USRC Active
Encyclopedia
One of the first ten revenue cutters, Active may have been the second of the ten cutters to enter service. The Columbian Centinel on 30 April 1791 noted:
offered to increase the payment by no more than 10 percent and then threatened to have the Maryland
cutter built in Virginia
, David Stodder, of Baltimore, agreed to build the revenue cutter for the government's asking price. She was laid down in January 1791 and her keel entered the water on 9 April of that same year. When she was sold out of government service in 1798, she was described as having a "square stern, a square tuck, no galleries and no figurehead." She was a two-masted topsail schooner
with a single deck. It is also known how she was initially outfitted and equipped thanks to the survival of a letter from her first master, Simon Gross, to Alexander Hamilton.
s, supplied to the Active by incoming ships, did not reach his desk for weeks, if at all. Relative incompetence amongst the officers and difficulty obtaining a full crew continually troubled the revenue cutter throughout its service life. Indeed, the collector wrote Hamilton in disgust that the cutter was "of no more advantage to the United States and perhaps much less, than if she had been built and manned on the lake Erie."
Gross and Porter both saw fit to leave the cutter under the command of the second mate
on numerous occasions, thereby adding to the frustration of the collector and the Secretary of the Treasury as well. Gross submitted his resignation in the summer of 1792 and Porter, with the recommendation of President George Washington
, assumed command of the lackluster Active. Even the President seemed satisfied that Gross was leaving government service. He noted in a letter that "...the service would sustain no loss by the resignation of the Master of the Maryland Revenue Cutter."
Little seemed to change under the command of Porter although he did complain that his third mate
, Forbes, had difficulty staying away from the bottle, as apparently did some of the other crewmen. Many of the crew were also unhappy with the daily ration allowance and poor pay and as such Porter, as did Gross, had trouble finding crewmen. He wrote to Hamilton asking for an increase, and Hamilton promptly raised the daily ration allowance from nine cents to 12. It is not certain if this solved Porter's problems but Porter once again asked for a greater increase in both the pay and ration allowances. This, however, was not the way to endear him to the parsimonious Secretary of the Treasury. But one wonders if Porter really cared at all. Despite his apparent concern for the welfare of his men and attention to duty, Hamilton was perplexed at the obvious inaction of the cutter, its commanding officer, and even his collector of customs.
According to Kern, for the next few years Porter rarely sailed on Active, rather, he let the first mate handle command of the cutter—if she sailed on patrol at all. He did sail to the West Indies with his son, twice in 1796, but not on board his cutter. He sailed on board a merchant vessel in which he had a monetary stake. Whether he had permission to leave his duty post and what occurred on board the cutter while he was way is unknown. Unfortunately her journals have not survived the ravages of the British Army
, which burned Washington, D.C.
in 1814, and the later fire at the United States Treasury Department in 1833, so there is little documentation regarding her accomplishments or conversely, explaining her inaction. But Hamilton's letters have survived and he was not overly pleased with his Baltimore based cutter. Indeed, when ordered to sell the Active in 1798, Porter could not locate her! He eventually found her grounded in the mud of the riverbank outside of Baltimore Harbor. She was sold at auction for $750.00 and her new owners sailed her to the West Indies and promptly sold her once again. Interestingly, Porter stayed on the federal payroll for another year after his cutter had been sold.
The cast of characters who paraded on, around, and nowhere near her decks continued to lead rather interesting lives. Porter went back into the merchant trade after failing to secure a commission in the Navy
and ran into trouble in the courts under suspicion of barratry
and fraud
. He was apparently not convicted and he eventually received a naval commission
as the sailing master of gunboat
based at New Orleans in 1807—under the overall command of his son! It seems that David Junior joined the Navy as a midshipman
at the age of nineteen and went on to have a distinguished career. Indeed, he became one of the Navy's most celebrated heroes, as did his two sons and his adopted son, David Glasgow Farragut. Not so the first master of the Active, Simon Gross. Gross had secured a commission as a first lieutenant
in the Navy after leaving the Active, only to earn the wrath of another famous naval personage, Captain
Thomas Truxton, who admonished him that "every drunkard is a Nuisance and no drunkard ought to be employ'd and if employ'd Shall ever remain an officer
with me." He later picked a fight with, of all people, David Porter, Junior, when they were both lieutenants. Gross made some rather "insulting" remarks about Porter's father, who, it will be remembered, was Gross's first mate on the Active! After a fistfight, Gross was dismissed from the service and he then enlisted as a seaman in the Navy. The last anyone heard of him he was an oarsman on an officer's barge.
