USRC Scammel (1791)
{{Short description|U.S. revenue cutter}}
{{other ships|USRC Scammel}}
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{{Infobox ship image |Ship image= |Ship caption= }} {{Infobox ship career |Hide header= |Ship country=United States |Ship flag={{USN flag|1798}} |Ship name=Scammel |Ship class= |Ship namesake=Alexander Scammell, Army Adjutant General |Ship owner=Department of the Treasury |Ship operator=Revenue-Marine |Ship ordered= |Ship awarded= |Ship builder=Joseph WhippleCanney, p 3 |Ship yard number= |Ship laid down=15 February 1791 |Ship launched=24 August 1791 |Ship sponsor= |Ship christened= |Ship completed= |Ship acquired= |Ship commissioned=1791 |Ship recommissioned= |Ship decommissioned=1798 |Ship in service= |Ship out of service= |Ship renamed= |Ship reclassified= |Ship refit= |Ship struck= |Ship reinstated= |Ship homeport= |Ship motto= |Ship nickname= |Ship honors= |Ship captured= |Ship fate=Sold 16 August 1798 |Ship notes= |Ship badge= }} {{Infobox ship characteristics |Hide header= |Ship tonnage= |Ship displacement=51 85/95 tons |Ship tons burthen= |Ship length=57.6 ft |Ship beam=15.8 ft |Ship height= |Ship draft=6.5 ft |Ship depth= |Ship hold depth= |Ship sail plan= |Ship power= |Ship propulsion=Sail |Ship speed= |Ship boats= |Ship capacity= |Ship complement=4 officers |Ship crew=4 enlisted, 2 boys |Ship armament=10 muskets, 20 pistols |Ship notes= }} |
USRC Scammel was one of the first ten cutters operated by the United States Revenue-Marine (later to become the U.S. Coast Guard).Evans, p 14 Her original name was Ferret.
Scammel was named by Alexander Hamilton for Adjutant General Alexander Scammell of New Hampshire, but one notes that Hamilton was rather careless about spelling - as were many men of letters of that time. This was the second cutter to receive the name of a Revolutionary hero but with an incorrect spelling ({{USRC|General Green}} was the first, the correct spelling is Greene).
Description
The surveyor who examined Scammel prior to her entering service noted that "she had two masts, one deck, a short quarter deck, low waists with rails fore and aft, and was schooner rigged."
Operational service
As in the case of so many of these cutters, the Scammel{{'}}s monthly journals have been lost. Nevertheless, some information has survived. She cruised from Nantucket to Passamaquoddy and on occasion did sail in tandem with the cutter Massachusetts. Scammel seized the Lucy of Stamford for "illegal registration" which was eventually condemned and sold, along with her cargo for $750. The money was awarded to Hopley Yeaton, master of Scammel.
Overall it would seem that Yeaton and his cutter carried out their duties effectively. The local collector, under whose authority Scammel sailed, Joseph Whipple, informed Hamilton that:
The services performed by the Cutter I conceive to have been very important to the safety and preservation of the Revenue. The Coast which is assigned to her, that of New Hampshire and the District of Maine, extending nearly 300 miles, many of which afford convenient places for fraudulent practices which have been checked by the attention and vigilance of the officers of the Scammel. The services for the year past consisted in cruising the aforementioned Coast, in entering and examining the Vessel's papers, instructing the ignorant coasters, and in bringing to justice those who break or evade the laws. Instances of contraventing of the laws have been discovered and prosecuted and some of them failed by the unaccountable determination of the court.
Crew
Hopley Yeaton, Master, 1791-1798. Yeaton probably brought along his slave, Senegal, during the Scammel{{'}}s patrols as was this practice was permitted by the Treasury Department at this time.
John Flagg, First Mate, 1791-1791.
John Parrott, Second Mate, 1791-1791.
Samuel Hobard, Third Mate, 1791-1791.
Yeaton fired three of his crew after their first few months of service. The men had been in "open rebellion" over issues of pay and daily food rations - particularly after they learned that their fellow sailors on board the Massachusetts received more and varied foods each day than they did.
Benjamin Gunnison, First Mate, 1792-1798.
John Adams, second mate, 1792-1796.
Sam Odiorne, second mate, 1796-1798.
In 1796, the enlisted crew were:
Danzil Donnavin, Seaman.
James Smith, Seaman.
Thomas Fowler, Seaman.
George Yeaton, Seaman (he was Yeaton's son).
Joseph Call, Boy.
Stephen Weeks, Boy.Scammel, 1791
Citations
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References
- {{cite web |title=Scammel, 1791 |url=https://www.history.uscg.mil/Browse-by-Topic/Assets/Water/All/Article/2054580/scammel-1791/ |website=www.history/uccg/mil |publisher=U.S. Coast Guard Historian's Office |access-date=19 December 2023}}
- {{cite book|last=Canney|first=Donald L.|title=U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters, 1790–1935|year=1995|publisher=Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland|isbn=978-1-55750-101-1}}
- {{cite book|last=Evans|first=Stephen H.|title=The United States Coast Guard 1790–1915: A Definitive History|year=1949|publisher=Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland}} No ISBN
{{First ten Revenue Service cutters}}
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