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Warship Wednesday, April 9, 2025: First of a Long Line

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

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Warship Wednesday, April 9, 2025: First of a Long Line

Naval History and Heritage Command photo NH 310

Above, we see the unique U.S. Revenue Cutter Windom circa 1900. She had already fought in one war under Navy orders, would go on to carry a “USS” during WWI, bust rum-runners, and chart a course for the modern Coast Guard.

Not bad for a 170-foot ship.

A New Era

In 1890, the Revenue Cutter Service– the forerunner of the USCG– was celebrating its centennial, having been authorized as part of the Treasury Department in 1790. Having fought during the Quasi War, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Civil War, the USRCS had a long history of suiting up for combat when needed.

It was a busy force.

In 1890, the 36 assorted cutters of the service had cruised a total of 301,416 nautical miles, boarded and examined 26,962 vessels for revenue purposes, and assisted 123 distressed vessels, saving a value of $2,806,056 in ships and cargoes on the sea. They did everything that year from chasing down seal poachers in the Bering Sea to breaking up smuggling rings along the Florida Keys and arresting murderers on the high seas.

However, it was stuck in the 19th century while pointing towards the 20th and was obsolete. Most of the 36 cutters were small (under 100 foot) sloops, luggers, and tugs, capable of harbor and coastal patrols at best. The more blue water of the fleet were typically iron-hulled topsail steam schooners (USRC Gallatin, Hamilton, Boutwell, Dallas, Dexter, Rush, Corwin, and Forward) of about 140 feet in length. Two big steamers with auxiliary rigs, the 165-foot USRC Perry and the 198-foot USRC Bear, were dedicated to the far-off Alaska patrol. A couple of more modern twin-screwed steam cutters, the 145-foot USRC Morrill and the 190-foot USRC Galveston, were just coming online.

Armament in many cases was simply whatever could be scrounged from the Navy’ that was small enough to carry and service without lifts, typically 3-pounder 47mm or 6-pounder 57mm breechloading mounts, while smaller cutters usually just carried small arms. Speaking of which, trapdoor Springfield conversions and S&W cartridge revolvers were the norm. Some older cutters carried breechloading 3-inch Ordnance conversions of Civil War-era cannon.

USRC Corwin departing for Alaska in 1887. She was a 140-foot topsail schooner-rigged iron-hulled steamer that exemplified the cutter service in 1890. She carried a single 6-pounder.

As noted by the SECNAV at the time, Benjamin Franklin Tracy, “At present this large fleet of small vessels is constructed without any reference to the necessities of modern warfare.”

Pioneering a new age of steel cruising cutters for the service, capable of serving as a gunboat for the Navy in times of war, would be our USRC Windom.

Modern for her era, she was the first cutter constructed with a fully watertight hull, longitudinal and transverse bulkheads, and a triple expansion steam plant capable of 15 knots sustained speed.

She would carry a twin schooner auxiliary rig, at least at first

Designed to service Chesapeake Bay, Windom would displace 412 tons, have a length of 170 feet, eight inches overall, and an extreme beam of 27 feet. Her normal draught, carrying 50 tons of coal aboard, would be 6.5 fee,t while her hold was 13.5 deep.

Her twin inverted cylinder, direct-acting, triple-expansion steam engines (11 3-4, 16 1-2, and 26 1-2  cylinders with a 24-inch stroke) were designed by the Navy’s Bureau of Steam Engineering under orders of Commodore George Melville and were “regarded in engineering circles as more advanced in type than any in the Revenue Cutter Service. They drove twin cast-iron propellers and could generate 800 hp at 175 rpm. They drew steam via a single tubular double-ended horizontal 16×12 foot boiler.

Her battery was one installed 6-pounder RF Hotchkiss with weight and space for a 3-inch or 4-inch BL and a second 6-pounder as well. Small arms of a “modern type” would be provided for the 45-member crew.

Revenue Cutter Windom, Port Arthur, Texas

The design of Windom would lead the service to order five so-called Propeller class cutters, which were larger and faster (as well as costing about twice as much per hull) at 18 knots. These vessels, to the same overall concept but each slightly different in design, were built to carry a bow-mounted torpedo tube for 15-inch Bliss-Whitehead type torpedoes (although they appeared to have not been fitted with the weapons) and as many as four modern quick-firing 3-inch guns (though they typically used just two 6-pounder, 57mm popguns in peacetime).

These ships included:

–McCulloch, a barquentine-rigged, composite-hulled, 219-foot, 1,280-ton steamer ordered from William Cramp and Sons of Philadelphia for $196,000. She was the longest of the type as she was intended for Pacific service and so was designed with larger coal bunkers.

–Gresham, a brigantine-rigged 206-foot, 1,090-ton steel-hulled steamer built by the Globe Iron Works Company of Cleveland, OH for $147,800.

