Дэвид Портер: Әскери теңізші және адмирал әкесі

Officer in the United States Navy
his son, the American Civil War admiral

David Porter (February 1, 1780 – March 3, 1843) was an officer in the United States Navy in the rank of captain and the honorary title of commodore. Porter commanded a number of U. S. naval ships. He saw service in the First Barbary War, the War of 1812 and in the West Indies. On July 2, 1812, Porter hoisted the banner "Free trade and sailors' rights" as captain of USS Essex. The phrase resonated with many Americans. Porter was later court martialed; he resigned and then joined and became commander in chief of the Mexican Navy. Porter County, Indiana was named after him.

Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Porter served in the Quasi War with France first as midshipman aboard Constellation, participating in the capture of L'Insurgente on February 9, 1799; then as 1st lieutenant of Experiment; and finally in command of USS Amphitheatre. During the First Barbary War (1801–07), Porter was first lieutenant of Enterprise, New York, and Philadelphia and was taken prisoner when the latter ran aground in Tripoli harbor on October 31, 1803. After his release on June 3, 1805, he remained in the Mediterranean as acting captain of Constitution and later captain of Enterprise.

Porter married Evalina Anderson, and they had ten children who survived, including six sons. One of these, David Dixon Porter, became an admiral in the U. S. Navy. Porter purchased the grand home built by the judge and politician David Lloyd in Chester, Pennsylvania. He made many additions, and the home became known as the Porter House. It was destroyed by explosion in 1882. Porter's father, David Porter Sr., met and befriended another naval veteran of the Revolution, George Farragut, from the Balearic island of Minorca. In late spring 1808, David Sr. suffered sunstroke, and Farragut took him into his home, where his wife Elizabeth cared for him. Already weakened by tuberculosis, he died on June 22, 1808. Elizabeth Farragut died of yellow fever the same day. Motherless, the Farragut children were to be placed with friends and relatives. While visiting Farragut and his family a short time later to express thanks for their care of his father and sympathy for their loss, Commodore Porter offered to take eight year old James Glasgow Farragut into his own household. Young James readily agreed. In 1809 he moved with Porter to Washington, where he met Secretary of the Navy Paul Hamilton and expressed his wish for a midshipman's appointment. Hamilton promised that the appointment would be made as soon as he reached the age of ten; as it happened, the commission came through on December 17, 1810, six months before the boy reached his tenth birthday. When James went to sea soon after with his adoptive father, he changed his name from James to David, and it is as David Glasgow Farragut that he is remembered.

Porter served in the Quasi War with France. He was appointed a midshipman on 16 April 1798. Assigned to Constellation under the command of John Rodgers, he saw action in the battle against L'Insurgente, notably saving the mast by cutting away slings after it was damaged. He was then selected as one of twelve men assigned to take possession of the captured ship at the conclusion of the engagement. He was promoted to lieutenant on 8 October 1799. As lieutenant he served as second in command of the schooner Experiment during the action of 1 January 1800, in which he got shot in his arm. He was promoted to master commandant on 22 April 1806 and was in charge of the naval forces at New Orleans from 1808 to 1810.

With the outbreak of the War of 1812, Porter was promoted to captain on July 2, 1812, and was assigned as commander of Essex. He sailed out of New York harbor with the banner, "Free trade and sailors' rights" flying from the foretopgallant mast. Porter and his fleet spent October–December 1813 resting and regrouping in the Marquesas Islands, which he claimed in the name of the United States and renamed them the Madison Islands, in honor of then President James Madison. Porter resigned from the Navy on August 18, 1826, and, shortly after, entered the Mexican Navy as its commander in chief. He held this position from 1826 to 1829.

He left the Mexican service in 1829 and was appointed United States Minister to the Barbary States. He was appointed as Chargé d'Affaires to the Ottoman Empire by President Andrew Jackson in 1831 and was promoted to Minister Resident in 1840. He died on March 3, 1843, in Constantinople, Ottoman Empire while serving as United States Minister Resident to the Ottoman Empire. He was buried in the cemetery of the Philadelphia Naval Asylum, and then in 1845 reburied in the Woodlands Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Porter is played by Jeff Chandler in the film Yankee Buccaneer (1952).

Several U. S. Navy ships have been named Porter after him. The town of Porter and Porter County in Northwest Indiana are named after David Porter. In 1836 the county seat of Porter County, Indiana was originally named Portersville, also named for David Porter. It was changed to Valparaiso in 1837, named for Porter's participation in the naval action near Valparaíso, Chile during the War of 1812.