Captain David Porter, Master; 1792–1798
Original Crew:
David Porter, First Mate
William Thomas, Second Mate
James Forbes, Third Mate; replaced by William Dunton when Forbes moved to second mate in 1792.
A Revenue Cutter, was launched at BaltimoreBaltimoreBaltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
the 9th inst. at Captain Stodder's Ship Yard, and is considered by good judges, a beautiful vessel. She is to be commanded, we hear, by Capt. Gross, formerly First-Lieutenant of the Continental Frigate CONFEDERACY."
Operational history
Active almost never made it into the water. Apparently no shipbuilder in the Baltimore area was willing to build a cutter for the price offered by the government. Eventually, after an exasperated Secretary of the Treasury Alexander HamiltonAlexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...
offered to increase the payment by no more than 10 percent and then threatened to have the Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
cutter built in Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
, David Stodder, of Baltimore, agreed to build the revenue cutter for the government's asking price. She was laid down in January 1791 and her keel entered the water on 9 April of that same year. When she was sold out of government service in 1798, she was described as having a "square stern, a square tuck, no galleries and no figurehead." She was a two-masted topsail schooner
Schooner
A schooner is a type of sailing vessel characterized by the use of fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts with the forward mast being no taller than the rear masts....
with a single deck. It is also known how she was initially outfitted and equipped thanks to the survival of a letter from her first master, Simon Gross, to Alexander Hamilton.
Personnel problems
Active seemed to have been plagued with problems from the start. For the first few months of her existence she remained tied up in port. Gross, a man of known intemperance, had trouble hiring a crew at the wages the government offered. The pay in the merchant service proved to be much more lucrative. Gross also did not get along with his first mate. These problems manifested themselves, despite the name of the cutter, in a decided lack of activity. Baltimore's Collector of Customs complained that merchant vessel manifestManifest
Manifest has different meanings. It may refer to the following:Arts* Manifest , the Melbourne Anime FestivalBusiness* Manifest Limited, the UK marketing companyComputing...
s, supplied to the Active by incoming ships, did not reach his desk for weeks, if at all. Relative incompetence amongst the officers and difficulty obtaining a full crew continually troubled the revenue cutter throughout its service life. Indeed, the collector wrote Hamilton in disgust that the cutter was "of no more advantage to the United States and perhaps much less, than if she had been built and manned on the lake Erie."
Gross and Porter both saw fit to leave the cutter under the command of the second mate
Second Mate
A second mate or second officer is a licensed member of the deck department of a merchant ship. The second mate is the third in command and a watchkeeping officer, customarily the ship's navigator. Other duties vary, but the second mate is often the medical officer and in charge of maintaining...
on numerous occasions, thereby adding to the frustration of the collector and the Secretary of the Treasury as well. Gross submitted his resignation in the summer of 1792 and Porter, with the recommendation of President George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
, assumed command of the lackluster Active. Even the President seemed satisfied that Gross was leaving government service. He noted in a letter that "...the service would sustain no loss by the resignation of the Master of the Maryland Revenue Cutter."
Little seemed to change under the command of Porter although he did complain that his third mate
Third Mate
A Third Mate or Third Officer is a licensed member of the deck department of a merchant ship. The third mate is a watchstander and customarily the ship's safety officer and fourth-in-command...
, Forbes, had difficulty staying away from the bottle, as apparently did some of the other crewmen. Many of the crew were also unhappy with the daily ration allowance and poor pay and as such Porter, as did Gross, had trouble finding crewmen. He wrote to Hamilton asking for an increase, and Hamilton promptly raised the daily ration allowance from nine cents to 12. It is not certain if this solved Porter's problems but Porter once again asked for a greater increase in both the pay and ration allowances. This, however, was not the way to endear him to the parsimonious Secretary of the Treasury. But one wonders if Porter really cared at all. Despite his apparent concern for the welfare of his men and attention to duty, Hamilton was perplexed at the obvious inaction of the cutter, its commanding officer, and even his collector of customs.
