The first USS Merrimack, was a ship launched by an Association of Newburyport Shipwrights and presented to the Navy in 1798. She was the first ship of the Navy to be named for the Merrimack River

Merrimack River

The Merrimack River is a river in the northeastern United States. It rises at the confluence of the Pemigewasset and Winnipesaukee rivers in Franklin, New Hampshire, flows southward into Massachusetts, and then flows northeast until it empties into the Atlantic Ocean at Newburyport...

. She saw action in the Quasi-War

Quasi-War

The Quasi-War was an undeclared war fought mostly at sea between the United States and French Republic from 1798 to 1800. In the United States, the conflict was sometimes also referred to as the Franco-American War, the Pirate Wars, or the Half-War.-Background:The Kingdom of France had been a...

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Service history

Captain Moses Brown commanded Merrimack when she was placed in service in December 1798. She departed Boston on 3 January 1799 for the Windward Islands

Windward Islands

The Windward Islands are the southern islands of the Lesser Antilles, within the West Indies.-Name and geography:The Windward Islands are called such because they were more windward to sailing ships arriving in the New World than the Leeward Islands, given that the prevailing trade winds in the...

 to protect American merchantmen in the Caribbean during the naval war with France. She arrived Prince Rupert Bay on the 20th, and, for the next two years, cruised in the West Indies and escorted convoys to the United States.

On 28 June 1799, she took her first prize L'Magicienne, the former American naval schooner , captured on 20 November 1798 and taken into the French Navy. She took French letter-of-marque schooner Bonaparte 7 August and, with and , recaptured American schooner John on the 15th, after that ship had struck her colors to French privateer Revelleiu the day before.

Merrimack freed American brig Ceres, 6 June 1800, after it had been taken by L'Hazard on 18 May 1800. On arriving off Curaçao, 22 September, she found that a French force of 16 ships from Guadeloupe was besieging the city with 1,400 men. That evening, with , Merrimack stood into the harbor through heavy fire from French cannon and muskets. The American gunners replied with great spirit driving the enemy troops from their guns, but from time to time, during the night, the French soldiers renewed the cannonade. The next morning, the French troops reembarked in confusion and fled.

Merrimack captured French privateer sloop Phoenix on 20 October 1800, and later in the year took French brig Brilliant. A list of American prizes credits Merrimack with recapturing English schooner Godfrey, but gives no details about the action.

She was stripped of naval equipment and sold in 1801. Subsequently, while operating in merchant service under the name Monticello, the ship was lost off Cape Cod

Cape Cod

Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

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External links

• USC Merrimack (1799) 3decks