–Manning, a brigantine-rigged 205-foot, 1,150-ton steamer ordered from the Atlantic Works Company of East Boston, MA, for a cost of $159,951.

–Algonquin, brigantine-rigged 205.5-foot, 1,180-ton steel-hulled steamer ordered from the Globe Iron Works Company of Cleveland, OH for $193,000.

–Onondaga, brigantine-rigged 206-foot, 1,190-ton steel-hulled steamer ordered from the Globe Iron Works Company of Cleveland, OH for $193,800.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

Meet Windom

Our subject, in frequent USRC/USCG practice, was named for a past secretary of the U.S. Treasury, in this case, William Windom. A long-term U.S. Congressman (1859-1869) and Senator (1870-1881, 81-83) from Minnesota, he served as the Treasury boss under James A. Garfield for nine months in 1881 and then again under Benjamin Harrison from 1889 through 1891, passing in office at age 63. He successfully helped defeat a push to transfer the Cutter Service to the Navy

The Honorable William Windom, of Minnesota, left, while in Congress compared to his official portrait as Secretary of the Treasury in the Garfield administration. NARA 165-A-3716 & LOC LC-DIG-cwpbh-03920

Honoring the late Mr. Windom, the Treasury Department carried his engraved portrait on the $2 U.S. Silver Certificate from 1891 to 1896, while the USRCS named its groundbreaking new cutter after him.

Ordered from the Iowa Iron Works, Dubuque, for $98,500, with delivery to be made down the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico and then to Key West. The plates, frames, angle irons, and castings employed in the hull were furnished by the West Superior Steel Works of Wisconsin, while William Cramp built her engines.

Accepted by the Treasury Department on 11 May 1896, she was moved to Baltimore, Maryland, where she completed fitting out and was placed in commission on 30 June 1896.

Her initial skipper was Capt. Samuel Edmondson Maguire, a 54-year-old Marylander who had joined the Revenue Cutter Service in 1871 as a third lieutenant after carpetbagging in Louisiana during Reconstruction. Maguire had volunteered during the Civil War as a private in Company C of the 114th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, the famed Zouaves d ‘Afrique, and was wounded at Fredericksburg.

In October 1896, Windom was tasked with keeping guard over the notorious gun-running steamer Dauntless.

Impounded at sea by the cruiser USS Raleigh off Florida after a run to arm rebels fighting against the Spanish in Cuba, Windom guarded the filibuster mothership until the Collector of Customs released the libeled Dauntless, after paying a $200 fine for lying to off the coast with no lights, to resume her illicit activities. Windom joined the cutters, Boutwell and Colfax, through the end of the year in Florida waters, based on the St. John River, to run interference against other filibuster boats headed for Cuba, impounding the steamers Kate Spencer and Three Friends in November.

Besides filibuster-busting, Windom spent the first 17 months of her career in quiet operations on the Chesapeake and patrolling the fishing grounds between the Virginia capes and Cape Hatteras.

Then came…

War with Spain!

On 24 March 1898, with the drums of war beating with Spain, President McKinley ordered the cutters Gresham, Manning, Windom, Woodbury, Hamilton, Morrill, Hudson, Guthrie, and Calumet, “with their officers and crews, be placed under the direction of the Secretary of the Navy.” This was later augmented by the Corwin, Grant, Perry, McCulloch, and Rush in the Pacific, as well as the McLane, Onondaga, and Winona, with at least 20 cutters on Navy and Army (Coastal Artillery) orders during the short conflict.

As noted by the Secretary of the Treasury after the conflict from the USRCS’s thin volume on the war:

There were in cooperation with the Navy 13 revenue cutters, carrying 61 guns, 98 officers, and 562 enlisted men. Of these, 8 cutters (43 guns), 58 officers, and 339 men were in Admiral Sampson’s fleet and on the Havana blockade; 1 cutter (6 guns), 10 officers, and 95 men were in Admiral Dewey’s fleet at Manila, and 4 cutters (12 guns), 30 officers, and 128 men cooperated with the Navy on the Pacific coast.

In addition to services rendered by vessels with the naval forces, there were 7 others, carrying 10 guns, 33 officers, and 163 men, with the Army, engaged in patrolling and guarding mine fields in various harbors, from Boston to Mobile and New Orleans.

Two days after the transfer order from McKinley, Windom, at Hampton Roads at the time, received orders to report at Norfolk and was there on 25 April when Congress passed the resolution recognizing that a state of war existed between the United States and Spain. She was painted gray and fitted with a four-inch main gun and a second 6-pounder.

