USS Independence: The Navy’s First Ship-of-the-Line, From Boston to Mare Island

USS Independence was the United States Navy's first ship-of-the-line and the first ship built at the Charlestown Navy Yard, and its first career was a disappointment. It was so big and so unorthodox in design that the Navy cut it down by a deck and turned it into a frigate, and the frigate career that followed was far more successful. The National Park Service tells the story.

USS Independence. National Archives, 513024.

Bainbridge's brainchild

Congress authorized 74-gun ships-of-the-line during the War of 1812 to compete with the powerful British Navy. William Bainbridge, commandant of the Charlestown Navy Yard and a former commander of USS Constitution, set out to plan the young republic's first. He hired shipwright Edmund Hartt and his sons, but Bainbridge's insistence on unorthodox changes during construction caused friction, and the Hartts walked off the job. Josiah Barker replaced them and built the ship as Bainbridge envisioned it. To help with bad-weather work, Bainbridge had the yard's first ship house built, finished in 1813.

British ships posed a constant threat. On June 1, 1814, HMS Shannon captured USS Chesapeake just outside Boston Harbor, leaving the yard exposed, and the Navy hurriedly armed the nearly finished ship. Two weeks later, Marines from HMS Nymph slipped into the harbor and burned a sloop within a mile of the yard, then tried to send the blazing ship into Independence. The attack failed, and the 90-gun ship was finally launched on June 22, 1814, after several failed attempts. It stayed in Boston Harbor for the rest of the war, defending the city. A month after the launch, a windstorm destroyed the ship house where it was built.

Depiction of HMS Nymph's attack on USS Independence. Naval History and Heritage Command, USN 902802.

A cumbersome flagship

Independence never fought in the War of 1812. In 1815 it sailed to the Mediterranean to reinforce U.S. vessels against Barbary pirates, but the United States had already begun negotiating peace with them by the time it arrived. It stayed in active service until 1822, but its size made it unwieldy, and smaller frigates such as Constitution proved more effective. On March 19, 1822 it returned to Boston, was decommissioned and was placed in ordinary, meaning out of service for repair, until 1836.

Ship-of-the-line USS Independence in a storm. Naval History and Heritage Command, NH 53101.

A new life as a frigate

In 1836 the ship was razeed, or cut down, to a 54-gun frigate, which made it the fastest and most powerful frigate in the Navy. It then traveled to Russia, Brazil, Sardinia and Hawaii. In 1846 it saw combat for the first time, as the flagship of Commodore William Shubrick in the Mexican-American War. Staging first at Monterey Bay, it joined the blockade of the Mexican coast, captured the Mexican ship Correo and landed Marines who occupied Mazatlán.

USS Independence after being razeed and refit as a frigate. Naval History and Heritage Command, NH 53102.

Receiving ship at Mare Island

After the war the ship served as an active vessel for nearly another decade, but by the late 1850s, with steam power arriving, it was showing its age. In 1857 it reached Mare Island Navy Yard in California for its last role as a receiving ship, quarters for new seamen not yet assigned to a seagoing vessel. Two other screw sloops built at Charlestown, USS Hartford and USS Narragansett, joined it there. It served in that role for over half a century until it was decommissioned for the last time on November 3, 1912, and the Navy struck it from its lists a year later. Private owners bought it and tried unsuccessfully to turn it into a floating restaurant, and it was burned for scrap in 1915.

USS Independence as a receiving ship at Mare Island Navy Yard. Naval History and Heritage Command, NH 53103.

For a ship with so little promise at first, the NPS concludes, Independence proved versatile and dynamic across a career of about a century: the Navy's first ship-of-the-line, flagship frigate of the Mexican-American War, and a sturdy receiving ship for over 50 years.

Sources

• National Park Service, "USS INDEPENDENCE", https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/uss-independence.htm. The NPS page cites Naval History and Heritage Command histories (2015), Black and Bearss, The Charlestown Navy Yard 1800-1842 (National Park Service, 1984) and the Navy's daily journals in the National Archives; rewritten in hubnx's own words.