USS Adams (1799)

USS Adams was a 28-gun (rated) sailing frigate of the United States Navy. She was laid down in 1797 at New York City by John Jackson and William Sheffield and launched on 8 June 1799. Captain Richard Valentine Morris took command of the ship. On 15 December, she took the French privateer Le Onze Vendémiaire.

On 10 January 1800, Adams and made the French schooner La Fougeuse their prize and, late in the month, Adams recaptured the schooner Alphia. Sometime in January she captured schooner "Le Gambeaux". French schooner L'Heureuse Rencontre was captured, and privateer "General Massena" also, and "Isabella", a prize of Berceau was recaptured, in February. The following month, she freed the sloop Nonpareil and she did the same for the schooner Priscilla in April.

But Adams most successful month came in May when she recaptured an unidentified schooner and teamed up with Insurgent once more in freeing a British letter of marque. During the same month she also recaptured schooner Nancy, schooner Grinder(There is an unclear reference to HMS Unity in connection to this ship), and an unidentified brig, she captured the brig Dove and the schooner Renomie.

In need of repairs, Adams returned to New York on 3 June 1800, after briefly running aground off Cape Hatteras, On 18 August Capt. Thomas Robinson was made her new Captain replacing Capt. Morris. Early in the fall she headed back to the Caribbean. However, on this cruise she did not have the success which she had enjoyed under Capt. Richard Morris but for the most part was limited to patrol and escort duty. She did manage to recapture the British schooner Grendin, but the date of the action is unknown. On 23 March 1801, the Secretary of the Navy ordered her home. She arrived prior to 7 June and was laid up at New York.

First Barbary War

However, trouble in the Mediterranean prevented her respite from being long. The Barbary states on the northern coast of Africa were capturing American merchantmen attempting to trade in that ancient sea and enslaving their crews. Capt. Edward Preble was ordered to New York to take command by the Navy Secretary on 12 January, 1802. In a letter dated 13 April, 1802 Preble asked for a furlough due to a rapid decline in his health since arriving in New York in January. His request was granted in a letter dated 16 April. Capt. Hugh G. Campbell was ordered to take command in a letter dated 17 April. On 10 June 1802, she departed New York and headed for the Strait of Gibraltar carrying orders for Commodore Richard V. Morris, her first commanding officer who was now in command of the American Mediterranean Squadron. She arrived there on 22 July and remained in that port blockading the Tripolitan cruiser Meshuda lest she escape and prey on American shipping. It was not until 8 April 1803 that she was freed of this duty. She then joined the rest of Morris' squadron in operations off Tripoli.

However, as a squadron commander, Morris seemed to have lost the dash and daring he had displayed in operations against the French in the West Indies while in command of a single ship. His indecisiveness in the Mediterranean prompted Washington to order his recall and he sailed for home in Adams on 25 September. The frigate carried Morris to Washington, arriving 15 November, 1803 and was placed in ordinary at the navy yard.

1805–1811

Capt. Alexander Murray was ordered to take command in a letter dated 9 July 1805. Adams cruised along the coast of the United States from New York to Florida protecting American commerce. In the autumn of the following year she was again laid up in Washington and – but for service enforcing the Embargo Act in 1809 – remained inactive at the nation's capital until the outbreak of the War of 1812. In August 1811 she became the receiving ship at the Washington Navy Yard.

Near the end of her homeward passage, Adams ran aground on the Isle au Haut on 17 August 1814 and was damaged seriously. Skillful seamanship aided by a rising tide managed to refloat the ship and despite heavy leaking she made it into the Penobscot River and reached Hampden, Maine (then part of the District of Maine under Massachusetts). There on 3 September 1814, during the Battle of Hampden, she was scuttled and set ablaze to prevent capture by a British squadron under the command of Rear-Admiral Edward Griffiths supporting British offensive operations in Maine. -->

First Barbary War

1805–1811

Further reading