USS ''Adams'' was a 28-gun (rated) sailing frigate of the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

. She was laid down in 1797 at

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by John Jackson and William Sheffield and launched on 8 June 1799. Captain Richard Valentine Morris took command of the ship. She was name for

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and 2nd president of the United States

John Adams John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, attorney, diplomat, writer, and Founding Father who served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before his presidency, he was a leader of t ...

Quasi-War with France

The frigate departed New York in mid-September 1799 and headed for the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greate ...

to protect American shipping from attacks by French

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

s, during the

Quasi-War The Quasi-War (french: Quasi-guerre) was an undeclared naval war fought from 1798 to 1800 between the United States and the French First Republic, primarily in the Caribbean and off the East Coast of the United States. The ability of Congress ...

with France. She arrived at Saint Christopher on 10 October and soon began cruising nearby waters in search of French men of war and any prizes which had been captured by warships flying French colors. Later that month, she recaptured the brig ''Zylpha'' and assisted in taking an unidentified 4-gun French privateer and freeing an English brig and a schooner from Boston which that vessel had seized. On 12 November, she again teamed with ''Insurgent'' in recapturing the 14-gun English brig ''Margaret''. On the 15th, they took the French privateer ''Le Onze Vendémiaire''. On the 20th, they cooperated in liberating the schooner ''Nancy'' which had struck her colors on the 18th. On 10 January 1800, ''Adams'' and made the French schooner ''La Fougeuse'' their prize and, late in the month, ''Adams'' recaptured the schooner ''Alphia''. Two more French schooners, ''L'Heureuse Rencontre'' and ''Isabella'' fell into her hands in February. The following month, she freed the sloop ''Nonpareil'' and she did the same for the schooner ''Priscilla'' in April. But ''Adams'' most successful month came in May when she recaptured an unidentified schooner and teamed up with ''Insurgent'' once more in freeing a British letter of marque. During the same month she also recaptured another schooner named ''Nancy'', one called ''Grinder'', and an unidentified brig while capturing the brig ''Dove'' and the schooner ''Renommee''. In need of repairs, ''Adams'' returned to New York in July 1800, but early in the fall headed back to the Caribbean under the command of Capt. Thomas Robinson. However, on this cruise she did not have the success which she had enjoyed under Capt. Richard Morris but for the most part was limited to patrol and escort duty. She did manage to recapture the British schooner ''Grendin'', but the date of the action is unknown. On 23 March 1801, the Secretary of the Navy ordered her home and she was laid up at New York. DANFS, USS ''Adams'', 3rd section

First Barbary War

However, trouble in the Mediterranean prevented her respite from being long. The Barbary states on the northern coast of Africa were capturing American merchantmen attempting to trade in that ancient sea and enslaving their crews. ''Adams'' was reactivated in the spring of 1802 under the command of Capt. Hugh George Canfield. On 10 June 1802, she departed New York and headed for the Strait of Gibraltar carrying orders for Commodore Richard V. Morris, her first commanding officer who was now in command of the American Mediterranean Squadron. She arrived there on 22 July and remained in that port blockading the Tripolitan cruiser ''Meshuda'' lest she escape and prey on American shipping. It was not until 8 April 1803 that she was freed of this duty. She then joined the rest of Morris' squadron in operations off Tripoli. However, as a squadron commander, Morris seemed to have lost the dash and daring he had displayed in operations against the French in the West Indies while in command of a single ship. His indecisiveness in the Mediterranean prompted Washington to order his recall and he sailed for home in ''Adams'' on 25 September. The frigate carried Morris to Washington and was placed in ordinary at the navy yard there in November 1803.

1805–1811

Reactivated under command of Capt. Alexander Murray in July 1805, ''Adams'' cruised along the coast of the United States from New York to Florida protecting American commerce. In the autumn of the following year she was again laid up in Washington and – but for service enforcing the

Embargo Act The Embargo Act of 1807 was a general trade embargo on all foreign nations that was enacted by the United States Congress. As a successor or replacement law for the 1806 Non-importation Act and passed as the Napoleonic Wars continued, it repr ...

in 1809 – remained inactive at the nation's capital until the outbreak of the

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States, United States of America and its Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom ...

. In August 1811 she became the

receiving ship A hulk is a ship that is afloat, but incapable of going to sea. Hulk may be used to describe a ship that has been launched but not completed, an abandoned wreck or shell, or to refer to an old ship that has had its rigging or internal equipmen ...

at the

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War of 1812

In June 1812, ''Adams'' was cut in half amidships and lengthened 15 feet in the course of being completely rebuilt as a sloop-of-war of 26 × 18-pounder guns. Commanded by Capt. Charles Morris, she was ready for action by the end of the year, but was bottled up in the

Chesapeake Bay The Chesapeake Bay ( ) is the largest estuary in the United States. The Bay is located in the Mid-Atlantic region and is primarily separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Delmarva Peninsula (including the parts: the Eastern Shore of Maryland / ...

by blockading British warships until she finally managed to slip out to sea on 18 January 1814. She cruised in the eastern Atlantic and along the African coast and took five merchantmen prizes before putting in at

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, in April. Underway again in May, she headed for the Newfoundland Banks and ultimately sailed eastward to waters off the

British Isles The British Isles are a group of islands in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner and Outer Hebrides, the Northern Isles, ...

. During this cruise, she took five more merchant ships chased two more into the River Shannon, and barely managed to escape from a much larger British warship. She captured ''Woodbridge'', which was sailing from India to Britain, but had to give her up when and arrived on the scene while escorting a convoy to the . Irwin John Bevan - The Burning of the Adams, 3rd September 1814

Irwin John Bevan - The Burning of the Adams, 3rd September 1814

Near the end of her homeward passage, ''Adams'' ran aground on the

Isle au Haut Isle au Haut () is a town in Knox County, Maine, United States, on an island of the same name in Penobscot Bay. The population was 92 at the 2020 census. Home to portions of Acadia National Park, Isle au Haut is accessible by ferry from Stoningt ...

on 17 August 1814 and was damaged seriously. Skillful seamanship aided by a rising tide managed to refloat the ship and despite heavy leaking she made it into the Penobscot River and reached

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(then part of the District of

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and ...

under Massachusetts). There on 3 September 1814, during the

Battle of Hampden The Battle of Hampden was an action in the British campaign to conquer present-day Maine and remake it into the colony of New Ireland during the War of 1812. Sir John Sherbrooke led a British force from Halifax, Nova Scotia to establish New Ire ...

, she was scuttled and set ablaze to prevent capture by a British squadron under the command of Rear-Admiral Edward Griffiths supporting British offensive operations in Maine.

Quasi-War with France

First Barbary War

1805–1811

War of 1812

See also

Citations

Further Information

Further reading