"One Thousand Fifty Years of American History Makers"

USS ALASKA

Captain
Joined
Mar 16, 2016
h53367.jpg


"One Thousand Fifty Years of American History Makers"

Photograph of a gathering of retired Navy and Marine Corps flag officers, taken circa 1923. Those present are (left to right, in front row):
Rear Admiral Yates Stirling (born 1843);
Rear Admiral George C. Remey (born 1841);
Rear Admiral George H. Wadleigh (born 1842); and
Rear Admiral Theodore F. Jewell (born 1844).
(left to right, in middle row):
Rear Admiral William T. Swinburne (born 1847);
Rear Admiral Spencer S. Wood (born 1861);
Rear Admiral Colby M. Chester (born 1844);
Rear Admiral Albert Gleaves (born 1858); and
Rear Admiral Newton E. Mason (born 1850).
(left to right, in middle row):
Major General George F. Elliott (born 1846);
Rear Admiral Warner B. Bayley (born 1845);
Rear Admiral Joseph L. Jayne (born 1863);
Rear Admiral Bradley A. Fiske (born 1854); and
Rear Admiral Reginald F. Nicholson (born 1852).

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/OnlineLibrary/photos/images/h53000/h53367c.htm

7 of the above had ACW service...

Rear Admiral Yates Stirling, Rear Admiral George C. Remey, Rear Admiral George H. Wadleigh, Rear Admiral Theodore F. Jewell, Rear Admiral William T. Swinburne, Rear Admiral Colby M. Chester, Rear Admiral Warner B. Bayley

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
Man! Just think of the stories one could have heard sitting around these men! Would have loved having a tape recorder then.
Regards
David
 
Yates Stirling (6 May 1843 – 5 March 1929) was a rear admiral in the United States Navy.

Stirling was born in Baltimore, Maryland, on 6 May 1843, the son of Archibald Stirling and the former Elizabeth A. Walsh. He and his wife, Ellen (1843–1929), had seven children. Their elder son, Yates Stirling, Jr. (1872–1948), also became a rear admiral in the Navy, making them only the second family in the history of the U.S. Navy to have father and son rear admirals concurrently living. The first were Rear Admirals Thomas O. Selfridge, Sr. and Junior. Stirling's younger son, Archibald (1884-1963), was a captain in the Navy.

Stirling was a companion of the Maryland Commandery of the
Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States as a veteran commissioned officer of the Civil War. He was a grandson of Thomas Yates (1740-1815), Captain, Fourth Battalion, Maryland Regulars during the American Revolutionary War.

Stirling attended private schools in Baltimore as a youth. He was appointed by Representative
Henry Winter Davis of Maryland to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland, as an acting midshipman on 27 September 1860. In June 1861, Stirling and several other midshipman, including Robley "Fighting Bob" Evans, future hero of the Spanish–American War, submitted letters of resignation, believing their loyalty was with the Confederacy. Four weeks later they had second thoughts and retracted their resignations, expressing loyalty to the Union. When the rank of acting midshipman was abolished on 16 July 1862, his rank became midshipman. After the American Civil War broke out in April 1861, the Academy moved to Newport, Rhode Island, for the duration of the war and Stirling graduated one year ahead of schedule in 1863 due to the expanded U.S. Navy's need for officers during the war. He was commissioned as an ensign on 28 May 1863.

Stirling served for the rest of the war in the
North Atlantic Blockading Squadron as part of the Union Blockade of the Confederate States of America. His first duty was aboard the screw sloop-of-war USS Shenandoah until 13 April 1864, when Shenandoah began a period under repair in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He then served aboard the flagship of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, the monitor USS Onondaga, on the James River in Virginia until reporting back aboard Shenandoah for duty when she returned to service in June 1864. Aboard Shenandoah he saw combat at Fort Fisher in North Carolina in both the First Battle of Fort Fisher in December 1864 and the Second Battle of Fort Fisher in January 1865 and remained on blockade duty through the end of the war in April 1865.

After the war, Stirling served aboard the
gunboat USS Mohongo in the Pacific Squadron from 1865 to 1867 and was promoted to lieutenant on 10 November 1866. Promoted to lieutenant commander on 12 March 1868, he was aboard the newly commissioned screw frigate USS Wampanoag during her brief initial deployment as flagship of the North Atlantic Squadron in 1868. He then served aboard the next flagship of the squadron, the screw sloop-of-war USS Contoocook, from 1868 to 1869 before a tour aboard the receiving ship USS Independence at the Mare Island Navy Yard at Vallejo, California, from 1871 to 1872. While stationed at Mare Island, his son and namesake, Yates, Jr. was born on 30 April 1872. After a lengthy period on sick leave from 1873 to 1875, Stirling returned to duty aboard the receiving ship USS Worcester at the Norfolk Navy Yard in Portsmouth, Virginia, from 1875 to 1876. He had torpedo duty in 1877, then had ordnance duty at the Washington Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., from 1877 to 1879.