USRC Windom in drydock at the Norfolk Navy Yard, Portsmouth, Virginia, 9 April 1898. Photograph from the Bureau of Ships Collection in the U.S. National Archives. 19-N-19-21-12

Windom’s wardroom during the war, in addition to Maguire, included:

  • First Lieutenant F. G. F. Wadsworth, executive officer
  • Second Lieutenant Richard Owens Crisp, navigator
  • Second Lieutenant S. P. Edmunds
  • Third Lieutenant J. V. Wild
  • Chief Engineer C. F. Coffin
  • First Assistant Engineer C. W. Zastrow
  • Second Assistant Engineer Edwin W. Davis
  • Surgeon John C. Travis (March 29 to August 1, 1898)
  • Surgeon W. E. Handy (August 2 to August 29, 1898)

On 30 April, Windom departed Hampton Roads on her way to the blockade off Cuba, stopping at  Key West briefly before arriving off Cuba on 8 May.

Assigned to Commodore Howell’s 1st Squadron, she patrolled the southern coast of Cuba near Cienfuegos until the 13 May, cutting the two Cienfuegos cables. She also helped cover the withdrawal of the Navy small boat raid to the cable house ashore (the Battle at Punta de la Colorados), closing with a Spanish battery and plastering it with 4-inch fire, scattering assembled local infantry. She also reportedly destroyed the lighthouse there, which was being used as an observation post by the Spanish, with her 6-pounders.

In all, Windom’s battery fired 85 rounds that day.

Her efforts helped allow 51 of the 53 Sailors and Marines dispatched from the cruiser USS Marblehead and gunboat USS Nashville to return to their vessels alive, and the cutter afterward evacuated several of the more seriously wounded bluejackets to Key West.

From her official report of the incident:

Windom then, after a respite at Key West, assumed station off Havana on 28 May, holding the line through August, chasing four Spanish blockade runners in June.

Hostilities ended on 13 August, and Windom reverted to Treasury Department control four days later. Arriving at Norfolk, she soon transferred newly installed guns to the USRC Gresham, returning to her pre-war appearance by October.

Maguire, the former Pennsylvania Zouave, remained in the service until 1906, when he retired as a senior captain, closing out 35 years of service to the Treasury Department. He passed in Patchogue, New York, in 1916, aged 73.

Return to Peace

Following the end of the Spanish-American War, Windom was soon back on her normal beat along the Chesapeake, including patrolling the America’s Cup Races in 1903.

In 1906, she transferred to Galveston to replace the cutter of the same name.

January 27, 1908. Photograph of the canal in Port Arthur, Texas. People stand along the shore. Boats are pulled over to the shore. The Revenue Cutter Windom is in the background. Heritage House Museum Local Control No: hhm_01293.

Working the length of the Gulf of Mexico from Key West to Brownsville, she returned to Maryland in September 1911 for a refit that saw her placed in ordinary for six weeks.

Back in Galveston, she was the first vessel to transit the newly opened Houston Ship Channel on 10 November 1914. President Wilson fired a cannon via remote control to officially mark the channel as open for operations. A band played the National Anthem from a barge in the center of the Turning Basin while Sue Campbell, daughter of Houston Mayor Ben Campbell, sprinkled white roses into the water from Windom’s top deck and decreed, “I christen thee Port of Houston; hither the boats of all nations may come and receive hearty welcome.”

USRC Windom in the Houston Ship Channel

In January 1915, Windom again entered ordinary in Maryland for an extensive one-year rebuild that saw her coal-fired boilers replaced by more efficient Babcock & Wilcox oil-fired models and her bunkers converted. This mid-life service extension saw her emerge with a new name: the USRC Comanche, soon to be the USCGC Comanche.

Recommissioned on 8 January 1916, Windom/Comanche returned to the Gulf and was deemed the Krewe of Rex’s royal yacht for Mardi Gras in New Orleans.

Windom as USCGC Comanche

View of the royal yacht “Comanche” as it prepares to dock at the foot of Canal Street on the Monday before Mardi Gras 1916

War with Germany!

With the U.S. entry into the Great War, Comanche was transferred from the Coast Guard to the Navy on 6 April 1917. She soon picked up another large deck gun, this time a 3″/50 Mk II. Her crew was bumped from 49 to 76 to allow for more watch standers and gun crew.

Commissioned as USS Comanche on 11 April 1917, she performed patrol duties in the New Orleans area under the command of LT Robert Ferriday Spangenberg, USNRF, until the summer of 1919.

Comanche was stricken from the Navy List on 1 August 1919 and returned to the Treasury Department on 28 August 1919.

Twilight

Wearing her white scheme once again, Comanche continued her patrols of the Gulf for another seven months and then headed for Key West where she was decommissioned on 17 April 1920 for repairs.

USRC Windom Gulf of Mexico NARA 56-AR-049

Recommissioned in July 1920, the ship relieved the USCGC Tallapoosa at Mobile and rejoined the Gulf Division. There, she was active in the campaign against bootleggers bringing contraband liquor up from the Caribbean during Prohibition.

