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Artist s rendering of the explosion of the Peacemaker gun on the
USS Princeton on February 28, 1844.
“Never in the mysterious ordinance of God has a day on earth been marked in its progress by such startling and astounding contrasts opening and advancing with hilarity and joy, mutual congratulation and patriotic pride, and closing in scenes of death, and disaster, of lamentation and unutterable woe.”
[1] –Virginia Congressman W.C. Rives
February 28, 1844 was a cold, clear day in Washington and it marked a momentous occasion. The
USS Princeton, a newly designed vessel for the U.S. Navy, was to be inaugurated with an excursion from Alexandria, Virginia to Mount Vernon. Hundreds of Washington’s best society boarded the ship that day, including President John Tyler, several cabinet secretaries, and former first lady Dolley Madison, the scion of Washington society.