Stirling returned to sea in 1878 as
commanding officer of the screw sloop-of-war USS Lackawanna in the Pacific Squadron and was promoted to commander on 26 November 1880 during his tour aboard Lackawanna. Detaching from Lackawanna in 1881, he had a second tour of duty at the Washington Navy Yard from 1882 to 1884 before a sea assignment as commanding officer of the sloop-of-war USS Iroquois in the Pacific Squadron from 1884 to 1886. He then commanded the receiving ship USS Dale at the Washington Navy Yard from 1887 to 1890 and the gunboat and dispatch vessel USS Dolphin from March 1890 to June 1891.

Stirling had duty as a
lighthouse inspector from December 1892 to December 1894 and was promoted to captain on 16 September 1894. He awaited orders from December 1894 until May 1895, then was commanding officer of the protected cruiser USS Newark from May 1895 to July 1896 and of the screw sloop-of-war USS Lancaster from July 1896 to June 1897. He was commander of the South Atlantic Squadron from July to December 1897. After duty as a member of the Lighthouse Board from 31 March 1898 to 1 July 1900, he became commandant of Naval Station San Juan in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on 21 November 1900, serving in that capacity into 1902. In May 1900, while commandant at San Juan, Captain Stirling rescued the Lloyd's agent there, a man named Butler who had jumped off the municipal pier that had caught fire. Stirling was promoted to rear admiral on 8 June 1902. Following his promotion, he was named commandant of the Puget Sound Navy Yard, where his son, Yates, Jr. joined him shortly thereafter as an officer of the yard.

Stirling was commander-in-chief of the
United States Asiatic Fleet from 11 July 1904 to 23 March 1905 before retiring from the Navy on 6 May 1905 at the mandatory age of 62. During the time he commanded the Asiatic Fleet, his flag was on the USS Wisconsin (BB-9) and his son, Yates, Jr. served as his flag lieutenant. When he was interviewed shortly after his retirement, Stirling recalled an incident early in his career when he was first lieutenant taking a ship into a New England harbor with some difficulty. An old lobsterman in a dory piled high with traps managed to interfere with the ship's passage. After Stirling called down to the lobsterman with some "choice deep sea language", the old man leisurely rested on his oars and replied, "And who be you?" Stirling blustered back, "Who am I? I'm the first officer of this ship." "Well, go to your skipper, then," replied the ancient mariner with dignity. "I don't argue with nobody but my equals an I'm cap'n o' this."

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yates_Stirling

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
George Collier Remey (10 August 1841 – 10 February 1928) was a rear admiral of the United States Navy, serving in the Civil War and the Spanish–American War.

Remey was born at Burlington, Iowa, and graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1859. Initially assigned to the sloop USS Hartford on the Asiatic Station, he returned to the United States with the outbreak of the Civil War and served in the gunboat Marblehead during the Peninsular Campaign, March–July 1862; and, afterward, in the blockade of Charleston. In April 1863, he assumed duties as Executive Officer in the screw sloop Canandaigua and during attacks on Fort Wagner briefly commanded Marblehead. From 23 August to 7 September, he commanded a battery of naval guns on Morris Island, and on the night of 7–8 September led the second division of a boat attack on Fort Sumter. The division made shore, but was smashed by gunfire. Remey and the surviving members of his party were forced to surrender. Following 13 months of imprisonment at Columbia, S.C., Remey was exchanged and returned to duty, serving in the sidewheel steamship De Soto until the end of the war.

In 1866, he saw service off the west coast of
South America. In 1870-71, he participated in the Tehuantepec Survey Expedition. After commanding the screw sloop Enterprise and service in the Mediterranean, he was appointed captain in 1885. Four years later he assumed command of the protected cruiser Charleston, flagship of the Pacific Squadron.

