USS Constellation was a nominally rated 38-gun wooden-hulled, three-masted frigate of the United States Navy.
The ship was built under the direction of David Stodder at The Joseph and Samuel Sterett shipyard on Harris Creek in Baltimore's Fell's Point maritime community, and was launched on 7 September 1797. Constellation was one of the original six frigates whose construction the Naval Act of 1794 had authorized.
The name "Constellation" was among ten names submitted to President George Washington by Secretary of War Timothy Pickering in March 1795 for the frigates that were to be constructed. The Flag Act of 1777 speaks of how the stars in the flag are "representing a new constellation".
Joshua Humphreys designed these frigates to be the young Navy's capital ships, and so Constellation and her sisters were larger and more heavily armed and built than standard frigates of the period. The Constellation's first duties with the newly formed US Navy were to provide protection for American merchant shipping during the Quasi-War with France and to defeat the Barbary pirates in the First Barbary War.
Design and construction
American merchant vessels began to fall prey to Barbary Pirates, along the so-called "Barbary Coast" of North Africa, Morocco, Tunis (in future Tunisia), Tripoli (in future Libya), and most notably from Algiers (in future Algeria), in the Mediterranean Sea during the 1790s. Congress responded with the Naval Act of 1794. The Act provided funds for the construction of six frigates to be built in six different East Coast ports; however, it included a clause stating that construction of the ships would cease if the United States agreed to peace terms with Algiers. By the time of the conclusion in 1815, of the later War of 1812 with Great Britain, the United States had fought a series of three brief, but savage naval and amphibious wars.
Joshua Humphreys' design was deep, long on keel and narrow of beam (width) to allow the mounting of very heavy guns while affording high speed downwind and efficiency when close-hauled. The design was to extremely heavy scantlings, including the planking, and incorporated Humphreys' innovative diagonal rib to limit hogging. This gave the hull greater strength than those of more lightly built frigates. Humphreys developed his design after realizing that the fledgling United States could not match for size the navies of the European states. He therefore designed his frigates to be able to overpower other frigates, but with the speed to escape from a "ship of the line" (equivalent to a modern-day "battleship").
Constellation was built under the direction of Colonel David Stodder at his naval shipyard on Harris Creek in Baltimore's Fell's Point maritime community, according to a design by Joshua Humphreys and launched on 7 September 1797, just as the United States entered the Quasi-War with the revolutionary French Republic. Harris Creek which flows into the Northwest Branch of the Patapsco River was later filled in to gain additional land for residential/industrial development and diverted underground to a subterranean storm drain and culvert in the early 19th century. It was situated east of Fell's Point and south of where modern-day Patterson Park, (near Highlandtown), and the community of Canton are currently located.
An earlier visitor to the Harris Creek naval shipyard of David Stodder, east of Baltimore Town in 1796, the Duke de la Rochefoucaule-Liancourt, saw the Constellation under construction and noted in his journal: "I thought her too much encumbered with wood-work within, but in other respects she is a fine vessel being built of those beautiful kinds of wood, the ever-green oak and cedar; she is pierced for 36 guns."
Armament
The Naval Act of 1794 had specified 36-gun frigates; however, Constellation and its sister-ship were re-rated to 38's because of their large dimensions, being in length and in width.
The "ratings" by number of guns were meant only as an approximation, as Constellation could and often did carry up to 48 guns. U.S. Navy ships of this era had no permanent battery of guns such as modern Navy ships carry. The guns were designed to be completely portable and often were exchanged between ships as situations warranted. Each commanding officer outfitted armaments to his liking, taking into consideration factors such as the overall tonnage of cargo, complement of personnel aboard, and planned routes to be sailed. Consequently, the armaments on ships changed often during their careers, and records of the changes were not generally kept.