Buchanan

Little-Remembered Heroine

Of the 273 iconic four-stack destroyers of three World War I–era classes, several gained fame during the later global conflict.

J. M. Caiella
March 2022
Adirondack illustration

A Very Short Life

With a service life of just 54 days, the screw sloop Adirondack had little time to make an impact on history.

J. M. Caiella
January 2022
painting of ship

The Yankee Racehorse

The 36-gun ship Constellation was one of the first six frigates of the new U.S. Navy, which was created in 1797.

J M. Caiella
November 2021
Ship

Fact vs. Fiction

The patrol craft PC-467 was one of 319 commissioned PCs built at 16 shipyards around the nation.

J. M. Caiella
September 2021
Kirk

‘Greatest Humanitarian Mission’

The tin can sailors of the destroyer escort USS Kirk (DE-1087) are quick to point out that their primary mission had been to hunt and kill.

J. M. Caiella
July 2021
William D. Porter Destroyer

Fact or Fiction?

Did the Fletcher-class destroyer William D. Porter (DD-579) deserve her reputation as a “hard-luck” ship?

J. M. Caiella
May 2021
The Illinois, a brick near-replica of the Indiana (Battleship No. 1) design, served as the home for naval exhibits at Chicago’s 1893 Columbian Exposition. Later, for a brief time, she was home to the Illinois Naval Militia.

The Brick Battleship

The U.S. Navy records only two commissioned warships named for the state of Illinois—the current Virginia-class submarine SSN-786 and Battleship No. 7 of 1901. Yet five years before the ...

J. M. Caiella
February 2021
Operating on Western rivers, the tinclad Rattler had an exemplary Civil War service record for such a modest warship, yet she was involved in two of the strangest events in U.S. Navy history.

Gunboat for Sale

Expediency, especially in time of war, often fosters stopgap measures that seldom provide perfect solutions.

J. M. Caiella
December 2020
The motor lifeboat CG 36500 was acquired by the Orleans (Massachusetts) Historical Society in 1981 and restored to operating condition. She has since been added to the National Register of Historic Places.

‘Work That We Were Supposed to Do’

A historic ship can be of any class, size, or utility, but the one thing they all have in common is that their status was achieved because of their crews ...

J. M. Caiella
October 2020