Comanche Commonwealth Lib 2002-013-002-029

Comanche Commonwealth Lib 2002-013-002-048

Arthur S. Graham – Ralph A. Dett – Albert T. Chase – Brady S. Lindsay with barrels of confiscated 195% liquor while serving on the U.S. Revenue Cutter Comanche off Texas, circa 1920. Digital Commonwealth 2002.013.002.039.

Serving successively at Mobile, Key West, and Galveston, she patrolled coastal waters constantly until June of 1930. During that period, she left the Gulf of Mexico only once, in 1923, for repairs at Baltimore and Norfolk.

In July 1927, while at sea 170 miles southeast of Galveston, she suffered a blaze in her fireroom that left her adrift and her radio room silent, the ship’s generators offline. Towed into port by a tug a week later, she was apparently never restored to her pre-blaze condition.

On 2 June 1930, she was detached from the Gulf Division and was ordered back to Arundel Cove for the final time.

She arrived at her destination on 1 July and was placed out of commission on the 31st. She was sold to Weiss Motor Lines of Baltimore on 13 November 1930 for a paltry $4,501.

While Weiss possibly kept her in service for a time longer, I cannot find her mentioned in Lloyds from the era. Odds are, with the downturn in the economy in the early 1930s leading to the Depression, and the aftermath of the 1927 fire never addressed, she was probably just scrapped.

Epilogue

Little remains of Winston/Comanche that I can find.

Some of her plans and papers are digitized in the National Archives.

The Coast Guard recycled the name “Comanche” for two subsequent cutters (served 1934-48 and 1959-1980) that we have profiled in the past.

Comanche seen on 26 November 1934, post-delivery but before commissioning in a rare period color photo. Note she does not have her Navy-owned main and secondary batteries fitted yet but does have her gleaming white hull, buff stack and masts, and black cap.

During WWII, a Maritime Commission Liberty ship (MC hull no. 516, 7194 GRT) was named SS William Windom. Entering service in early 1943, she dodged Scharnhorst on Arctic convoys, landed cargo at Normandy, and survived the war to be scrapped in 1964.

Meminisse est ad Vivificandum – To Remember is to Keep Alive

***

Ships are more than steel
and wood
And heart of burning coal,
For those who sail upon
them know
That some ships have a
soul.

***

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Stars and Bars, on Ice

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Today is the 80th Anniversary of Operation Iceberg, the invasion of the Japanese island of Okinawa, the last major amphibious assault of World War II.

Men of the 7th Infantry Division head for the beaches of Okinawa in LVTs. 1 April, 1945. SC 205191

It was an Army-led effort, commanded by Lt. Gen. Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr. (USMA 1908), whose 180,000-strong Tenth United States Army— the only campaign fought by this Army– included the 7th, 27th, 77th and 96th Infantry divisions in the XXIV Corps; along with the 1st, 2nd and 6th Marine Divisions of III Amphibious Corps.

In a weird bit of military trivia, the hard-fought battle was, sort of and unintentionally, the high water mark of the Confederate military.

As recently noted by the DOD but not sufficiently explained:

On May 29, 1945, a Confederate flag was raised over Shuri Castle before being removed and replaced by an American flag three days later, on Buckner’s orders.

What makes this flag story interesting is that Buckner’s father, Simon Bolivar Buckner, was a Confederate Army brigadier general and later governor of Kentucky.

Buckner was among the Americans killed on Okinawa. He was hit by Japanese artillery fire on June 18, 1945, while checking on the progress of his troops at the front. He was the highest-ranking U.S. military officer killed during World War II

Buckner was only one of 65,631 casualties the Tenth Army suffered in the three-month campaign.

As for “the rest of the story,” as Paul Harvey used to say…

The U.S. Ensign finally hoisted over Shuri’s battled ramparts on 30 May (not three days later) was raised by Marines of the 1st Division, a distinguished relic that reportedly already had been flown by the unit over Cape Gloucester and at Peleliu.

The souvenir-sized “Stars and Bars” it replaced had been carried in the helmet of a Captain in the 5th Marine Regiment, Julian Delano Dusenbury (Clemson ’42), who added a Navy Cross for the fight at Shuri Castle to the Silver Star he earned at Peleliu. Wounded on 7 May (for the third time in the war) and evacuated, his men– mostly from the South– recovered the flag from his bloody helmet and, having no other one to fly, rose it over Suri when it was finally captured.

Zouaves and surfboats!

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From Osprey’s upcoming title, American Civil War Amphibious Tactics, by Ron Field, illustrated by Steve Noon:

Hawkins’ Zouaves At Hatteras Inlet, August 28, 1861

Elements of the 9th New York Infantry, also known as Hawkins’ Zouaves [or the New York Zouaves, Little Zouaves, and Zoo-Zoos], land via surfboats on Hatteras Inlet, North Carolina, on August 28, 1861. The first major amphibious landing of the Civil War was disrupted by gale-force winds and high surf that stove many of the boats and caused the landings to be called off, leaving 323 troops stranded on the beach overnight. Re-forming at the point where they had struggled ashore, these men spent a miserable night ashore in a driving rain. Although vulnerable to attack from the Confederate garrison at Forts Hatteras and Clark, Colonel William F. Martin, commanding the Confederate defenses in the forts, overestimated their numbers and lost the initiative, surrendering to Flag Officer Silas H. Stringham, USN, the next day.

