The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-08-06
OBITUARY.
Captain william skiddy

died ut stanford, Connecticut. on Monday, july
%, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. Cap
tain Skiddy was born at Peekskill, New York,
in 1894. He early displayed a liking for the
sea, and in 1905 sailed on his first voyage in the
merchant service. On the breaking out of the war
with Great Britain, while first mate of the brig
Stephen, that vessel was captured by the British
frigates Andromacbe and Britain. He was q
prisoner on board the Hector prison hulk Gan
old line-of-battle ship, in Plymouth harbor,
England, till exchanged and sent home in the
cartel ship Robinson Potter, March, 1918, after
eight months captivity. On reaching New
York he entered the very next day as volunteer
masters mate on board the United States sloop-
of.war Hornet. He was with Captain James
Biddle on board the Hornet while she was
blockaded in the harbor of New London. In
November, 1914, the Hornet ran the blockade
and reached New York, from whence she sailed
as part of Commodore Decatur's fleet January
%, 1915. Captain Skiddy was in the Hornet
when she captured the British brig Penguin, off
the island of Tristan d'Achuna one of the latest
and not least brilliant actions of the war, and
when she escaped from the British seventy-four
CORVALLIS, after an e~ventful and exciting chase,
in which the Hornet was compelled to throw
over guns, boats, and everything else that could
be spared.
t the close of the war he returned to the
merchant service. He continued in this service
until 1917, when he retired from the sea. In
1874 he began his work of naval construction,
building the ship John r. Skiddy, aud in 1916
built the New World, both of which vessels were.
then unsurpassed as merchantmen. Soon after
leaving the sea the United States Government
appointed him to superintend the construction
of the Collins steamers, which were then to be
in Government employ as mail steamers and to
serve in war jim the navy. He designed the Hum
boldt, Franklin, Arago, and the Fulton, of the
French line, and all of the Pacific Mail Company's
steamers to the building of the Alaska.
One valuable service to the country must not
be passed by. Shortly after the close of the
war, it was declared that the Hornet had set the
precedent by her capture of the British brig-of-
war Penguin in 1915. The brief newspaper
paragraph recording this fell under the eye of
Captain Skiddy, then the only surviving Off
Ger of the Hornet during that memorable cruise.
He was withal the one officer whose testi-
mong was of prime importance. From his know
ledge of French he was the interpreter to
Captain Biddle in every instance in which any
vessel was spoken from which the news of peace
could possibly be learned, and thus could state
from absolute knowledge that no rumor of the
close of the war reached the Hornet till after the
capture of the Penguin and chase by the Corn
wallis. He wrote at once to Messrs. Seward
and Welles, Secretaries of State and of the Navy,
stating the above facts, and at their request pre-
pared a full and duly attested affidavit, now in
the archives of the State Department. Appoint
in international law, perhaps of great moment,
was thus providentially established for all the
future,