A 74-gun ship-of-the-line, launched in 1782 and donated to the French navy on completion, was named America. Others commemorated the young nation's ideals and institutions ( Constitution, Independence, Congress).
Some ships honored early patriots and heroes ( Hancock and General Greene). Another ship was named Raleigh to commemorate the seagoing exploits of Sir Walter Raleigh. As if to emphasize the ties that many Americans still felt to Britain, the first ship of the new Continental Navy was named Alfred in honor of Alfred the Great, the king of Wessex, who is credited with building the first English naval force. Ship names in the Continental Navy and the early federal Navy came from a variety of sources.
The ships of the Continental Navy, and of the Navy later established under the federal Constitution, were not named in any strictly categorical manner. The Navy traces its ancestry to 13 October 1775, when an act of the Continental Congress authorized the first ship of a new navy for the United Colonies, as they were then known.
0 kommentar(er)
