Historical Materials

The first ship named "Jamestown" was a sloop of war launched in 1844 at the Gosport Navy Yard, Virginia, the first American warship to be given that name. Classed as a “ship sloop”, a.k.a. “sloop of war” the “Jamestown” was built at Norfolk Navy Yard in 1843-44 to a design by Naval Constructor Foster Rhodes. Her 1844 battery consisted of four 8-inch shell guns and eighteen 32-pound muzzle-loading cannon. Her registry (not overall) dimensions were: length 157’ 6” between perpendiculars (rudder post to stem rabbet at main deck), beam 35’ , and depth in hold of 16’ 2” for a register (not actual) tonnage of 985 tons.

Leaving Hampton Roads on June 25, 1845, she was the flagship of Commodore Charles W. Skinner, then in command of U.S. naval vessels operating off the western coast of Africa to suppress the slave trade. The sloop returned to the U.S. and ported in Boston on August 6, 1846.

While the "Jamestown" was moored in Boston, the Cunard Line steamer "Hibernia" arrived with news of the the second consecutive year that blight had ruined the potato crop in Ireland and the resulting Irish famine, and Bostonians responded immmediately. Mayor Josiah Quincy hosted a meeting attended by about four thousand people at Fanueil Hall on February 18, 1847. A New England Relief committee was formed, which included Robert Bennet and John Murray Forbes. R. B. Forbes began to lobby for the "Jamestown" which was lying idle in Charlestown Navy Yard. On March 3, by U.S. Congressional resolution, R. B. Forbes was authorized to take command of the "Jamestown," while Captain George Coleman McKay was authorized to command USS "Macedonian," then at New York Navy Yard.

$151,000 and tons of food were donated and loaded onto the vessel by the Boston Labourers Society (mostly Irish), free of charge. R.B. Forbes supervised this and the refitting of the ship, including removal of all but two of its cannon."When the "Jamestown" left Boston at 8:30 a.m. on March 28, 1847, she carried 800 tons of provisions worth $40,038. The cargo comprised various grains, such as oats, rye, flour, indian corn, and beans but also 400 barrels of port, 100 tierces of ham and some mutton, as well as some dried local apples. There were also 28 barrels of clothing and 800 empty sacks to be used for distributing the barreled train in smaller units." 

R. B. Forbes completed the Atlantic crossing in a record 17 days. Forbes wrote a book about it, and had Lane draw a lithograph as frontispiece. The “Jamestown” proved to be an excellent sailer, but slightly top-heavy unless carefully ballasted and trimmed. Her passage from Boston to Ireland was very fast, due to hard driving.

After the Civil War, the “Jamestown” was placed in ordinary, forgotten by the public, and never returned to active service. Her last years were spent as a marine hospital in New York Harbor, still afloat in 1932.

This is taken from "Jamestown" account, summarized and prepared for Forbes House Museum by John Colhoun, Erik Ronnberg's research, and Catherine Shannon's account (via Forbes House).

References:

Howard I. Chapelle, “History of the American Sailing Navy” (NY: W. W. Norton & Co., Inc., 1949), pp. 440, 443 (hull Plan), 494 (spar dimensions), 544 (index notes).

Lieut. George F. Emmons, U.S.N., “The Navy of the United States, from the Commencement, 1775 to 1853” (Washington: Gideon & Co., 1853), pp. 100, 101.