Commandant of the Portsmouth Navy Yard at the outbreak of the Spanish–American War, he was ordered to take charge of the Naval Base Key West, whence he directed the supply and repair of all naval forces in Cuban waters and organized supply lines to Army forces in Cuba. After peace returned, Rear Admiral Remey resumed duties at the Portsmouth Navy Yard. In April 1900, he assumed command of the Asiatic Station and for the next two years guided the ships of that station through the diplomatic and military chaos that was China. He then returned to the United States and served for a year as Chairman of the Lighthouse Board before retiring on 10 August 1903. Rear Admiral Remey died at Washington, D.C. on 10 February 1928.

In 1943, the
destroyer USS Remey (DD-688) was named in his honor.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_C._Remey

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
Rear Admiral George Henry Wadleigh (September 28, 1842 – July 11, 1927) served in the United States Navy during the American Civil War and the Spanish–American War.

Wadleigh was born in
Dover, New Hampshire, and entered the United States Naval Academy on September 26, 1860, with the rank of midshipman. He graduated on May 28, 1863, with the rank of ensign. He then served during the Civil War in the Gulf of Mexico on the steam sloops Lackawanna and Richmond, seeing action at the battle of Mobile Bay, August 5, 1864, and receiving promotion to master on November 10, 1865.

After the Civil War he became a companion of the Massachusetts Commandery of the
Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States.

In 1866-1869 Wadleigh was in
European, Mediterranean and African waters as an officer of Ticonderoga, and received promotion to the rank of lieutenant on November 10, 1866, and to lieutenant commander on March 12, 1868.

During the following decade he had shore duty at the Naval Academy and several other facilities and was
Executive Officer of the gunboat Shawmut, monitor Canonicus, schoolship St. Mary's and sloop Pensacola.

Promoted to
commander on March 13, 1880, in 1881 he commanded Alliance during an arduous Arctic cruise searching for survivors of the ill-fated Jeannette expedition.

Commander Wadleigh spend most of the 1880s in shore positions. He returned to duty afloat in 1889-1891 as Commanding Officer of the
Great Lakes gunboat Michigan. Promoted to captain on July 10, 1894, he commanded the receiving ship Richmond until late in that year, then took command of the new cruiser Minneapolis, in which he cruised in U.S., West Indian and European waters into 1897.

Captain Wadleigh served at the
Boston Navy Yard until June 1898, including some very busy months near the end of that tour as the Navy prepared ships for Spanish–American War operations. From July 1898 until December 1901 he was Commanding Officer of the cruiser Philadelphia, in the Pacific, and the receiving ship Wabash at Boston.

He achieved the rank of
rear admiral in February 1902 and was briefly Commandant of the Philadelphia Navy Yard and President of the Board of Inspection and Survey before retiring from active duty in June of that year. In retirement, Rear Admiral Wadleigh made his home at Dover, New Hampshire. He died on July 11, 1927.

The
destroyer USS Wadleigh (DD-689) was named in honor of Rear Admiral Wadleigh.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_H._Wadleigh

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
Theodore Frelinghuysen Jewell (August 5, 1844 – July 26, 1932) was a rear admiral of the United States Navy.

Jewell was appointed an acting midshipman on November 29, 1861 when he entered the
United States Naval Academy. His class of 1865 graduated early on November 22, 1864. He served on the USS Colorado, at the Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. and at the U.S. Naval Academy. During the Civil War while still at the Naval Academy, in the summer of 1863 when the nation's capital was threatened by General Robert E. Lee's forces, he was in command of a fleet of howitzers at the US Naval Yard for the defense of Washington, D.C.


Jewell was involved in peacekeeping activities from the
Tuscarora in Seoul, Korea, Panama in 1872, and Hawaii in 1874, during the election of King Kalākaua, to negotiate the duty-free exportation of sugar to the United States. A riot occurred on election day and marines and sailors from the Tuscarora and the USS Portsmouth landed to restore order.

In 1879 he was executive officer of the frigate
Constitution. From January 1893 to February 1896 he was superintendent of the Naval Gun Factory at the Washington Navy Yard.

Jewell served with Admiral
Dewey at the Battle of Manila Bay and later commanded the European squadron of the American Fleet in March 1904 when he was made a rear admiral. He retired in November 1904.

He was the son of Thomas and Eleanor (Spencer) Jewell, born in Washington D.C. on August 5, 1844. On June 15, 1871 he married Elizabeth Lindsay Poor, daughter of rear admiral
Charles Henry Poor. They had one son Commander Charles T. Jewell.

