DECEMBER 23RD, 1864: President Lincoln signed a bill passed the preceding day by Congress which created the rank of vice admiral. A fortnight earlier, secretary Welles had written in his report to Lincoln: "In recommending, therefore, that the office of vice-admiral should be created, and the appointment conferred on Rear-Admiral David G. Farragut, I but respond, as I believe, to the voice and wishes of the naval service and the whole country."
Thus was Farragut made the first vice admiral in the Nation's history as he had also been the first rear admiral.
The Army-Navy Journal wrote of him: "In Farragut the ideal sailor, the seaman of nelson's and Collingwood's days, is revived, and the feeling of the people toward him is of the peculiar character as that which these great and simple-hearted heroes of Great Britain evoked in the hearts of their countrymen."
--Old B-R'er
No comments:
Post a Comment