The navy yard at Washington described by Bernhard, duke of Saxe-Weimar Eisenach during his visit in November 1825

This yard was a year later described the British navy Lieutenant Fred. Fitzgerald de Roos.(1)

P. 172: “With Messrs. Huygens, father and son, we rode to the navy-yard, which is under the command of a commodore. The commodore was just gone travelling, therefore, we were accompanied on our tour by Captain Booth. In this navy-yard ships are only built and refitted; after that they descend the Potomac into the Chesapeake Bay, and go to Norfolk, where they are armed. At the time of our visit there were but two frigates in the yard, called forty-four gun ships, but mounting sixty-four pieces: the Congress, an old ship, which was repairing, and the Potomac, an entirely new ship, which has been launched, but subsequently hauled up and placed under a roof. Upon the spot where the frigate Brandywine, which carried Gen. La Fayette to France, was built, the keel of a new frigate was laid, and at the same time the foundation for a house over this new ship was begun. The ground being very moist, this building is erected on piles. Opposite the entrance of the navy-yard, stands a rostral column of white marble with allegoric figures. It was erected by the officers and midshipmen of the navy of the United States, to commemorate the death of their comrades who fell in the attack of Tripoli. The English, at the time of their taking possession of Washington, on the 25th of June, 1814, broke the fingers of one hand belonging to the allegoric figure representing America, and destroyed the stylus in the hand of the muse of history. This inscription has been added to the column: “MUTILATED BY THE BRITISH.” At the foot of the monument stand two Spanish brass twenty-four pounders, taken by the Americans at Tripoli. In this, as well as in other American navy-yards, there are several buildings. I found large forges where chain-cables are made, and tried in the same manner I had witnessed two years ago in Newbridge, South Wales. All the old copper taken from the ships is melted, and with an alloy of brass, converted into utensils of every description used on board ships; a steam-engine of fourteen horse-power moves a saw-mill, consisting of two large and several smaller circular saws, as also, machines for block making, which however, can by no means be compared with Brunei’s block machine in Portsmouth; in the little arsenal are the muskets, swords, &c. I observed a contrivance on the locks of the guns to insulate the priming, and secure it in damp

p. 173: weather. I saw also a kind of repeating musket with two locks, one behind the other. With such muskets, by means of the anterior lock, twelve consecutive discharges can be produced, and these being over, the gun is loaded again like an ordinary infantry musket, and fired by means of the lowest lock. After the anterior lock is fired, all the remaining shots incessantly follow, and cannot be withheld at will, as it is the case with the repeating gun bought by me in New York, already described. It is yet unknown how this successive firing can be obtained. Captain Booth showed me also double screws of his own invention, the object of which is to supply the place of ordinary lanyards for ships. This officer has obtained a patent for his contrivance, and it has been adopted, for experiment, in the frigate Brandy wine; in the same navy-yard is a laboratory, under the arsenal, where the necessary fire-works for the artillery are made. The place seemed to me to be ill chosen, since an explosion that may easily happen in such an establishment, might cause most terrible consequences to the navy-yard.”

Source

Bernhard, duke of Saxe-Weimar Eisenach. Travels trough North America during the years 1825 and 1826. 2 Vols. Philadelphia, 1828.