You’ve probably never heard of Rear Admiral Purnell Frederick Harrington, but he is part of the reason you are reading this magazine. One evening in October 1873, when Harrington was a lieutenant commander, he and 14 other naval officers gathered in a two-story, white clapboard classroom building on the grounds of the U.S. Naval Academy. It stood near the end of Maryland Avenue, on the Severn River—close to today’s Rickover Hall.
The officers were concerned that the robust U.S. Navy of the Civil War period had become pathetically weak in the eight years since the war’s end. Determined to reverse the situation, the officers that night became the founding members of the United States Naval Institute. The new organization’s objective—“the advancement of professional and scientific knowledge in the Navy”—differs only slightly from today’s Naval Institute mission.
Harrington was only 19 when he became an acting ensign in October 1863—an early graduation for the Academy’s class of 1864. On 5 August 1864, when he was barely 20, he took part in combat on board the screw sloop Monongahela in the Battle of Mobile Bay. Harrington’s ship bombarded forts ashore and then, at full speed, rammed the Confederate ironclad Tennessee. The victory in that battle closed down the last Gulf port still in use by the South.
During the remainder of his active career, he had a variety of billets. One shipboard duty was as executive officer of the Hartford, which had been Admiral David G. Farragut’s flagship at Mobile Bay. In the early part of the Spanish- American War, Harrington was skipper of the monitor Puritan, in the blockade of Santiago, Cuba. In later years, he commanded the Navy yards at Portsmouth, New Hampshire; Brooklyn, New York; and Norfolk, Virginia. After being placed on the retired list in 1906 as a rear admiral, he remained on active duty until early 1908 in connection with the Jamestown Exposition at Hampton Roads. When the United States entered World War I in 1917, Harrington—ever the patriot—said he would be willing to give up his rank and serve as a foot soldier if need be. Because he was then 73 years old, the nation declined his offer.
In 1933, Congress authorized the Academy to give degrees and diplomas to new graduates. Until then, they got only commissions. In 1937 Congress extended the authorization to past graduates. In September of that year, as the oldest living alumnus, Harrington received the first of the retroactive diplomas. The following month, Harrington died at the age of 93—the last surviving member of the men who had founded the Naval Institute. During his membership he wrote several articles for Proceedings.
All told, Harrington had four tours of duty at the Naval Academy after being commissioned. In the late 1880s, he was commandant of cadets at the Naval Academy—the billet now known as commandant of midshipmen—and was on duty in Annapolis when Edward Latimer Beach graduated in 1888.
Beach got his own baptism of fire as a crew member of the cruiser Baltimore at the Battle of Manila Bay a century ago. In 1902, as a lieutenant, Beach was secretary-treasurer of the Naval Institute when it published the first edition of The Bluejackets’ Manual. He was also the author of a series of novels about Naval Academy life—no doubt inspiring many future midshipmen. Beach went on to command the battleship New York (BB-34) at the end of World War I before retiring as a captain in 1921.
When he was 50 years old, a few years before completing his active service, Captain Beach had a son who was also his namesake. When the son, widely known as Ned, entered the Naval Academy as a midshipman in 1935, his father gave him a membership in the Naval Institute. Like Harrington and the senior Beach, Ned Beach became both a warrior and an author. He graduated second in the class of 1939 and compiled an outstanding record as a submariner in World War II.
Slade Cutter, one of the great submarine skippers of that war, has observed that every commanding officer who had Beach in his crew prospered as a result. Most notable was Commander George Street, who had Beach as his executive officer in the Tirante (SS-420). Street received the Medal of Honor for a harbor-entry exploit in 1945, and Beach was awarded the Navy Cross, rare for an exec. Ned Beach later became a celebrated author, widely praised for his submarine novels, notably Run Silent, Run Deep.
This spring, as part of the Naval Institute’s 125th anniversary, work began to transform a wing of the old Annapolis Naval Hospital into the organization’s new headquarters, named Beach Hall in honor of both father and son. They are links in the unbroken chain initially forged in 1873 by Purnell Harrington and his far-seeing colleagues.