Many Notable Officers Assigned to Coast Survey-- Part 2: Porter, Lee, Rodgers, Maffitt and Ammen

Some of the the U.S. officers who served on the Coast Survey ships who went on to achieve greater fame in the Civil War were David Dixon Porter, John Rodgers, Samuel Philips Lee, C.R.P. Rodgers, Thornton Jenkins, Daniel Ammen, C.H. McBlair and Alban Stimers.

Also, John N. Maffitt, who would later gain fame for commanding the CSS Florida and several blockade runners, was ordered to the Coast Survey in 1842, where he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant in 1843 and went on to serve fourteen years   in the hydrographic survey.  He surveyed Nantucket, Massachusetts; Wilmington, North Carolina; Charleston, South Carolina and Savannah, Georgia.  A channel in Charleston Harbor still bears his name.

These and others served on the Coast Survey's steamships.

These ships became an intrinsic part  of great national  endeavors driven by  remarkable changes in transportation  technology, new insights in science of the United States coastline in the first half of the 19th century.

--Old B-Runner