Two hundred years ago today the USS Revenge, under the command of Oliver Hazard Perry, sank in the waters off Rhode Island. On Friday, divers, Charles Buffum, Mike Fournier and Craig Harger, announced that they believe that they have located the wreck. In the wreckage they have found four 42-inch long cannons, an anchor, canister shot, and other metal objects that make them confident that they have the right ship. They do not have a positive identification however and some have noted that the Revenge was originally armed with 6 pounders with a length of 72″. Whether the ship was subsequently rearmed with carronades is the subject of discussion as well as whether the published photographs of the guns show trunnions indicating a conventional gun or lugs indicating carronades.
We never gave up the ship! Divers claim they have found the 200-year-old wreck of the USS Revenge
The Revenge was commanded by Oliver Hazard Perry, the U.S. Navy hero who immortalised the phrase ‘I have met the enemy and they are ours’.
His battle flag – which to this day is a symbol of the Navy – implored: ‘Don’t give up the ship’.
Some argue that the Revenge changed the course of American history: Because of its sinking, it is believed, Perry was sent to the Great Lakes.
There he defeated the British in the 1813 Battle of Lake Eries off the shores of Ohio, Michigan and Ontario in the War of 1812.
Note: The phrase “don’t give up the ship was the dying command of James Lawrence in command of the USS Chesapeake. Perry adopted it for his battle flag to memorialize his friend Lawrence.
I have a section of a wooden sailing ship bow which the nautical museum curator at Southport, NC estimated to be from the early 19th century and gave me copies of plans of ships of that day and with those plans I can see a place where my section with a couple dowel holes and one dowel in place would fit.
I found the section while walking the beach on Martha’s Vineyard around 1990 and always wondered which ship it came from. Can you tell me where to get a good description/sketch of the Revenge for comparison?
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