“SIR,

"Navy Department, 9th June, 1834.

"Your letter of the 5th inst. has been read; I shall be happy to oblige you with the inspection of any papers in this department which are not confidential, and may be useful to you in your contemplated publication.

"I am, very respectfully, yours, &c.
(Signed)

"To J. N. Reynolds, Esq."

"LEVI WOODBURY.

The same facilities, in answer to a similar request, were politely proffered me by the Honourable John Forsyth, Secretary of State.

One important object still remained to be accomplished, and without which the work would be very defective; and this was to obtain a copy of the official and public documents connected with the cruise. As there had been special, as well as general instructions from the department to Commodore Downes, I deemed it my duty to inform the latter of my application to the department for copies of these papers, and received from him the following reply; a copy of which I enclosed to the Secretary of the Navy:

"DEAR SIR,

"Charlestown, 26th August, 1834.

"In answer to your note of the 19th inst., I have to state, that your having undertaken to prepare a Journal of the Potomac's Cruise while on the Pacific station, with my knowledge and approbation, and so often having held free communication with me on the subject; and knowing, as you do, my wish, that whatever is published should be authentic, I can of course have no objection that my instructions from the Navy Department, under which I acted while on the coast of Sumatra, with all official papers and reports made or received during the cruise, should be placed in your hands, with the sanction of the department, for the illustration of your book.

"Yours, very sincerely,
(Signed)

“J. N. Reynolds, Esq., New-York."

"JOHN DOWNES.

"Navy Department, September 1st, 1834.

“SIR, "Your letter of the 27th ultimo has been received, enclosing a copy of Commodore Downes' letter to yourself, consenting to your application for a copy of his instructions.

"The Secretary of the Navy will be here in a few days, when your request shall be submitted to him.

"I am, respectfully, yours,

"Your letter of the 20th inst. has been received; Commodore Downes has the permission of the department to furnish you with copies or extracts, as may be most desirable to you, of his instructions and reports in relation to his operations at QuallahBattoo.

"I am, very respectfully, yours,

"MAHLON DICKERSON. "P. S. Commodore Downes has this day been authorized to furnish the above papers.

"J. N. Reynolds, Esq., New-York."

With such credentials in my hands, and the consciousness of a well intended effort in my heart, I would respectfully make my début before the American public-uninfluenced by vain ambition, unembarrassed by ill-timed diffidence. If my plain narrative of maritime incidents, perils, and achievements—

"All that occurred, part of which

I was

has no pretension to the charms of fine writing, it has at least the honest merit of truth and fidelity in the delineation of such facts as it purports to record.

VOYAGE

OF THE

UNITED STATES FRIGATE POTOMAC.

CHAPTER I.

Object of the Cruise-Selection of the Frigate-Her departure from WashingtonReflections on passing Mount Vernon-Descending the River-Hampton-Roads— New-York-Additional Orders-Final Departure-Sandy Hook-Dismissing the Pilot-Tributes of Affection.⚫

THE United States frigate Guerriere, under the command of Commodore Thompson, having nearly fulfilled her term of service on the west coast of South America, in the Pacific, it became necessary to despatch another ship-of-war to relieve her on that important station. For this purpose, early in the year 1831, the Navy Department selected and for the first time put in commission the frigate Potomac, then lying at the navy yard in Washington city. She had been built at the same place ten years previously, and is of the first class of frigates, a fine model, and commanding, warlike appearance.

The officers intended for the cruise had received their orders in the early part of the year; and in the month of March a number of them had repaired on board, and reported themselves to the first lieutenant as ready for duty. On the 10th of May Commodore Downes was notified of his appointment to the command of the Potomac, then fitting for sea at the navy yard at Washington, for the purpose of joining the squadron in the Pacific. Being at that period employed on other public duties, he was only able to visit the frigate once previous to her removal from the seat of government. He then left her in the

charge of the executive officer until she should arrive in the port of New-York.

During the whole month of May the most active preparations were going on aboard, so that by the 31st she was hauled out from the navy yard wharf, and by the aid of two steam-boats was towed over the bar, and moored head and stern off the mouth of the eastern branch of the Potomac. Previous to her removal from the navy yard, she had been visited by the President and Honourable Secretary of the Navy.

The period from the 1st to the 14th of June was exclusively occupied in the outfits of the ship, and in getting off stores and various other articles; though all the sea-stores could not be taken in at this place, owing to the want of a sufficient depth of water in many parts of the Potomac river. In the mean time the ship had undergone a material change in her appearance and internal arrangements, and not only began to assume more of the regularity of a man-of-war among her inmates, but in every other respect bespoke preparation for a distant voyage. She was at this time, 15th, again visited and inspected by the Honourable Secretary of the Navy and Navy Commissioners.

On the following morning, the 16th, orders were issued to the commanding officer to proceed with the Potomac down the river to Norfolk. The anchor was immediately weighed, and the frigate put in motion by the aid of a fine steam-boat selected for towing her down the river to Hampton-Roads.

The movements of a vessel of such dimensions down the intricate channel of a river which rises so many leagues from the ocean, was not only calculated to produce a painful anxiety, but was, in fact, a matter of no small responsibility. The city of Washington, it is well known, is that point in the United States to which the largest vessels can be navigated the farthest into the interior of the continent. This single fact evinces the wisdom and foresight of him whose advice thus located the capital of the empire which he founded.

Neither sectional partiality nor prejudice, it appears, had the least influence in determining this important matter; for the father of his country did not recommend the spot where the city of Washington now stands, until he had bestowed great and unwearied pains, and made laborious and interesting reconnoissance

of the country adjacent; and though the conflicting claims of other states, particularly those of Pennsylvania, were strongly urged against the measure, yet, fortunately for the nation, the popularity and influence of Washington surmounted every obstacle, and permanently fixed the seat of the general government in, perhaps, the best possible position that could be selected in any part of the United States.

It may be mentioned as a curious coincidence, and a fact not generally known, that the present permanent seat of our national legislature is contiguous to the very spot where formerly were lighted the council-fires of the Powhattans, the most prominent, numerous, and powerful nation of red men in Virginia; and on the banks of the Potomac, extending from the shores of Chesapeake to the Patuxent. These people lived under a royal government, their despotic monarch being the father of the celebrated Pocahontas. The valley at the foot of Capitol-Hill, washed by the Tiber Creek, the Potomac, and the Eastern Branch, was, as we are informed by tradition, periodically visited by the Indians, who named it their fishing-ground, in contradistinction to their hunting-ground. Here, the tradition adds, the aborigines assembled in great numbers, in the vernal season, for the double purpose of preserving fish and consulting on the affairs of the nation. Greenleafe's Point was their principal camp, and the residence of the chiefs, where councils were held among the various tribes thus gathered together. This tradition was doubtless familiar to Washington.

It has been said above that a more eligible site for the seat of our national government could not have been selected. It is true that a hostile fleet has once violated the purity of these waters, conveying a sufficient military force to invest the capital of the nation, from which most of its physical strength had been drawn to defend points which seemed more exposed to immediate attack. But we were then a young, weak, and divided people, contending with a gigantic power. Things have changed since that period; and the waters which have borne the warlike Potomac with her frowning batteries so many leagues from the interior to her destined element, can scarcely again, in the course of human events, be agitated by a hostile keel.

Under the old confederation, by which the states were nomi