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HISTORY
In brief
 The
US Brig Niagara or the Flagship Niagara, is a wooden-hulled brig
that served as the relief flagship for Oliver Hazard Perry in the
Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. It is one of the last
remaining ships from the War of 1812. The Niagara is usually docked
behind the Erie Maritime Museum in downtown Erie in the U.S. state
of Pennsylvania as an outdoor exhibit for the museum, but travels
the Great Lakes during the summer, serving as an ambassador of
Pennsylvania when not docked. It was listed on the National Register
of Historic Places in 1973 and was designated the official state
ship of Pennsylvania by the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 1988.
The Niagara was constructed from 1812 to 1813 to protect the
vulnerable American coastline on Lake Erie from the British and
played a pivotal role in the battle for the lake. Along with most of
warships that served in the war, the Niagara was sunk for
preservation on Presque Isle in 1820. Raised in 1913, it was rebuilt
for the centennial of the Battle of Lake Erie. After deteriorating,
restoration of the Niagara was started again in the 1930s, but was
hampered by the lack of funds caused by the Great Depression and
remained uncompleted until 1963. A more extensive restoration was
carried out in 1988 in which much of the original ship was largely
destroyed. The incorporation of new materials and modern equipment
makes it ambiguous as to whether it is or is not a replica.
Construction
In the beginning of September 1812, Daniel Dobbins, a merchant on
the Great Lakes, arrived in Washington, D.C. to warn the United
States government of the vulnerability of the Lake Erie coastline to
a British attack. Dobbins had been captured by the British after a
surprise attack at Fort Mackinac in Michigan, but was able to
negotiate his release. Dobbins was briefly detained again by the
British in Detroit after the city was captured. After several days
of discussions with president James Madison and Secretary of the
Navy Paul Hamilton, Dobbins convinced them that the safest place to
build a fleet was in the sheltered bay formed by Presque Isle at
Erie, Pennsylvania. On 15 September, Hamilton authorized Dobbins to
construct four gunboats. Hamilton also granted $2,000 to be used for
the construction and appointed Dobbins, a civilian, to the rank of
sailing master in the United States Navy. On 31 December, Captain
Isaac Chauncey, the commander of naval forces on Lake Ontario,
arrived in Erie for a day, made some alterations to Dobbins' ship
design and authorized him to build, additionally, two brigs. Oliver
Hazard Perry was promoted to Commodore in February 1813 and was
given orders to report to Erie from Newport, Rhode Island. Perry
arrived in Erie on 26 March, after being held up in Sackets Harbor,
New York for two weeks by Chauncey in case of a possible attack by
the British.
The construction of the fleet was largely supervised by Noah Brown,
a shipwright brought in from New York City. The keels of two brigs
were each constructed out of a single 14-by-18-inch (360 mm × 460
mm) black oak log. Due to a lack of iron, the timbers that made up
the hulls were joined using wooden pins called treenails. In place
of the oakum and pitch normally used to caulk ships, lead was used.
The timbers used in the brigs were still green, as the builders did
not have the luxury of time to allow the wood to dry properly. A
total of 65 cannons were shipped to Erie to arm the fleet; Hamilton
approved the production of 37 cannons by a foundry in Washington,
D.C. and the rest were moved from Sackets Harbor. The Tigress and
the Porcupine were launched in April 1813, the Scorpion in May, and
the brig Lawrence on 25 June. The Niagara was launched on 4 July
along with the Ariel.
One of the strategic advantages of building a fleet in Erie was that
the bay formed by Presque Isle was cut off from the Lake Erie by a
sandbar, which prevented British warships from being able to enter
the bay. The brigs Niagara and Lawrence both had a draft of 9 feet
(2.7 m), which was too deep to cross the sandbar. On 4 August, the
Niagara was pulled onto the sandbar using its anchor in a technique
called kedging and was lightened by removing its cannons and
ballast. A pair of 90-by-40-foot (27 by 12 m) barges, called
"camels", were placed on either side of the ship. The camels were
sunk and secured to the Niagara. The water was pumped out of the
camel, lifting the ship. By the following day, the Niagara was
safely over the sandbar and was rearmed; the Lawrence was floated
over the sandbar a couple of days before the Niagara. During the
construction, the area was usually under daily surveillance by the
British. On the day the Lawrence crossed the sandbar, a pair of
British warships, the Queen Charlotte and the Lady Prevost, observed
for an hour and failed to notice the actions of Perry
War of 1812
On 6 August, Perry ordered a shakedown cruise of the fleet, now
totaling ten after the inclusion of three merchant vessels—the
Somers, the Trippe and the Ohio—that were converted into warships
and the Caledonia, which was captured from the British. Lieutenant
Daniel Turner was placed in command of the Niagara for the cruise,
as the fleet was still seriously undermanned; Dobbins had even
written a letter, directed to Secretary Hamilton, out of desperation
back in December 1812. Word arrived on 8 August that Jesse Elliott
was en route to Erie from Black Rock, New York with 89 men. Elliott
was promoted to commodore and given command of the Niagara after
arriving in Erie on 10 August.
