.
As a senior officer in the young American navy, Rodgers played a major role in the development of the standards, customs and traditions that emerged during this time. Rodgers was, among other things, noted for commanding the largest American squadron in his day to sail the Mediterranean Sea. After serving with distinction as a lieutenant, he was soon promoted directly to the rank of captain (the rank of Master Commandant did not exist at that time). During his naval career he commanded a number of warships, including , the flagship of the fleet that defeated the Barbary states of North Africa.
During the War of 1812, Rodgers fired the first shot of the war aboard his next flagship, , and also played a leading role in the reoccupation of Washington D.C. after it was occupied by British forces. His own hometown of Havre de Grace, Maryland was raided and burnt during the war. Later in his career he headed the Board of Navy Commissioners, and he served briefly as Secretary of the Navy. Following in his footsteps, Rodgers' son, and several grandsons and great-grandsons, also became commodores and admirals in the United States Navy.
Early life
Rodgers's parents were part of a large wave of Scottish immigrants to the Thirteen Colonies in the years prior to the American Revolution. His father, John Rodgers, was born in Scotland in 1726. He emigrated to America and in 1760 married Elizabeth Reynolds (born 1742) from Delaware, who was also of Scots ancestry. They had eight children, four sons and four daughters; the younger John Rodgers was named for his father. Like many other Scots immigrants, his father became a proponent of the patriot cause and served as a colonel in the militia.
Rodgers was born in 1772 on a farm in a village near the "Susquehanna Ferry", on the north shore of the Susquehanna River (near today's Perryville) in Cecil County. This was near its mouth at the Chesapeake Bay. He was raised here for the first thirteen years of his life. While Rodgers was still a youth, the village on the south shore (in Harford County) was named "Havre de Grace" by Marquis de Lafayette after a famous French port of the same name. The young Rodgers was known to fish in the Susquehanna and Chesapeake Bay near his home. He attended local school, and read books about the seafaring life. He had often seen schooner-rigged ships in Havre de Grace but longed to see the large square-rigged vessels he had always read about.
Realizing Rodgers was determined to go to sea, his father helped arrange his apprenticeship with Captain Benjamin Folger, a master ship builder of Baltimore, and Revolutionary War veteran. He had served aboard merchant ships and as commander of Felicity, used in the capture of a privateer. By this time, Folger was captain and owner of Maryland. Rodgers served a five-year apprenticeship on this ship.
thumb|upright|Minerva Denison Rodgers, portrait by [[John Wesley Jarvis, ]]
In 1806 Rodgers married Minerva Denison; they had three sons, Robert, Frederick and John, and two daughters together.