USS Constellation is a sloop-of-war, the last sail-only warship designed and built by the United States Navy. She was built at the Gosport Shipyard between 1853 and 1855. She was named for the earlier frigate of the same name that had been broken up in 1853. The sloop's primary armament was sixteen shell-firing guns and four 32-pounder long guns, though she carried other guns as well, including two Parrott rifle chase guns. Constellations career as a front-line unit was relatively short; after entering service in 1855, she served with the Mediterranean Squadron until 1858, and in 1859, she was assigned as the flagship of the Africa Squadron, where she served with the African Slave Trade Patrol. During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the ship returned to the Mediterranean to patrol for Confederate vessels. In late 1864, she returned to the United States to be decommissioned, as most of her crews' enlistments had expired. She spent the rest of the war out of service.
Constellation was recommissioned in 1871 for use as a training ship, being used for shooting practice and training cruises for midshipmen. She filled this role for twenty-two years, and during this period, she saw a number of other activities, including transporting exhibits for the 1878 Exposition Universelle in Paris and carrying food to Ireland during the 1879 Irish famine. She was reduced to a stationary training hulk in late 1893, being moored in Newport for the next twenty years. During this period, the mistaken belief that the two Constellations were one and the same arose, and she was presented as such in 1914 during the centennial of the writing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", the national anthem of the United States. Briefly renamed Old Constellation in 1917 to free the name for a new battlecruiser of the , she reverted to her original name when the battlecruiser was scrapped in 1925. Constellation was recommissioned in 1940 as part of the build-up in anticipation of the United States' entry into World War II, during which she served as the port flagship of the commander of the Atlantic Fleet.
Proposals to restore the vessel as a museum ship had been submitted already in the 1930s, but work began in earnest after World War II. Shortages of funds prevented her transfer to the city of Baltimore, Maryland, until 1955. Operating under the mistaken belief that she was the original Constellation, the organization responsible for the ship modified her to match the earlier vessel's appearance during a refit in the late 1950s and early 1960s. During this period, a controversy arose over the vessel's identity that lasted into the 1990s, when new research definitively proved that the Constellation launched in 1797 and the 1854-launched vessel were distinct ships. Periodic repairs have been carried out since the mid-1990s to repair rotted wood. Constellation remains open to the public as part of the Historic Ships in Baltimore in the city's Inner Harbor, having been designated a National Historic Landmark.
Design and construction
From 1816 to the 1830s, the Navy accumulated extensive stocks of live oak timbers for use in new warship construction under the provisions of the Act for the Gradual Increase of the Navy of the United States, passed in 1816. In the early 1850s, the Navy decided to build a new sail-powered ship using these existing stockpiles, calling for a sloop-of-war that would be fast, with a long endurance, and sufficiently armed to be capable of engaging other warships of her type. This would produce a capable warship while keeping costs low since the material used was already on hand and an expensive steam engine would not be required. Chief Constructor John Lenthall prepared the design, along with Edward Delano, the constructor of the Gosport Shipyard. In June 1853, Lenthall completed the hull half model, which was necessary to scale up the design and to prepare the necessary hull timbers. During this period, the new vessel's namesake, , was in the process of being broken up a short distance away in the Gosport yard.
Service history
thumb|left|Engraving of Constellation in dry dock, c. 1859
Constellation was commissioned on 28 July 1855, under the command of Captain Charles H. Bell. She immediately departed for a tour with the Mediterranean Squadron that lasted three years. During this period, she stopped in Málaga, Spain in July 1856 to protect American nationals in the area during a period of civil unrest. Later that year, she came to the aid of a barque in the Sea of Marmara; the ship received an official thanks from the Emperor of Austria. On 17 April 1858, she left the Mediterranean Squadron for a short patrol in the Caribbean Sea to protect American shipping in the region. On 5 June she returned to the New York Navy Yard before proceeding to Boston, where she was decommissioned on 13 August.
In June 1859, she recommissioned for service with the Africa Squadron, where she served as the squadron flagship, under the command of Captain Thomas Aloysius Dornin. She arrived off the mouth of the Congo River on 21 November, where she began operating as part of the African Slave Trade Patrol. As part of its efforts to end the Atlantic slave trade, the Navy awarded prize money for each slave ship captured, along with a $25 bounty for each slave that was freed; these prizes were divided among the crew, based on rank. On 29 December, she captured the brig Delicia that had no papers and was fitted to carry slaves in her hold. On 26 September 1860, Constellation captured the barque Cora, which had 705 slaves aboard, who were then released in Monrovia, Liberia. The Navy impounded Cora and sold her at an auction. After returning to New York, she was modified to carry a large cargo of food and other supplies to Ireland for the relief effort for the 1879 Irish famine. To accommodate as much food as possible, some of the ship's guns were removed, along with some of her ballast. She was able to carry more than 2,500 barrels of flour and potatoes. She left the United States in March 1880 and arrived in Queenstown (now Cobh), Ireland on 20 April, where she sent the food ashore, took on ballast, and returned to the United States, arriving in June. She was towed to a drydock at Locust Point, near Fort McHenry, in 1996, and a $7.3 million rebuilding and restoration project was undertaken and completed in 1999. About half of her original but badly-rotted wood was replaced.