Admiral Jewell died July 26, 1932 at his residence in Washington, D.C. and was buried in
Arlington National Cemetery.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Frelinghuysen_Jewell

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 
Colby Mitchell Chester (February 29, 1844 – May 4, 1932) was a United States Navy admiral. He is the only naval officer to have actively served in the Civil War, the Spanish–American War, and World War I.

Chester was born in New London, Connecticut, on 29 February 1844, and graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1863.

In 1864, Chester participated in operations against
Mobile, Alabama, aboard the Richmond, part of the squadron commanded by Admiral David G. Farragut. He served in the Navy for 46 more years.

He was
Commandant of Cadets at the United States Naval Academy in 1891–94; commanded the Cincinnati, flagship of the South Atlantic squadron during the Spanish–American War; became commanding officer of Kentucky upon her commissioning on May 15, 1900 until 1901, and became superintendent of the U.S. Naval Observatory in 1902, and retired on February 28, 1906.

Chester's active-service record was extended to February 28, 1909 to round out a full 50-year service career with the U.S. Navy. He was recalled to special duty in 1917, during World War I, as the first
Commandant of the Navy ROTC units at Yale University and Brown University.

In 1923 he traveled to
Turkey at the head of the Americans who participated in an agreement called the Chester concession.

He died in Rye, New York, in 1932, and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colby_Mitchell_Chester

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
Rear Admiral Warner Baldwin Bayley (9 September 1845 – 22 April 1928) was a United States Navy officer. His career specialized in engineering and included service in the Spanish–American War and the investigation of the sinking of the battleship USS Maine.

Bayley was born in
Baldwinsville, New York, on 9 September 1845. He was appointed to U.S. Navy service as an acting third assistant engineer during the American Civil War on 4 August 1864. He mustered out of the Navy on 28 April 1869, but apparently returned to Navy service soon thereafter, being promoted to second assistant engineer on 2 September 1870. He served aboard the screw sloop-of-war USS Lancaster in the North Atlantic Squadron from 1873 to 1874, then had a tour of shore duty at the Navy's Bureau of Steam Engineering from 1875 to 1877 and was promoted to first assistant engineer on 21 September 1877. He then returned to sea in the Asiatic Squadron, first aboard the gunboat USS Monocacy from 1877 to 1878, then aboard the tug USS Palos from 1878 to 1880.

After another tour at the Bureau of Steam Engineering from 1880 to 1881, Bayley was on special duty with the
United States Department of the Navy from 1881 to 1885. He then served aboard the screw steamer USS Pensacola in the European Squadron from 1885 to 1888. He had duty under the United States Fish Commission from 1888 to 1892, followed by a tour at the New York Navy Yard in Brooklyn, New York, from 1892 to 1893.

Bayley returned to sea in 1893, serving aboard the new gunboat
USS Machias in the North Atlantic Squadron into 1894. In April1894 he reported for duty aboard the gunboat USS Alert and was promoted to chief engineer on 25 May 1894. He was aboard the monitor USS Monterey from 1895 to 1896.

After brief service at the Bureau of Steam Engineering beginning in June 1896, Bayley began a tour at the
United States Civil Service Commission in August 1896. He remained there until he reported aboard the battleship USS Massachusetts in the North Atlantic Squadron for duty as Fleet Engineer. Massachusetts was reassigned to the Flying Squadron in March 1898 and operated with that squadron off Cuba after the Spanish–American War broke out in April 1898. Although Massachusetts was away coaling and missed the climactic Battle of Santiago de Cuba, Bayley distinguished himself in other actions off Cuba and was advanced two numbers for "eminent and conspicuous conduct in battle" during his time aboard her.

After the U.S. Navy abolished the distinction between engineering and
line officers, Bayley's rank was converted to lieutenant commander on 3 March 1899. Leaving Massachusetts in November 1900, he reported to the Bureau of Steam Engineering on 27 November 1900 for inspection duty, and was promoted to commander on 3 March 1901.

From September to November 1903, Bayley was a member of a board of inquiry examining the 15 February 1898 destruction of the battleship
USS Maine in Havana harbor, which precipitated the outbreak of the Spanish–American War. He became a member of the Navy Examining Board on 2 November 1903 and, promoted to captain on 1 July 1905, remained on it until going on an extended period of sick leave beginning 11 November 1905. He retired from the Navy at the rank of rear admiral while on sick leave on 18 April 1906.

Bayley married the former Annette Williamson (d. 19 August 1947) in October 1890. They were had one son.

Bayley died in
Washington, D.C. on 22 April 1928 and is buried with his wife at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warner_B._Bayley

Cheers,
USS ALASKA
 
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