Military and War Museums in Massachusetts - USS Constitution, USS Massachusetts, Boston Navy Yard, USS Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. (Paperback)

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Pages: 36. Chapters: USS Constitution, USS Massachusetts, Boston Navy Yard, USS Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., Springfield Armory, USS Cassin Young, USS Salem, Bunker Hill Monument, Fort Warren, Museum of World War II, USS Lionfish, United States Naval Shipbuilding Museum, Higgins Armory Museum, USS Constitution Museum, Minute Man National Historical Park, German corvette Hiddensee, Old Chelmsford Garrison House. Excerpt: USS Constitution is a wooden-hulled, three-masted heavy frigate of the United States Navy. Named by President George Washington after the Constitution of the United States of America, she is the world's oldest floating commissioned naval vessel. Launched in 1797, Constitution was one of six original frigates authorized for construction by the Naval Act of 1794 and the third constructed. Joshua Humphreys designed the frigates to be the young Navy's capital ships, and so Constitution and her sisters were larger and more heavily armed and built than standard frigates of the period. Built in Boston, Massachusetts at Edmund Hartt's shipyard, her first duties with the newly formed United States Navy were to provide protection for American merchant shipping during the Quasi-War with France and to defeat the Barbary pirates in the First Barbary War. Constitution is most famous for her actions during the War of 1812 against Great Britain, when she captured numerous merchant ships and defeated five British warships: HMS Guerriere, Java, Pictou, Cyane and Levant. The battle with Guerriere earned her the nickname of "Old Ironsides" and public adoration that has repeatedly saved her from scrapping. She continued to actively serve the nation as flagship in the Mediterranean and African squadrons, and circled the world in the 1840s. During the American Civil War she served as a training ship for the United States Naval Academy and carried a...