On 17 August, Perry's fleet anchored off of Sandusky, Ohio, and
dispatched a boat to inform General William Henry Harrison of their
presence. Harrison and his staff met with Perry aboard the ships the
next day and agreed to a rendezvous in Put-in-Bay. In Put-in-Bay,
Harrison made available 100 "Kentucky and frontier riflemen" to
serve on board as Marines. Before the fleet made a stopover at Fort
Amherstburg, Canada to gather intelligence, where the British fleet,
under the command of Commodore Robert Heriot Barclay, was based.
While Perry's fleet was under construction, Barclay had ordered the
construction of the HMS Detroit, which was to be a match for the
Niagara and the Lawrence. Unbeknownst to Perry, supplies in Fort
Amherstburg were running out, as his fleet had cut off shipments
from Long Point. Fearing an uprising caused by a shortage of food,
Barclay and his fleet set sail as soon as the Detroit was complete.
Battle of Lake Erie
On 10 September, both fleets got underway. The Detroit fired the
first shot around noon, while still out of range. Perry formed the
fleet into a line, with the larger ships each being assigned a
target: the Lawrence to the Detroit, the Niagara to the Queen
Charlotte, and the Caledonia to the Hunter. As the line moved to
engage, the Niagara, under the command of Elliott, lagged behind the
fleet. The cause of the failure of the Niagara to maintain formation
is unknown, either deliberate on the part of Elliott, or because it
was becalmed. After a couple of hours, all of the cannons on the
Lawrence that were facing the British were out of commission and the
brig could no longer be maneuvered. Perry lowered his battle flag,
emblazoned with the last words of Captain James Lawrence, "Don't
Give Up The Ship", and transferred to the still-intact Niagara via a
small rowboat. Perry took command of the Niagara and crossed the
British line perpendicularly in a tactic called crossing the "T".
The Queen Charlotte, while attempting to prevent the Niagara from
breaking through the line, collided with the Detroit and became
entangled. The Niagara opened fire with both broadsides: the
starboard broadside hitting the Queen Charlotte and the Detroit, and
the port into the Lady Prevost. After several broadsides, the Queen
Charlotte surrendered, followed shortly after by the Detroit and the
rest of the British fleet.
After the battle, the Niagara assisted in the transporting of
Harrison's army to the mouth of the Detroit River in preparation for
an invasion of southwest Ontario. On 25 April 1814, command of the
Niagara was transferred to Arthur Sinclair. After repairs, the
fleet—consisting of the Niagara, the Lawrence, the Caledonia, the
Scorpion and the Tigress—departed Erie for Detroit. In Detroit,
soldiers under the command of Colonel George Croghan embarked with
the fleet, bound for Mackinac Island. The fleet arrived on 26 July
and landed on 4 August. The battle was ultimately lost, with Croghan
being forced to retreat back to his boats. On 13 August, the fleet
arrived at the mouth of the Nottawasaga River where they attacked a
blockhouse owned by the North West Company. The blockhouse was
destroyed by the British, along with the schooner Nancy, to prevent
their supplies from being captured.