Yup, I already have it on pre-order.

Crescent City Downtime

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Living just an hour from New Orleans, the wife and I tend to day trip it frequently and have a list of haunts we stop in at.

Last weekend, being great weather (60-70 degrees, unlimited visibility), in need of some R&R time after a week in Vegas for SHOT, and a week before New Orleans is slammed by the Superbowl and the start of the larger Mardi Gras parades, seemed good timing.

The city was the cleanest I’ve seen in a long time, with seemingly every other building in the high-traffic touristy areas catching a new coat of paint. Also lots of new barricades and bollards, and a larger LE presence, specifically Orleans Parish S.O., for obvious reasons.

Plus, I was able to check in at a few of my favorite antique stores in the area and pick up several WWII-Cold War vintage French Foreign Legion badges, a familiar site in the city, and a couple of 54mm Wheat’s Tiger Rifles (1st Louisiana Special Battalion Zouaves), the latter from the Black Butterfly on Royal Street.

I don’t collect lead soldiers, but I do like the Tigers as I haven’t seen them anywhere else (they are made by a local hobbyist for the Black Butterfly) and Wheat’s motley crew of Zouaves certainly had one of the more colorful backstories.

Navy Revisiting Heritage and Tradition this week

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Two ship commissionings in the news show some decent salutes to those who have sailed into history in days prior.

In New York on Saturday– one day shy of the USMC’s 249th birthday– the Navy commissioned the second destroyer to carry the name of GySgt John Basilone, DDG-122.

Why New York? Basilone was born in Buffalo and grew up in Raritan, New Jersey, just 45 minutes away from the Big Apple.

During Basilone’s service on Guadalcanal, he led two machine gun sections of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, 1st Marine Division, where he used his detachment’s M1917 water-cooled Browning machine guns and an M1911 .45 Government Issue pistol to great effect to break up a Japanese charge of some 3,000 Japanese against his emplacement. The feat earned him the nation’s highest military decoration and was depicted in 2010’s “The Pacific.”

His Medal of Honor citation, from his public file in the National Archives:

Basilone. He was posthumously honored with a Navy Cross for his actions on Iwo Jima, making him the only enlisted Marine in WWII to earn both of the service’s two highest honors.

In 1945, the Navy named a destroyer after Basilone, and in 1948, a life-sized statue of him was installed in his enlistment hometown of Raritan, New Jersey.

The new USS John Basilone’s battle flag includes a pair of crossed M1917s inside the Blue Diamond shoulder patch of the 1st Marine Division.

The Battle Flag is on the portside yardarm. (Photo: General Dynamics)

As detailed by the Navy, “These words characterize the life and service of Gunnery Sergeant Basilone, honor his legacy, and charge future generations of Selfless Warriors to sharpen their spears, take a stand, and move forward.” (Photo: General Dynamics)

Once commissioned, the USS Basilone will be part of the Atlantic Fleet. If she has anything like the service life shown in the rest of her class, she will only retire around 2064.

‘Old Ironsides’ Assist

Meanwhile, up the coast from NYC in Boston, the 27th Littoral Combat Ship, the future USS Nantucket (LCS-27) is set to commission on 16 November at the historic Charlestown Navy Yard. The 14th Freedom-variant is the fifth navy warship to honor “the rich heritage of the people of Nantucket and the maritime legacy that the island represents.”

The first was a Civil War-era Passaic-class monitor known for giving hard service at Charleston and Morris Island while the second and third served in the Great War on coastal service.

The monitor USS Nantucket, seen in her post-war configuration. Loaned to the North Carolina Naval Militia in 1895, she was somewhat fancifully recommissioned for Spanish-American War service and only sold for scrapping in 1900. NH 66760-A.

The fourth, a 177-foot steel-hulled Alert-class gunboat (PG-23) commissioned in 1876, carried the name Nantucket as a training ship for the Massachusetts Maritime Academy from 1918 through 1942.

USS Nantucket (PG-23), formerly USS Ranger and USS Rockport, was then loaned to the State of Massachusetts for use at Massachusetts Nautical School. Courtesy of Mr. Gershone Bradford. NH 500

Fittingly, PCU Nantucket (LCS-27) is tied up near the USS Constitution this week as she awaits entrance to the fleet.

Civil War echos via Long Beach

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The California State Military History & Museums Program in Rancho Cordova recently received a pair of circa 1905 3-inch Salute Guns.

The museum believes they were originally part of the old San Diego Army Barracks (which closed in 1921 and became the property of the city in 1938) before standing guard in front of the Long Beach Seventh Street National Guard Armory from the mid-1930s until 2020.

