South America
Assigned to the Pacific Squadron, Massachusetts operated along the U.S. West Coast in a project for the selection of sites for lighthouses and buoys by the joint Navy and Army Commission. She departed San Francisco 12 August 1852; steamed via ports in Ecuador, Chile, and Brazil; and arrived Norfolk, Virginia, 17 March 1853. She decommissioned the following day.
Massachusetts recommissioned at Norfolk 2 May 1854, Lt. Richard W. Meade in command. After fitting out, she departed for the Pacific Ocean 5 July, reached the Straits of Magellan 13 December, and arrived Mare Island, California, 8 May 1855. During June and July she cruised the coast between San Francisco and the Columbia River; thence, she sailed for Central America 25 August. She showed the flag from Mexico to Nicaragua and returned to San Francisco 9 January 1856.
Read more about this topic: USS Massachusetts (1845)
Famous quotes containing the words south america, south and/or america:
“Indeed, I believe that in the future, when we shall have seized again, as we will seize if we are true to ourselves, our own fair part of commerce upon the sea, and when we shall have again our appropriate share of South American trade, that these railroads from St. Louis, touching deep harbors on the gulf, and communicating there with lines of steamships, shall touch the ports of South America and bring their tribute to you.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)
“The South is very beautiful but its beauty makes one sad because the lives that people live here, and have lived here, are so ugly.”
—James Baldwin (1924–1987)
“The best of America drifts to Paris. The American in Paris is the best American. It is more fun for an intelligent person to live in an intelligent country. France has the only two things toward which we drift as we grow older—intelligence and good manners.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)