USS Missouri (1841)

For other ships with the same name, see USS Missouri.
USS Missouri on fire at Gibraltar
History
Name: USS Missouri
Laid down: 1840
Launched: 7 January 1841
Commissioned: 1842
Fate: Destroyed by fire, 2627 August 1843
General characteristics
Type: Sidewheel Steam Frigate
Displacement: 3,220 long tons (3,272 t)
Length: 229 ft (70 m)
Beam: 40 ft (12 m)
Propulsion: Steam engine/Sails
Complement: 268
Armament:
  • 2 × 10 in (250 mm) guns
  • 8 × 8 in (200 mm) guns

The first Missouri, a 10‑gun side‑wheel frigate, one of the first steam warships in the Navy, was begun at New York Navy Yard in 1840; launched 7 January 1841; and commissioned very early in 1842 Capt. John Newton in command.

Departing New York at the end of March 1842 on a trial run to Washington, D.C. with sister ship Mississippi, Missouri grounded opposite Port Tobacco, Maryland, 1 April, and did not arrive in Washington until the 13th. The warship made numerous trial runs out of the nation's capital during the spring and summer of 1842, demonstrating the advantages of steam propulsion in restricted waters to the Government, and then departed for a long cruise to the Gulf of Mexico. The frigate returned to Washington 25 April 1843 and then underwent overhaul in preparation for extended distant service.

On 6 August 1843 Missouri embarked the U.S Minister to China Caleb Cushing, bound for Alexandria, Egypt, on the first leg of his journey to negotiate the first commercial treaty with China. The same day the ship was visited by President John Tyler who came on board for a few hours' cruise in Hampton Roads, observing the crew working the ship and the powerful twin paddlewheels in action. The President disembarked at Old Point Comfort, and the frigate steamed from Norfolk, Virginia, via Fayal in the Azores, for Gibraltar on the first powered crossing of the Atlantic by an American steam warship.

The Burning of the USS Missouri

Missouri arrived Gibraltar on 25 August and anchored in its harbor. On the night of the 26th, the engineer's yeoman accidentally broke a demijohn of turpentine in the storeroom which soon ignited. The flames spread so rapidly that the warship was abandoned, the crew barely escaping with their lives. Minister Cushing was able to rescue his official letter to the Daoguang Emperor of China, allowing him to later carry out his mission. In four hours, the steam frigate was reduced to a blackened and sinking hulk and finally at 03:20 in the morning of the 27th, the forward powder magazine blew up, destroying the still burning skeleton of the ship.

British ship of the line HMS Malabar assisted Missouri in fighting the fire and took aboard some 200 of her men. Sir Robert Thomas Wilson, the Governor of Gibraltar, threw open the gates of that base to Missouri survivors in an unprecedented act of courtesy which was recognized by a resolution of appreciation from Congress. The remnants of the once proud frigate, a hazard to navigation, were painstakingly removed by divers, piece by piece, from the shallow waters of the harbor.

See also

References

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 9/5/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.