BULLETIN OF THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS VOLUME 22 AUGUST 1918 NUMBER 8 T GIFT OF A NAVAL MANUSCRIPT HE Governors of the Society of the New York Hospital have presented to the Library the original journal of Surgeon's Mate William M. Clarke, on board the ship of war President and the brig Argus. It comprises about 150 written pages in a folio ledger. Clarke became surgeon's mate on November 25, 1809, and surgeon by commission on July 24, 1813. He was lost at sea in the Wasp in 1815. The President was built at New York in 1800. Commodore John Rodgers who, from the end of the Tripolitan war in 1805 to the outbreak of the War of 1812, was the leading officer of our navy in active service, reorganized the fleet in 1810 and chose the President as his flag-ship. During the War of 1812 he was senior naval officer in command of the navy of the United States. On March 28, 1812, Rodgers sailed for New York in the President, accompanied by the Essex, but owing to a gale did not reach New York before April 3d. On April 9th, the Secretary of the Navy ordered Rodgers to sea for the purpose of guarding commerce, since reports had been current of molestation of our trade by the Guerrière and another British frigate. He cruised for several weeks between Sandy Hook and Cape Hatteras without encountering British vessels. The first part of June was spent at New York in repairing and equipping his fleet. On June 21, 1812, Rodgers's ships joined Decatur's fleet in Sandy Hook Bay. On the 15th, the British frigate Belvidera had been seen off Sandy Hook, and on the 19th Commodore Decatur, not aware that war had been declared, had fallen in with the British ships the Tartarus and the Mackerel, near New York. It was also on the 21st that Rodgers received official infor mation of the declaration of war and orders from the Secretary of the Navy. Within ten minutes after the receipt of the message he put to sea with a fleet composed of five ships, and on the afternoon of the 23d, the President came into action with the British frigate Belvidera, a 32-gun ship, actually mounted with forty-two guns. It was in this action that Rodgers is said to have personally fired "the first shot of the engagement, which was the first shot of the War of 1812." About fifteen minutes after this shot was fired one of the bow chasers of the President burst, killing or wounding several men. Commodore Rodgers was "blown into the air, and in falling on the deck fractured a bone in one of his legs. Supported by his men, he continued to direct the fight." The manuscript journal of Surgeon's Mate Clarke shows that in this engagement three men were killed and twenty-one wounded on the President, among the latter being Rodgers, Lieut. Gamble, Lieut. Heath, and Midshipmen Perry, Montgomery, and Ellery. Most of the wounded suffered from burns, cuts, or contusions. The journal is precise on this subject. On July 2, 1812, Rodgers took the first prize ship of the war, named in Clarke's journal the brig Traveller, which corrects, no doubt, a misreading of Rodgers's log as given by Paullin in his life of Rodgers, published in 1910, where the brig is called Tionella. The last day of the cruise was August 31st. Early in the autumn of 1812 Rodgers had command of the President, Congress, and Wasp. Meanwhile, on September 26th, Surgeon's Mate Clarke had received orders from Rodgers (dated the 24th) to transfer himself to the U. S. brig Argus, also lying at Boston, and he complied the same day. The Argus was under command of Arthur Sinclair and was attached to that division of the three divisions of the seagoing fleet which Decatur now commanded. Therefore, from September 26, 1812, to April 23, 1813, the manuscript journal of Clarke is a record of the brig Argus, he having succeeded Surgeon's Mate Richard C. Edgar in that office. He was superseded in May, 1813, by Surgeon James Inderwick. The Clarke journal is, therefore, complementary to the Inderwick journal of the cruise of the Argus, which was presented to The New York Public Library by the Governors of the Society of the New York Hospital a year ago, and was printed by the Library in its BULLETIN for June, 1917 (vol. 21, p. 383405). The last date of Clarke's journal is April 23, 1813, and Inderwick's journal was begun on May 11th, of the same year. - VICTOR HUGO PALTSITS. D NEWS OF THE