The Long Beach Armory, 854 East 7th Street, Long Beach, Los Angeles County, California, before its closure in 2020. Note the signal guns. 

These guns are the last remnants of one of the best-known (and loved) field guns of the Civil War.

Patented in 1855 by cannon engineer John Griffen, superintendent at Phoenix Iron Co in Pennsylvania, and thus known originally as “The Griffen Gun,” the 3-inch (9.5 pounder) Ordnance Rifle, Model of 1861, became one of the most popular and prolific pieces of light artillery in Union service during the Civil War, with some 1,100 produced– 940 from Phoenix Iron alone. It was lighter (816 pounds) and more accurate than the slightly more common M1857 12-pounder Napoleons and available in better quantities than the 10-pounder M1861 Parrott.

Tidball’s Battery (Battery A, 2nd U.S. Artillery), near Fair Oaks, Va., June 1862 – Lt. Robert Clarke, Capt. John C. Tidball, Lt. William N. Dennison, and Capt. Alexander C.M. Pennington, posing around an M1861 3-inch Ordnance Rifle, PIC (for Phoenix Iron Company) Nr 247 LOC image LC-DIG-cwpb-01024

Starting in 1885, the Army began replacing these Civil War-era guns with more contemporary steel, rifled, breech-loading models, ultimately resulting in the M1897 field piece, which would remain in service until the Great War.

Although a wrought iron muzzle-loading rifled cannon, the Army kept some 300 unconverted M1861 3-inchers on inventory for assorted reasons (primarily as gate guards) through the Spanish-American War, although none deployed to that conflict.

Another 350 usually non-spiked guns, many of which had been sold as surplus through Bannerman’s to local cities and towns, have made their way into the assorted state and National Military Parks since then.

Starting in 1905, the Army made a move to convert its stocks of remaining M1861s to breech-loading saluting guns capable of firing standard 3-inch black powder blank cartridges. They were then mounted on steel pedestal mounts and typically placed on either side of an installation’s flagpole.

Saluting guns, 3-inch, at Fort Worden circa 1930s. Puget Sound Coast Artillery Museum Collection

3-inch M1861/05 Saluting gun, Washington Barracks, Washington, D.C. 1921. Note the breech. NARA 111-SC-000213-ac

From a 1908 War Department Ordnance report

In all, at least 25 were converted by the United States Rapid-Fire Gun and Power Company of Derby, Connecticut, and the balance (about 270) was done by Army cannon works, primarily Rock Island Arsenal in Illinois, with the Army allocating $4,600 in 1905 and another $16,000 in 1906 for the conversions.

It was noted that a whopping 13,800 pounds of saluting powder was on hand in Army depots in 1907 (vs 367,183 pounds of smokeless powder for artillery) for use with such guns and many posts, besides lighting them off for special events and on holidays, would fire a “Noon-day gun.”

By the late 1940s, especially with the general contraction of bases following WWII, most of these saluting pieces found their way to the scrap heap. 

As for the recently saved California guns, they will soon be installed on either side of the CSMH&MP’s Consolidated Headquarters Complex’s flagpoles.

Private William Henry Christman

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Some 160 years ago this week, all that was mortal of Private William Henry Christman, late of Pocono Lake, Pennsylvania and a recent enlistee with the 67th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regiment, was buried in what was then part of Arlington House, the seized former state of Col. Robert Edward Lee (USMA 1829)– a regular who had resigned his commission and had cast his lot with the Confederacy, and wife, Mary Anna Randolph Custis.

Christman, a 20-year-old farmer, enlisted in March 1864 but just two months later succumbed to rubella in a Washington, D.C. hospital on 11 May 1864, being buried in Arlington two days later, soon joined by service members who were wounded in the Wilderness and never made it back to their unit.

Today, Pvt. Christman is in Section 27, Grave 19 at Arlington National Cemetery, and the estate, purchased for $26,000 in back taxes by the federal government on 11 January 1864, is the final home of some 400,000 men and women who have been laid to rest in the cemetery’s rolling hills.

Arlington held a commemoration of Pvt. Christman’s burial, as well as the fallen from The Wilderness, this week.

Tico Updates

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For the past five months, the Dwight D. Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group (IKECSG) has been in the Middle East under CENTCOM control where it has been neck deep in swatting away Houthi anti-ship missiles and drones and firing TLAMs ashore in retaliation. Its AAW boss is centered on the vintage Ticonderoga class guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58). Commissioned on 18 March 1989, she recently celebrated her 35th anniversary while underway and is the Navy’s 3rd-oldest active cruiser.

