The Portland daily press., 1897-06-09
FAMOUS OLD HAIR TFORD.
Farragut's Ship Reconstructed.
Will Be Placed in Commission Again Next
Year-Somethine of Her Past.
(From the Washington Star.)

(From the Washington Star)
Next to the grand old Constitution
there is no vessel in the service today bet
ter known to every school boy and his
near forebears than theS Hartford; and d
trifle over 10 months hence will find her
once more on the active list of the navy.
AT present she is practically rebuilding at
the Mare island navy yard, but when
next we know her she will be finer and
more formidable craft than of yore, and
something besides a handsome and in
structlVe monument to the glorious mem
DRY OF American seamen and the Officer
that LED them through those trying times
1t IS the purpose of the department to
make her school for "the man behind
the gun"-that most potent of factors in
the hour of trial, and he that shall point
in actual conflict one of her modern rifles
will have an enviable record to maintain
"a record that now has become the heri-
tage OF the whole country at large rather
than the right merely of single section.
The keel of the Hartford WAS laid at
the Boston navy-yard January 1, 1858,
and on November %, following, with
much pomp and ceremony the good ship
was successfully launched. AS the vessel
left her ways one fair sponsor broke across
the ships figurehead a bottle of Connecti-
cut river water, another, quite as fair,
followed with a bottle of Hartford spring
water, while the late Admiral Preble,
then a lieutenant, concluded with like
quantity of ocean brine. To the readers
of portents there may have been in the
Precipitation to that fortune which after
ward bore the ship triumphantly through
such fires as never craft before had en-
dured. For some guarding grace must
have helped her amid the frightful tenn
pest of shot and shell ssand flame in the
early morning of April a. '62, when in
passing forts jackson and St. Philip
with their ponderous batteries of hun
dred guns, she carried Farragut's flag Of
victory in the face of defense no less
courageous though it failed; must have
made her more than equal to the cannon
of Vicksburg and must have tided her
over the deadly mines and past the batter
les of Fort Morgan on that 9th of August
in '64, when Farragut, with heroic pur-
pose and sailor bluntness, DAMNED the
torpedoes, called order out of perilous
confusion and steamed VIGOROUSLY into
Mobile bay
Early in June, 50, the Hartford was
first commissioned, and some DAYS later
sailed away on her maiden cruise to
the East Indies, where she remained till
'61. After the war, she returned to the
Asiatic squadron as the flagship of Ad-
miral FL. II, Bell, who had been Farra-
quits fleet captain and chief of staff at
New Orleans; and naming of our recent
torpedo boats recalls the brave Macken-
zie, who died on that cruise and brings to
mind the last action of the Hartford-a
record of which is fresh only in the musty
archives of the navy department.. That
action was the last serious work of the
navy, and is interesting now because of
recent changes in the Orient df
EARLY in 81 the American bark Rover
was wrecked on the southeastern end of
Formosa, and her captain, his wife, and
every member of the crew, save a Chinese
sailor, who escaped to tell the tale, were
barbarously murdered by the native saw
ages. Appeals to the Chinese authorities
awaited nothing, for even they, in their
narrow strip of questionable civilization
on the western coast, were mortally fear
full for the safety of their own heads at
the hands of those murder loving natives.
A reconnoiter by the Ashuelot discovered
only that superior force should be
brought to bear upon the savages; and
shortly afterward Admiral Bell sailed in
strength for the place. On the 9TH of
June, '67, he left Shanghai with the
Hartford and the Wyoming, and about s
O'Clock of the morning of the 18th follow
ing the ships anchored in a small bay
within half a mile of the shore, and near
the scene of the shipwreck. The sun
shone with tropical intensity upon the
CLASSY waters of the bay, while the air
quivered with humid heat, which was
to tell so fearfully on that valiant band
of 191 officers, seamen and marines. On
the way down from Shanghai the men
had been carefully drilled, and, as far as
possible, prepared for the task before
them; and as most of them had served
through the war they knew the meaning
of serious work. In brief while the
party was landed, and, in two divisions
one under the direction of Commander
Belknap and the other headed by Lieut..
Commander Read-started on their mis-
sion of chastisement and for a rendezvous
at big black rock well up among the
hills. Reads command was to make
detOur and to flank the enemy to the
right of Belknap's direct attack.
Off in the distance the enemy could be
heard yelling taunts, while from the ships
by glasses, they could be seen dancing
about in parties of 10 or dozen, their
bodies afiame with scarlet paint, and
their rifle barrels glistening in the hot
sunshine. Raching down to within
hundred yards of the beach, and binding
the shore for depth of a third of mile,
was dense jungle of prickly plants, mat
ted, thorny vines, and a troublesome
species of small banyan tree. Through
this painful labyrinth the men pushed
and toiled as best they could, tearing
their hands and faces and rending their
clothes, only to emerge upon a few acres
of rolling ground, sun scorched, and de-
void of everything but few deserted
huts and number of partly domesticated
buffaloes Just ahead the hills rose
abruptly, broken into spurs with deep
ravines, choked with rocks and a thick
growth of tall grass and small trees; and
there the willy savages began their cruel,
cunning warfare, so thoroughly in keep
ing with the practices of our own In
dams. Familiar with every foot of those
devious pathways, it was an easy thing
for them to slip down unseen, deliver a
vollav from behind their blinds of oroo,,