Original page can be found at the Naval Historical Center homepage
USS Java
Early
in the War of 1812, Constitution captured British frigate 'Java in
a bitter fight off the coast of Brazil 29 December 1812. However, Java's shattered condition and the long distance from home prompted Commodore
Bain-bridge to burn his prize.
American frigate Java was named
for this American victory, and, later in the Civil War, the screw sloop of war under construction at
the New York Navy Yard.
(Fr:
t. 1,511; l. 175' b.p.; b. 44'6" dph. 13'8";
cpl. 400; a. 33
long 32-pdrs., 20 42-pdr. car.)
Java
was a 44-gun
frigate built at Baltimore in 1814 and 1815 by Flannigan &
Parsons. Not completed until after the end of the War of 1812, Java, Captain Oliver
Hazard Perry in command, got underway from Baltimore 5
August 1815, picked up spare rigging at Hampton Roads and New York, and sailed to Newport, R.I., to fill out her crew. Ordered to the Mediterranean, the new frigate stood out from Newport 22 January 1816 in the face of a bitter gale. At sea one of her masts snapped with 10 men upon
the yards, killing 5.
Java
was off
Algiers In April where Perry went ashore under a flag of truce and persuaded the dey of Algiers to honor the treaty which he
had signed the previous summer but had been ignoring. Next she visited Tripoli with Constellation, Ontario, and Erie to show the strength of the United States. Then, after a cruise in the
Mediterranean
stopping at Syracuse, Messina, Palermo, Tunis Gibraltar, and Naples, the frigate returned to Newport early in 1817. and was
laid up at Boston.
Java
returned to
active service in 1827 under Captain William
M. Crane for a second deployment in the Mediterranean. There she protected American
citizens and commerce
and performed diplomatic duties. Toward the end of the cruise she served as flagship of Commodore
James Biddle.
After
returning to the United States in 1831, Java became receiving ship at Norfolk, where she was broken up in 1842.
__________
Java
was the name
assigned to a screw sloop begun by the New York Navy Yard in 1863 but never completed. Her hulk was broken up in
1884.
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Copyright 2004, 2005, Gregory D.
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