STRAIT OF HORMUZ (Nov. 26, 2023) USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) (IKE) and the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58) transit the Strait of Hormuz as the Dwight D. Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group (IKECSG) makes an inbound transit to the Arabian Gulf, Nov. 26. The IKECSG is deployed to the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations to support maritime stability and security in the Middle East region. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Merissa Daley)

It is planned by the Navy to inactivate the Philippine Sea next year, a process that will begin likely this October, so this is her last hurrah.

Speaking of which, sisters USS Shiloh (CG-67), USS Normandy (CG-60), and USS Lake Erie (CG-70) are set to be decommissioned along the same timelines, at least according to the latest Navy budget request.

Meanwhile, in Fiji

In the Central Pacific, USS Antietam (CG 54), long part of the forward-deployed Reagan Strike Group based in Japan, is currently in Fiji where she is participating on detached service as part of the OMSI (Oceania Maritime Security Initiative), giving grief to stateless (and often interloping Chi-Com) trawlers. Sure, it is more of a job for the USCG– Antietam has Coast Guard law enforcement personnel aboard– but at least the crew gets a port call in Fiji!

She just wrapped up 11 years forward deployed to Yokosuka and is (for) now stationed in Pearl Harbor.
In 2023, the cruiser’s last full year as part of America’s Forward Deployed Naval Forces-Japan (FDNF-J), Antietam sailed nearly 34,000 miles, participated in the largest-ever Exercise Talisman Sabre alongside the Royal Australian Navy, and visited ports in Vietnam, South Korea, the Philippines and Palau.
She is set to decommission as soon as October unless Congress stops that. 

War Dragon is back (for now)

There is a bright spot to the Tico program, as USS Chosin (CG-65) has finally left Puget Sound after eight long years, having recently completed modernization at Vigor. The “War Dragon” arrived back at her long-absent homeport of San Diego– under her own power!– earlier this month.

USS Chosin (CG-65) will likely retire in 2027, at which point, she will probably be the last of her class in operation

Ex-USS Chancellorsville

One Tico that has been lost in the sauce for the past couple of months is the USS Robert Smalls (CG-62), recently renamed by the Pentagon to “erase the shame” of bearing the name USS Chancellorsville— which to be fair, Smalls should have seen his name given to a destroyer while ex-Chancellorsville picked up the name of another, more politically correct, battle.

While Chancellorsville/Smalls is set to be retired in 2026, troublesome relics from the ship have been transferred via the NHHC to the Spotsylvania County Museum, adjacent to the First Day of Chancellorsville Park, in Virginia.

The items have become historical in their own right, having ridden on the Pascagoula-built cruiser since 1989, service that included winning the Spokane Trophy twice, seeing combat in Desert Storm, participating in a 1993 TLAM strike against the Iraqi Intelligence Service, the Navy’s Fukushima response, the near-collision with the Russian destroyer Admiral Vinogradov, and tense transits through the Taiwan Strait.

Via the Museum: 

Led by the Friends of the USS Chancellorsville (CG 62), an organization created to enhance the relationship between the ship’s commissioning committee the Fredericksburg Area Council of the Navy League, and the County of Spotsylvania, the following materials originally donated by the Friends of the USS Chancellorsville were transferred via Unconditional Deed of Gift from the United States Naval History and Heritage Command to the Spotsylvania County Museum following a decommissioning initiative to bring historic objects back to the USS Chancellorsville’s heritage community:

  • McClellan Cavalry Saddle
  • Framed case of excavated Chancellorsville battle artifacts, presented by Craig-Carroll
  • Framed case of excavated Chancellorsville battle artifacts, presented by Conroy F. Parker (seen above)
  • Ames Manufacturing Co. Model 1860 Light Cavalry Saber, presented to Captain Bill Keating on June 4, 1992, aboard the Chancellorsville by Dr. David Amstutz and acquired by the Fredericksburg Area Council of the Navy League (hung in Captain’s Cabin) (seen above)
  • Framed map of Chancellorsville 
  • “Battle of Chancellorsville, Sunday, May 3, 1863” Print (original art from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Famous Leaders and Battle Scenes of the Civil War, 1896) 
  • USS Chancellorsville at sea photo print (seen above)
  • “The Campaign of Chancellorsville: A Strategic and Tactical Study” by John Bigelow Jr., 1910 Yale University Press
  • Stellar Nioh 2022 – JFTM-07 plaque for Capt. Edward A. Angelinas, commanding officer of USS Chancellorsville (presented by Capt. Takeuchi Shusaku, commanding officer of J.S. Maya)
  • October 18, 2015, Japan Self-Defense Force Fleet Review plaque
  • DD-116 Teruzuki plaque presented to Capt. Curt Renshaw, commanding officer of USS Chancellorsville, 2015 (presented by Cmdr. Takayuki Miyaji, commanding officer of J.S. Teruzuki)

Army Reset, 1903 edition

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Some 120 years ago, the U.S. Army’s experience fighting in Cuba and Puerto Rico in the Spanish-American War, followed by overseas campaigning in the Western Pacific to pacify the Philippines, led the force to leave behind its only gently updated Frontier ways for something more modern. For example in these American Solider prints by H. Charles McBarron.