On 26 October 2004, Constellation made her first trip out of Baltimore's Inner Harbor since 1955, and her first to Annapolis since 1893. The trip to the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis took about eight hours and her visit lasted six days. While there, she was available for public tours from 27 to 31 October. The vessel was towed to and from Annapolis, as her rigging and ballast were not in a condition to allow her to sail on her own.
In 2011, significant rot was discovered in the ship's hull during routine maintenance; many of the affected timbers had been installed during the refit in the 1990s. After raising funds to cover the cost of the reconstruction, the ship was dry docked at the United States Coast Guard Yard just to the south of Baltimore in October 2014. The project cost about $2 million and was completed in February 2015. Further repairs were necessitated in mid-2016 after some hull planks were found to have rotted.
An education center was erected next to the ship as part of the museum complex, though by the late 1990s, the building was in poor condition and needed to be replaced. Efforts to begin work in 1999 and then in the 2000s failed, and the building was finally demolished in 2019. Work began on a new building, but progress was delayed significantly, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020. The pandemic also dramatically reduced visitors to the ship, which was closed until April 2021, but by June, numbers had increased to previous levels. Construction of the new building was completed by June 2022, when it was opened to the public.
The ship is now part of Historic Ships in Baltimore, which also operates the Coast Guard cutter WHEC-37, the World War II submarine , the , and the Seven Foot Knoll Light. Constellation and her companions are major contributing elements in the Baltimore National Heritage Area. She is the last existing intact naval vessel that saw active service in the American Civil War, and she was the last solely wind-powered warship built by the U.S. Navy.
Identity controversy
thumb|Constellation in 2012
thumb|Constellation at Baltimore's Inner Harbor in 2019
The city of Baltimore and the organization that maintained Constellation promoted the ship as having been the 1797 frigate and even rebuilt sections of the ship to resemble the earlier vessel. Additionally, they relied on the fact that some of the funds used to build the sloop were originally allocated to rebuild the frigate, the incorrect assertion that the keel and futtocks from the broken-up frigate were used in the construction of the sloop, and that at the time of her donation to the city, the Navy insisted that the vessel was the original frigate launched in 1797. They also relied on a series of forged documents that had been created in the 1960s to support their position. Stephen Bockmiller and Lawrence Bopp agree with Chapelle, writing in USS Constellation: An Illustrated History, that "working under the subterfuge of 'repairs,' the Navy actually began building a new ship about 900 yards from where the original Constellation was being dismantled. Thus, unwittingly, the Navy itself would originate the arguments about the authenticity of the Constellation. To further compound the argument, some salvageable timbers from the original ship, particularly the ship's knees, were used in constructing the new vessel." In USS Constellation on the Dismal Coast, published in 2013, C. Herbert Gilliland wrote, " For much of the twentieth century, this ship was believed to be the 1797 frigate Constellation. In fact, however, when the 1797 frigate was being dismantled at the Gosport Navy Yard near Norfolk, Virginia, work was beginning on the 1854 sloop, likely reusing some timber from the old ship in building this very new one. The misidentification was maintained by deliberate deception, apparently to enhance the likelihood of the ship's being preserved as a historic relic. Naval records and the evidence from the extant ship's hull, though, make it clear that the vessel floating today dates from 1854."
In September 1991, researchers Dana M. Wegner and Colan Ratliff from the David Taylor Research Center and Kevin Lynaugh, from the Carderock Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center, published an exhaustive report on the question.
left|thumb|Constellation in 2019
In addition to evaluating the half model, the researchers also reviewed all the evidence used in the debate to date. With the help of FBI and BATF forensics investigators, they concluded that some 25 to 30 documents supporting the ship being a rebuild were forgeries. In 1991, they published their findings and conclusion that the current Constellation and the original frigate are two different ships. The authors did not agree with Chapelle, however, over the nature of the new ship's construction; they pointed out that the Act for the Gradual Increase authorized the Navy to build new ships from the oak acquired under its provisions, so there was no need to subvert Congress's authority on the matter. Lynaugh summarized the report in a separate article published in 1993, Discussion of the Origins of the Frigate and the Sloop Constellation, and concluded that "though not built in Baltimore in 1797, the present ship was the last sail-only powered warship designed and built by the U.S. Navy. As such, it is a rare artifact of first importance and truly deserves to be preserved and displayed for the American public."
Indeed, the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (DANFS), the official reference work for vessels of the US Navy, has exemplified and evolved with this identity controversy. In its 1969 edition it stated that the original Constellation was "Laid up in ordinary at Norfolk from 1845 through 1853, she was found to be greatly in need of extensive repair. Thus, in 1854 she was brought into the yard and, in keeping with the needs of the time, modified into a 22-gun sloop-of-war." By its 2004 edition this had been modified to state the original Constellation was broken up at Norfolk in 1853.
For its part, Historic Ships in Baltimore, the organization that operates the museum of which Constellation is a part, does not present the ship as having been the original vessel. They instead acknowledge that the first vessel was broken up in 1853, and present the accounts provided by more recent editions of DANFS. Its predecessor organization, the U.S.F. Constellation Foundation, had maintained the opposite policy until its board resigned in 1994 and was replaced by advocates of the new-ship school of thought.
Awards
- Civil War Campaign Medal
- Spanish Campaign Medal
- World War I Victory Medal
- American Defense Service Medal
- American Campaign Medal
- World War II Victory Medal
- National Defense Service Medal
See also
- List of sloops of war of the United States Navy
- Bibliography of early American naval history
- Ship of Theseus