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USS Fenimore Cooper (1853)

History
United States
Name: USS Fenimore Cooper
Namesake: James Fenimore Cooper, noted American author, was born in Burlington, New Jersey, 15 September 1789 and served as midshipman in the Navy between 1 January 1808 and 6 May 1811
Laid down: date unknown
Christened: as the New York City pilot boat Skiddy
Acquired: January 1853
Commissioned: 21 March 1853
Decommissioned: 13 August 1859
Struck: 13 August 1859
Homeport: New York City, San Francisco, California
Fate: Abandoned in a typhoon in Tokyo Bay, Japan
General characteristics
Type: Schooner
Displacement: 95 tons
Length: not known
Beam: not known
Draft: not known
Propulsion: Schooner sail
Speed: not known
Complement: not known
Armament: Three guns

USS Fenimore Cooper (1853) was a schooner assigned as a ship’s tender to accompany a surveying expedition. After departing from Hampton Roads, Virginia, and navigating the Cape of Good Hope, the expedition traveled throughout the Pacific Ocean accumulating hydrographic information from the South China Sea to the Bering Strait in the Arctic and Alaska.

Subsequently, Fenimore Cooper performed supply operations based out of San Francisco, California, before once again returning to her Pacific Ocean survey work, which continued until she was destroyed in a typhoon off Yokohama, Japan.

Fenimore Cooper was a US Navy schooner named for James Fenimore Cooper. She was the New York pilot boat Skiddy until purchased by the Navy in January 1853. She was commissioned 21 March 1853, Master H. K. Stevens in command.

Fenimore Cooper was acquired for use as a ship's tender for the Surveying Expedition to the Bering Strait, North Pacific, and China Seas commanded by Commander C. Ringgold, and later, Lieutenant J. Rodgers.

The expedition of five ships, led by USS Vincennes, sailed from Hampton Roads, Virginia 11 June 1853 for the Cape of Good Hope and the Orient. Fenimore Cooper and two other ships charted archipelagos and passages between Batavia and Singapore and from Java northward to the South China Sea until June 1854, when she rejoined the flagship at Hong Kong. Through that summer, the expedition cruised the coast of China, joining the East India Squadron in protecting American interests.


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