The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1899-10-11

With little gun and in momentarl
danger of being sunk by the first sho
of any size that hi. her. At the bat
tie of Fort Fisher Dewey was the exec
utive officer of the Colorado, which
was the biggest ship he had ever beer
in. She carried forty guns and erea
Of nearly seven hundred. After tn,
fight Dewey was assigned to Com
mander McComb's. squadron in the
James River and then to the North
Atlantic blockading squadron. He
served as Lieutenant in both the
Brooklyn and the sAgawam. At the
battle of Fort Fisher, where the Navy
performed the part of the work that
the Army should have performed-thai
is, an assault by land-Dswey distin-
guished himself along with most OF
the other young officers, aud some time
after that battle he was promoted to
the rank of Lieutenant-C Commander
His commission stated that the promo.
ton was for meritorious conduct at the
battle of Fort Fisher. The capture OF
Fort Fisher was practically the last ma.
val battle of the war, and it was the
last fighting that Dewey saw for thirty
three years. His whole fighting expe-
rienee until May, 1898. is thus summed
up, and it was in the intervening years
that Dewey time and time again re-
marked on the briefness of the biogra-
ply he had earned.
After the war was over, Dewey was
sent to the Portsmouth Navy Yard.
He was a hero there, where all naval
officers are heroes, and 1t was there
that he met Miss Susie p Goodwin, a
daughter OF New Hampshire's war
Governor, Ichabod Goodwin. She was
a young woman Of great beauty and OF
fine education, and Dewey fell in love
with her and cut out all the other suit
ors for her hand. They were married
on October 4, 1857, and were immedi-
ately separated, for Dewey was assign
ed again to the Colorado and spent
nearly year in Europe. The next
year he was assigned to duty in the
Naval Academy. Then he was placed
in command of the Narragansett for a
while, then in charge Of the Torpedo
Station at Newport, and in April, 1873,
when he got his next promotion, that
to the rank of commander, he was
again assigned to the Narragansett.
The following year Dewey's only child
was born, George Goodwin Dewey, and
the young wife died.
There wasn't much of a story in
Dewey's life after that until the prep
aration OF the war with Spain, in
which he was to make everlasting
fame. He settled into the humdrum
life of the ordinary naval officer. He
went to the Pacific on a surveying ex-
pedition ia 1878. lu 1876 he returned
and was appointed Lighthouse In
speetOr. He served two years at that
and then became Secretary OF the
Lighthouse Board, place he held un-
I'll 1882. That year it was his turn for
sea duty, and he was sent to the Ash
stic squadron to command the Juniata-
He was sick year then and all but
died. His promotion to the rank OF
Captain came in 1884, 26 years after he
had been graduated from the Naval
Academy, and he was assigned to COM
mand the Dolphin. The Dolphin ranks
now as despatch boat. She was, new
ertheless, one of the first of the white
squadron, of which the American peo-
pie were so proud, and it is interesting
to note here that she was the only steel
ship that Dewey ever commanded un-
til he went aboard the Olympia as the
Commodore of the Asiatic squadron.
He commanded the Pensacola after the
Dolphin. In 1889, when he returned
to America, he became the Chief of
the Bureau of Equipment and Recruit
ing. AS the Chief of this Bureau, he
had the ex-ofiicio rank of Commodore
and it was in this efiice, naval officers
say, that Dewey did his best work for
the country before the opportunity
came to smash the Spanish fleet in the
Philippines. He attracted the atten-
ton there that later made him the COM
mander of the Asiatic squadron. While
there was no war in sight and no shad-
ow of a war, he assumed that there
would be one and he did everything
that could be done in that department
to prepare for one If it came.
Roosevelt is a man after the pattern
of Dewey and when he became the As
sistant Secretary of the Navy, he was
attracted by the thoroughness of Dew
ey's work and by the energy that he
II was President Mckinley
who made Dewey the commander Of
the Asiatie squadron, and it was Sena-
tor Redfield Proctor and Theodore
Roosevelt who were in u large measure
responsible for the choice. Senator
Proctor himself appealed to the Presi-
dent to make Dewey commander ofthe
and the President promised.
1t is no disparagement 10 Secretary
Long to say that Dewey was not the
man he had selected for the place. The
man he selected would probably have
done as Dewey did and he might to-
day be the hero of the nation that
Dewey is, but Dewey had been chosen
before the Secretary made known his
choice. The Secretary heartily con-
CURED with the President in his selec-
tion.
In Washington Dewey spent much
of his leisure time at the Metropolitan
Club; in New York, at the University
Club. He was fond of good company
and was good company himself. He
paid attention to Miss Virginia Low
cry, now the Duchess d'Arco, the wife
Of the Spanish Ambassador at Wash
ington. The Spaniard beat him In
love. Dewey's one ambition now is the
that most American fathe 5
have, the ambition for his sons success.
So it will be seen the story Of Dewey's
life is lesson in American citizenship.
Dewey, the ordinary boy, Dewey, the
ordinary man, became Dewey, the na-
tons hero, by energy, by grit, by ab-
soluta fearlessness. and by being ready