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Authors: Nathaniel Philbrick
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myself more at ease with these giants, ” Wilkes wrote Jane. He was also convinced he had put together an impeccable collection of scientific instruments. But when he returned to the United States in January, he received little of the praise he had anticipated.
By the winter of 1837, more than a dozen scientists had been chosen for the Expedition. Instead of showering Wilkes with compliments, they were quick to point out that he had neglected to purchase a single microscope, as well as many other instruments required in fields outside the area of his own expertise. After being lionized by the intelligentsia of Europe, it was more than the fiercely proud and sensitive lieutenant could tolerate. When Dickerson finally offered him a position as the Expedition’s astronomer, it was under the condition that he report to a civilian scientist who had been a particularly vocal critic of his efforts in Europe. He had been dreaming about sailing on a voyage of discovery for decades, but Wilkes decided he wanted no part of the Expedition as it was presently organized. If he could not go on his own terms, he would not go at all.
The spring of 1837 was not good to the Exploring Expedition. In June, Jeremiah Reynolds decided to make public his grievances against the secretary of the navy. In a series of scathing letters published in The New York Times, he excoriated Dickerson, eventually forcing the secretary to respond with two letters of his own. This war of words did neither man credit, serving only to further tarnish the image of what one wag renamed “the Deplorable Expedition.” In the meantime, the Expedition was denied the services of one of the most talented writers in the country when political infighting made it impossible for the friends of Nathaniel Hawthorne to secure him a position as the voyage’s historiographer.
In May, the Panic of 1837 struck the nation’s economy. For the last six years, state governments had been piling up huge debts to finance the construction of canals and railroads. Land speculation was rife all over the nation, and imports were outpacing exports. Much of America’s economic expansion had been made possible by English capital, and when a financial crisis rocked Europe, many British creditors called in their loans. On May 10, banks in New York suspended the payment of coined money. Soon banks across the country were closing their doors. Just a few months into the presidency of Jackson’s handpicked successor, Martin Van Buren, the American economy was in chaos. In this climate of frightening loss and uncertainty, the U.S. Exploring Expedition, a tenuous enterprise in the best of economic times, struggled to become a reality.
Wilkes decided it was time to embark on a new endeavor. That spring he proposed that the Depot of Charts and Instruments sponsor a survey of Georges Bank, a 10,000-square-mile section of tumultuous shoal water approximately a hundred miles off Cape Cod. A prime fishing ground, the Banks were notoriously dangerous. To provide an accurate chart of this serpentine-shaped shoal would be an immense service to mariners throughout the region. For a thirty-nine-year-old lieutenant who had not commanded a ship in fourteen years, it was a challenging test. It also happened to be an assignment that would demonstrate whether he had the ability to coordinate a survey of the kind that would make up the primary mission of the Exploring Expedition, and on June 14, Dickerson granted his request.
Saying good-bye to Jane and the children, Wilkes traveled to the navy yard in Norfolk, where the eighty-eight-foot brig Porpoise awaited him. He planned to employ what was, for the American navy, a new and revolutionary system of surveying known as the quincunx method. Dickerson had given him permission to borrow some of the instruments he had purchased in Europe. Using two schooners and a fleet of whaleboats, along with specially designed buoys equipped with flags, he and his officers would
By the winter of 1837, more than a dozen scientists had been chosen for the Expedition. Instead of showering Wilkes with compliments, they were quick to point out that he had neglected to purchase a single microscope, as well as many other instruments required in fields outside the area of his own expertise. After being lionized by the intelligentsia of Europe, it was more than the fiercely proud and sensitive lieutenant could tolerate. When Dickerson finally offered him a position as the Expedition’s astronomer, it was under the condition that he report to a civilian scientist who had been a particularly vocal critic of his efforts in Europe. He had been dreaming about sailing on a voyage of discovery for decades, but Wilkes decided he wanted no part of the Expedition as it was presently organized. If he could not go on his own terms, he would not go at all.
The spring of 1837 was not good to the Exploring Expedition. In June, Jeremiah Reynolds decided to make public his grievances against the secretary of the navy. In a series of scathing letters published in The New York Times, he excoriated Dickerson, eventually forcing the secretary to respond with two letters of his own. This war of words did neither man credit, serving only to further tarnish the image of what one wag renamed “the Deplorable Expedition.” In the meantime, the Expedition was denied the services of one of the most talented writers in the country when political infighting made it impossible for the friends of Nathaniel Hawthorne to secure him a position as the voyage’s historiographer.
In May, the Panic of 1837 struck the nation’s economy. For the last six years, state governments had been piling up huge debts to finance the construction of canals and railroads. Land speculation was rife all over the nation, and imports were outpacing exports. Much of America’s economic expansion had been made possible by English capital, and when a financial crisis rocked Europe, many British creditors called in their loans. On May 10, banks in New York suspended the payment of coined money. Soon banks across the country were closing their doors. Just a few months into the presidency of Jackson’s handpicked successor, Martin Van Buren, the American economy was in chaos. In this climate of frightening loss and uncertainty, the U.S. Exploring Expedition, a tenuous enterprise in the best of economic times, struggled to become a reality.
Wilkes decided it was time to embark on a new endeavor. That spring he proposed that the Depot of Charts and Instruments sponsor a survey of Georges Bank, a 10,000-square-mile section of tumultuous shoal water approximately a hundred miles off Cape Cod. A prime fishing ground, the Banks were notoriously dangerous. To provide an accurate chart of this serpentine-shaped shoal would be an immense service to mariners throughout the region. For a thirty-nine-year-old lieutenant who had not commanded a ship in fourteen years, it was a challenging test. It also happened to be an assignment that would demonstrate whether he had the ability to coordinate a survey of the kind that would make up the primary mission of the Exploring Expedition, and on June 14, Dickerson granted his request.
Saying good-bye to Jane and the children, Wilkes traveled to the navy yard in Norfolk, where the eighty-eight-foot brig Porpoise awaited him. He planned to employ what was, for the American navy, a new and revolutionary system of surveying known as the quincunx method. Dickerson had given him permission to borrow some of the instruments he had purchased in Europe. Using two schooners and a fleet of whaleboats, along with specially designed buoys equipped with flags, he and his officers would
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