122 BULLETIN OF THE ESSEX INSTITUTE. 



and it devolved upon the Salem Light Infantry, some- 

 times called the Salem Zonaves, of the 8th Massachusetts 

 Regiment in Major General Butler's command, to guard 

 and defend the ship while grounded in the harbor of 

 Annapolis, in 1861. He also stated that the ship was so 

 well built and her timber so well seasoned, owing to 

 delays in her construction, that some of the shots in her 

 early contests failed to make any impression upon her 

 sides, and for that reason she was afterwards known as 

 "Old Ironsides." He gave her full history from the time 

 of her launching in Boston, in October, 1797, down to 

 the celebration of the one hundredth anniversary in Bos- 

 ton, in October, 1897. At the close of the talk the Pres- 

 ident upon reqnest told the story of the time when she 

 was chased into Marblehead Harbor on a Sunda}^ after- 

 noon, by a couple of English frigates during the war of 

 1812. He also told of the dinner tendered to Captain 

 Bainbridge in Hamilton Htdl by the Salem Light Infantr>\ 

 A commodore's salute was fired from the miniatnre ship 

 which was borrowed for the occasion from the East India 

 Marine Society. Mr. John Robinson then said that it was 

 presented by Commodore Hull and that there was among 

 the old bills of the Academy one for twelve dollars for 

 repairs on the model of the Constitution about that date. 

 It is presumed the model was injured by the salute. The 

 bill read : 



East India Marine Society ) o i -m -r^ 



, -^ 1- 1 T3 . f Air C Salem, May Dr., 



to English Prisoners ot War ) 



1814 To repairing &c &c the Constitution $12.00. 



Received payment for the above Prisoners. 



June. Thomas Webb. 



The Prison Ship then lay in the North river, off where 

 the Universalist church now stands, then the site of the 