According to Kern, for the next few years Porter rarely sailed on Active, rather, he let the first mate handle command of the cutter—if she sailed on patrol at all. He did sail to the West Indies with his son, twice in 1796, but not on board his cutter. He sailed on board a merchant vessel in which he had a monetary stake. Whether he had permission to leave his duty post and what occurred on board the cutter while he was way is unknown. Unfortunately her journals have not survived the ravages of the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
, which burned Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
in 1814, and the later fire at the United States Treasury Department in 1833, so there is little documentation regarding her accomplishments or conversely, explaining her inaction. But Hamilton's letters have survived and he was not overly pleased with his Baltimore based cutter. Indeed, when ordered to sell the Active in 1798, Porter could not locate her! He eventually found her grounded in the mud of the riverbank outside of Baltimore Harbor. She was sold at auction for $750.00 and her new owners sailed her to the West Indies and promptly sold her once again. Interestingly, Porter stayed on the federal payroll for another year after his cutter had been sold.
The cast of characters who paraded on, around, and nowhere near her decks continued to lead rather interesting lives. Porter went back into the merchant trade after failing to secure a commission in the Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
and ran into trouble in the courts under suspicion of barratry
Barratry
Barratry is the name of four legal concepts, three in criminal and civil law, and one in admiralty law.* Barratry, in criminal and civil law, is the act or practice of bringing repeated legal actions solely to harass...
and fraud
Fraud
In criminal law, a fraud is an intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual; the related adjective is fraudulent. The specific legal definition varies by legal jurisdiction. Fraud is a crime, and also a civil law violation...
. He was apparently not convicted and he eventually received a naval commission
Officer (armed forces)
An officer is a member of an armed force or uniformed service who holds a position of authority. Commissioned officers derive authority directly from a sovereign power and, as such, hold a commission charging them with the duties and responsibilities of a specific office or position...
as the sailing master of gunboat
Gunboat
A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies.-History:...
based at New Orleans in 1807—under the overall command of his son! It seems that David Junior joined the Navy as a midshipman
Midshipman
A midshipman is an officer cadet, or a commissioned officer of the lowest rank, in the Royal Navy, United States Navy, and many Commonwealth navies. Commonwealth countries which use the rank include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Kenya...
at the age of nineteen and went on to have a distinguished career. Indeed, he became one of the Navy's most celebrated heroes, as did his two sons and his adopted son, David Glasgow Farragut. Not so the first master of the Active, Simon Gross. Gross had secured a commission as a first lieutenant
First Lieutenant
First lieutenant is a military rank and, in some forces, an appointment.The rank of lieutenant has different meanings in different military formations , but the majority of cases it is common for it to be sub-divided into a senior and junior rank...
in the Navy after leaving the Active, only to earn the wrath of another famous naval personage, Captain
Captain (naval)
Captain is the name most often given in English-speaking navies to the rank corresponding to command of the largest ships. The NATO rank code is OF-5, equivalent to an army full colonel....
Thomas Truxton, who admonished him that "every drunkard is a Nuisance and no drunkard ought to be employ'd and if employ'd Shall ever remain an officer
Officer (armed forces)
An officer is a member of an armed force or uniformed service who holds a position of authority. Commissioned officers derive authority directly from a sovereign power and, as such, hold a commission charging them with the duties and responsibilities of a specific office or position...
with me." He later picked a fight with, of all people, David Porter, Junior, when they were both lieutenants. Gross made some rather "insulting" remarks about Porter's father, who, it will be remembered, was Gross's first mate on the Active! After a fistfight, Gross was dismissed from the service and he then enlisted as a seaman in the Navy. The last anyone heard of him he was an oarsman on an officer's barge.
Commanding officers
Captain Simon Gross, Master; 1791–1792Captain David Porter, Master; 1792–1798
Original Crew:
David Porter, First Mate
William Thomas, Second Mate
James Forbes, Third Mate; replaced by William Dunton when Forbes moved to second mate in 1792.