How did USS Constitution get the name Old Ironsides?

A Name Among Six Frigates

The name Constitution was one of ten sent to President George Washington for the six frigates authorized by the Naval Act of 1794, and she was the third of them built. Joshua Humphreys designed the frigates as the young Navy's capital ships, larger and more heavily armed than standard frigates of the day, and Constitution was built at Edmund Hartt's shipyard in the North End of Boston, launching in 1797.

Enslaved workers were used to harvest the oak for her hull, a fact the ship's own museum now records and presents to visitors as part of her history. That dense oak gave the hull unusual strength, a quality that would later earn the ship her famous nickname during a single battle at sea.

USS Constitution is a three-masted, wooden-hulled heavy frigate, the second-oldest naval vessel still in commission and the oldest still afloat. She is berthed at the old Charlestown Navy Yard, across the harbor from downtown Boston and at the end of the Freedom Trail. Her crew are serving sailors, assigned to the ship as part of their Navy duty.

The Battle That Earned a Nickname

Constitution is best known for her service in the War of 1812 against Britain, when she captured numerous merchant ships and five British warships: Guerriere, Java, Pictou, Cyane and Levant. These victories made her one of the most celebrated ships in the young Navy's history, and news of her successes traveled quickly along the Atlantic seaboard.

The capture of Guerriere earned Constitution the nickname Old Ironsides, a name that took hold with the public and never let go. It added to a public affection for the ship that, more than once, saved her from being broken up for scrap in the decades that followed her most famous victory.

That affection explains why the ship survives today. Proposals to scrap her surfaced more than once over the following century, and each time public sentiment, rooted partly in the memory of her victory over Guerriere, helped keep Constitution afloat rather than broken up for parts, a pattern that continued well into the twentieth century.

A Career Spanning Two Centuries

After the war, Constitution served as flagship in the Mediterranean and African squadrons, and in the 1840s she sailed around the world. During the Civil War she worked as a training ship for the Naval Academy, and in 1878 she carried American art and industrial exhibits to the Paris Exposition, a rare mission for a warship of her age.

She was retired from active service in 1881 and served afterward as a receiving ship, before being designated a museum ship in 1907. In 1934 she completed a three-year tour of the country, visiting ninety ports and drawing crowds eager to see the famous frigate firsthand, a journey still remembered as one of her most extensive after retirement.

Constitution sailed under her own power for her two hundredth birthday in 1997, and again in August 2012 to mark the bicentennial of her victory over Guerriere. The guns visitors see on board today have all been replicas since a restoration carried out between 1927 and 1931, when the ship underwent extensive work to keep her seaworthy for decades to come.

On Board Today

Constitution remains a fully commissioned ship, and her crew of seventy-five officers and sailors, all active-duty Navy, are assigned to her as special duty rather than as museum staff. Their mission is to explain the Navy's role in war and peace through education, historical demonstration and public events, as part of the Naval History and Heritage Command.

A tour covers the spar deck, with its rigging and guns, and the gun deck below, lined with long guns, while rangers and crew members on board can answer questions about the ship's construction and long service. The separate USS Constitution Museum within the yard keeps this history in more depth, including research into who actually built the ship.

Even so, tours of the ship are free of charge and run throughout the year, though schedules and access can change with naval operations or maintenance. Visitors should confirm current details directly with the ship's crew or with the National Park Service before planning a visit to Charlestown and the navy yard around it.

The Charlestown Navy Yard

The yard was one of the first shipbuilding facilities of the Navy. Planned in 1799, it opened in 1800 and began building ships in 1812, continuing to work until July 1, 1974, with its last quarter-century spent repairing ships rather than building them, under the name Boston Naval Shipyard, a designation that lasted until the yard finally closed.

The National Park Service now controls twenty-five acres of the yard as part of Boston National Historical Park, while the rest of the site has been redeveloped for offices, shops and housing. More than two dozen buildings survive from the yard's working years, among them the Commandant's House and the Marine Barracks.

The long Charlestown Ropewalk, which opened in 1837, at first made rope for the entire Navy, and Dry Dock 1 was inaugurated on June 24, 1833, after delays caused by granite shortages and bad weather. The destroyer USS Cassin Young, launched in 1943, is the second ship moored at the yard, alongside Constitution herself, and visitors can see both from the pier.

The Bunker Hill Monument

The Battle of Bunker Hill was fought on June 17, 1775, during the siege of Boston, with most of the fighting on Breed's Hill, a sixty-two-foot glacial drumlin in the south of the Charlestown peninsula. Colonial troops fortified the summit and threw back two British assaults with heavy losses before the redoubt fell on the third attempt.

It was a British victory, but a costly one; among the American dead was General Joseph Warren, the popular leader of the Massachusetts Committee of Safety. A first monument on the site, raised in 1794, honored Warren, and the Bunker Hill Monument Association later formed to save the ground when it came up for sale in 1822.

The present obelisk, designed by Solomon Willard, was begun in 1825. Twice the work stopped for lack of money, and it was finally dedicated on June 17, 1843, then the largest obelisk in the United States. William Wetmore Story's statue of Colonel William Prescott, the colonial commander, stands on its south side, and the National Park Service has run the monument since 1976.

Planning the Visit

Walk the Freedom Trail over the bridge from the North End to Charlestown to reach both sites. See the ship first, allowing time for the tour, then the museum, and finally climb the streets to Monument Square, where a circular path runs round the obelisk, the Prescott statue and the granite entrance building of 1902.

The National Park Service runs both the navy yard and the monument as part of Boston National Historical Park, and its rangers on site can advise on what visitors can see and do on a given day, including any limits on the ship tour or the climb inside the obelisk.

Inside the obelisk, a spiral stair of 294 steps winds around a hollow central core, lit only by narrow openings on the north face. Four gates on the avenue around the square, each named for a regiment that fought in the battle, lead up to the monument. Give the pair of sites half a day, and more if the museum holds your interest.