The 1898 U.S. Soldier shows the last use of the blue Army field uniform in a major U.S. war. The trend toward neutral colors had led to the adoption of a khaki tropical service uniform but few of the troops who reached Cuba were issued it. Also note the exposed cartridge Mills belt, from which hang his canvas haversack and the knife bayonet for his side-loading Krag rifle. In addition to the old “Union blue” uniform trimmed in black mohair, both the Medical Department officer and the artillery private are wearing the enameled red, white, and blue five-bastion fort badge of Headquarters, Fifth Army Corps, on their hats– an extension of the unit identification system introduced during the Civil War.

The below 1903 plate by McBarron shows the difference just a half-decade can make. Showing troops in the Philippine Islands, they are wearing khaki tropical service dress with bronze buttons. The Grab campaign hat, distinctively American, became the official head covering and was the most liked by the soldier.

In the left foreground is a first lieutenant with the gold hat cord and bronze coat of arms of the United States on his standing collar, both worn by all officers of the Army. On his coat he wears the silver shoulder bar of his rank and on his collar bronze crossed rifles indicate his arm, the infantry. The lieutenant’s breeches are laced from the calf nearly to the knee and are close fitting to go under his russet leather leggings. His waistbelt, of the same color of leather, supports his .38-caliber holstered service revolver and his saber.

The sergeant in the right foreground is in the same uniform as the lieutenant. He has an infantry blue cord on his hat and infantry blue chevrons on the sleeves of his coat despite the adoption of white as the infantry color in late 1902. Troops in or returning from the Philippines were permitted to continue using items in the old infantry blue until they were worn out and stocks were exhausted. On the sergeant’s hat can be seen the numeral and letter identifying his unit and on his collar the crossed rifles and the block letters U.S., all in bronze. In the place of the lieutenant’s leather leggings he wears khaki, canvas ones, and his belt is the blue-grey looped cartridge belt used with the .30-caliber Krag rifle.

The privates in the background are wearing the most frequently seen version of the khaki uniform without the coat—dark navy blue wool shirt, which was a holdover from pre-tropical service days. The soldier on the left is ready for field service with his blanket roll, covered by the khaki shelter half, slung over his shoulder. The soldier on the right, a sentry, carries only his rifle and wears the cartridge belt.

Of course, the Krag in 1903 was on its way out, replaced by the Mauser-based M1903 Springfield and its big M1905 bayonet, with the Mills belt to be phased out instead of the 10-pouch dual-stripper clip M1910 canvas belt that would become iconic in the Great War.

Similarly, the largely ornamental Model 1902 Army Officers’ Saber replaced the Civil War-era M1850 Staff & Field Officers Sword– resulting in the weapon no longer being suitable for campaigning– while the very capable M1911 .45 ACP would tap out the anemic Colt M1892 .38 Long revolver. 

With a few other changes, the road to the Doughboy of 1917 was clear.

Soldier with 30th DIV sniping from a trench in Belgium July 9, 1918. 

Plastering Charleston, 160 years ago

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Reportedly the oldest naval combat photos that can be definitively dated.

Taken from Fort Sumter by George Cook on 8 September 1863, it shows the 18-gunned steam-powered wooden-hulled broadside ironclad USS New Ironsides and two Ericsson-designed single turret monitors, USS Montauk, and USS Passaic, firing on Conferate-held Fort Moultrie in Charleston Harbor.

The photo is credited to George S. Cook and is attributed as “taken by a Confederate photographer.” (Source: Field, Ron. Silent Witness, 2017, page 264) in combat, firing on Fort Sumter. LOC LC-USZ62-49549

The photo shows tents and soldiers on the beach of Morris Island. In the distance, ironclads, including USS New Ironsides and five monitor-class warships are in action against Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie in Charleston harbor. (Source: 99 Historic Images of Civil War Charleston, ed. by Garry Adelman, John Richter, and Bob Zeller, Center for Civil War Photography, 2009, p. 18). LOC LC-DIG-cwpb-04748 (digital file from original neg.)

At this stage in Dupont’s efforts to reduce the rebel defenses at Charleston, Fort Wagner was bombarded daily until it was evacuated by the Confederates on 6 September when his ships then turned their attention to Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie, operating for the rest of the year against these fortifications which guarded the “Cradle of the Rebellion.”

The event was reported in The Illustrated London News, as “Iron clad frigate New Ironsides and two Ericsson batteries going into action at Charleston,” complete with a much more romantic depiction. 

Hant-tinted copy of a line engraving by Smyth, depicting USS New Ironsides and two monitors in action at Charleston, South Carolina, circa 1863. Courtesy of the Navy Art Collection, Washington, D.C. U.S. NH 85573-KN

Patrick O’Brien has done a more contemporary work.

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