MONTH GIFTS URING the month of July, 1918, the Library received as gifts a total of 1,476 volumes, 4,403 pamphlets, 4 maps and 50 prints. Some of the more important and interesting of these gifts were the following: From Mr. J. P. Morgan came "I Disegni della R. Galleria degli Uffizi in Firenze. Serie Prima, Portafoglio 1-4; Serie Seconda, Portafoglio 1-4; Serie Terza, Portafoglio 1-4; Serie Quarta, Portafoglio 1-4. Firenze, Roma, 1912–1917"; from the American Museum of Natural History, "Joseph Hodges Choate, a founder of the American Museum of Natural History, a tribute from the Trustees of the American Museum, prepared by Henry F. Osborn, President, 1918" [signed copy by the President and Secretary]; and from Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn of New York 15 volumes: "The Life of James McCosh, a record chiefly autobiographical, edited by William Milligan Sloane, New York, 1896; Psychology, the cognitive powers by James McCosh, N. Y., 1889"; and other works. Some of the more interesting gifts in Genealogy were the following: From Mr. Thomas W. Bicknell came "History and Genealogy of the Bicknell Family and some collateral lines of Normandy, Great Britain and America, comprising some ancestors and many descendants of Zachary Bicknell, from Barrington, Somersetshire, England, 1635," editor and publisher, Thomas Williams Bicknell, Providence, 1913; from Mrs. Anna M. Goodridge of New York "The Goodridge Genealogy. A history of the descendants of William Goodridge," by Edwin Alonzo Goodridge, A.M., M.D. (Privately printed.) N. Y., 1918; from Mr. Richard B. Teachenor of Kansas, Mo., "A partial history of the Tichenor Family in America, descendants of Martin Tichenor of Connecticut and New Jersey." Kansas City, Mo., 1918 (no. 10 of 350 copies printed for private circulation). The following works were received as gifts from the authors: From Mr. B. H. Nadal of New York came "Friendship and other poems," by B. H. Nadal. N. Y., 1916 (2 copies, 1 with miscellaneous additions); from Edward Branch Lyman of New York "Me'ow Jones, Belgian refugee cat. his own true tale." as written by Edward Branch Lyman. N. Y. [copyright 1917]; from William Chauncy Langdon of Urbana, Ill., "The pageant of Thetford; The pageant of Meriden; The Amherst Christmas mystery," 1916; and others, by William Chauncy Langdon; from Thomas Skelton Harrison "The homely diary of a diplomat in the East, 1897-1899," by Thomas [ 465 ] Skelton Harrison. Boston, 1917; from Ernest Schmatolla of New York "Chemical, metallurgical and kindred patents, granted 1918," compiled by Ernest C. Schmatolla; from Mrs. Evelyn Saxton "Droll stories of Isthmian Life," by Evelyn Saxton. 1914 (3 copies); from Mr. John Jay Chapman of New York "Homeric scenes, N. Y., 1914; Cupid and Psyche, N. Y., 1916; A sausage from Bologna," New York, 1909, by John Jay Chapman. From Mr. Hugh Ferriss of New York we received the original drawing of the Fourth of July Parade, convoyed by airplanes, passing the Public Library (reproduced in the New York Tribune, July 14, 1918), together with 6 reproductions of his drawings in the Tribune. The following gift of music came from Mr. Bruno Huhn of New York: "Collection of songs," by Bruno Huhn, including: Cato's Advice; A secret from Bacchus; A song of Glenann; Summer changes; Strephon, the Shepherd, and others. The most important gifts received from institutions and firms were the following: From the British Museum came A catalogue of English coins in the British Museum, the Norman Kings, by George Cyril Brooke, in 2 vols. London, 1916; Miscellaneous Coptic texts in the dialect of Upper Egypt, edited, with English translations, by E. A. Wallis Budge. London, 1915; and others; from the Long Island Historical Society, Brooklyn, came a miscellaneous collection of 666 volumes and 1027 pamphlets; from the Royal Typewriter Company of New York "U. S. Patents, Typewriters, vols. 1, 2, 4-34; Booktypewriters, vol. 1," and another volume not numbered. D ADDITIONS AND USE OF THE LIBRARY IN JULY, 1918 URING the month of July, 1918, there were received at the Library 15,296 volumes and 6,003 pamphlets. (These figures include the additions to both Reference and Circulation Departments.) The total number of readers recorded in the Central Building was 47,444. They consulted 138,029 volumes. Visitors to the building numbered 155,885. |