After the Treaty of Ghent was signed, ending the war, the majority
of the surviving ships that participated in the Battle of Lake Erie
were disposed of in 1815. The Queen Charlotte, the Detroit, and
Lawrence were sunk for preservation in Misery Bay on Presque Isle,
whereas the Niagara was kept afloat and operated as a receiving
ship. It was sunk in 1820 when the naval station at Presque Isle was
closed. Benjamin H. Brown of Rochester, New York bought all four
ships in 1825, but sold them in 1836 to George Miles of Erie. Miles
raised the ships, planning on using them as merchant vessels. The
Lawrence and the Niagara, not having a large enough hold and being
in poor condition, were allowed to sink again
Centennial
As part of celebrations for the centennial of the Battle of Lake
Erie, the Niagara was raised from Misery Bay in April 1913. Its keel
was found to be in good enough condition for the brig to be rebuilt.
Efforts to rebuild the Niagara were hampered by the lack of original
plans. The restored Niagara was launched on 7 June, complete with a
new bowsprit, rigging and reproduction cannons supplied by the
Boston Navy Yard. From mid-July to mid-September, the Niagara was
towed to various ports on the Great Lakes—including Milwaukee,
Chicago, Detroit, Buffalo and Cleveland—by the USS Wolverine, the
Navy's first iron-hulled warship. Ownership of the Niagara was
transferred to the City of Erie in 1917, where it remained docked
deteriorating.
The City of Erie transferred ownership of the Niagara to the newly
formed "USS Niagara Foundation" in 1929, which was tasked with
"acquiring and restoring the ship and making it the centerpiece of a
museum." The onset of the Great Depression forced the Commonwealth
of Pennsylvania to take ownership, through the Flagship Niagara
Commission, two years later. $50,000 was made available for another
restoration in 1931, but by 1938 the state stopped its funding,
leaving the restoration unfinished. The Niagara was transferred to
the Pennsylvania Historical Commission, predecessor of the
Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, and became a project
for the Works Progress Administration. The Historical Commission
contracted Howard I. Chapelle to draw up plans for another
restoration of the Niagara, based on other period ships that were
built by Noah Brown, like the Saratoga. According to Chapelle, very
little of the original Niagara remained, as parts of it had been
sold as souvenirs, and the 1913 reconstruction was not accurate to
the period. The hull of the Niagara was launched in October 1943
without any masts, spars, or rigging. It was placed in a concrete
cradle in 1951. Discovery of dry rot throughout every part of the
Niagara made it clear that a complete reconstruction would
eventually be needed. Funds were appropriated by the Pennsylvania
Historical and Museum Commission to make the Niagara "presentable"
for the sesquicentennial of the Battle of Lake Erie in 1963 with the
addition of rigging and cannons. The Niagara was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places on 11 April 1973.
Museum ship
In 1981, the Flagship Niagara League was formed with intent of
reconstructing the Niagara so that it would be a working ship,
instead of an "outdoor museum piece". The organization was
eventually incorporated a non-profit organization associated with
the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. Melbourne Smith,
builder of the Pride of Baltimore, was hired in 1986 by the
Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission to head the
reconstruction. The decay of the Niagara was so bad that it was
dismantled and ultimately destroyed, with various timbers salvaged
and used in non-structural areas of the ship. The destruction of the
old ship and use of new wood often leads the Niagara to be
considered a replica. While the first Niagara was built hurriedly,
the new Niagara was built out of properly seasoned and preserved
yellow pine and Douglas fir. The new Niagara was launched on 10
September 1988, but was not completed until 18 July 1990 when its
sea trials were held. The Pennsylvania General Assembly designated
the Niagara as the official flagship of Pennsylvania on 29 April
1988 and described its purpose as being a "sailing ambassador for
Pennsylvania". In March 2008, the yellow pine mainmast was replaced
with one of Douglas fir.
The Niagara is one of two remaining vessels that served in the War
of 1812, the second being the USS Constitution. The United States
Coast Guard certified the Niagara as a Sailing School Vessel in
August 2005. For safety reasons, the Niagara was equipped with
modern equipment such as auxiliary diesel engines, lifeboats, radar,
LORAN and radio.
The Niagara was also depicted on a commemorative Pennsylvania
license plate. In 2009, the Flagship Niagara League assumed
day-to-day management of the Niagara after a decision by the
Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission to cut $250,000 to
fill a budget deficit. The Niagara was used to depict the whaleship
Essex in an episode of the Public Broadcasting Service documentary
series American Experience. As part of the bicentennial of the
Battle of Lake Erie, the Niagara took part in a reenactment of the
battle on September 2, 2013 in Put-In-Bay along with 16 other tall
ships.
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