I Bring the News

 

 

From: Oxsan
Date: 03 Jun 2001
Time: 17:36:26

Before satellite communication, before television, before radio, before telephone and before the invention of the telegraph the announcement of naval victories by the U. S. Navy were sometimes surrounded by a bit of romance and glamour. I suppose we would now refer to it as "hype".

"The drama of the occasion must have been breathtaking: a grand military ball at Tomlinson's Hotel on Capitol Hill attended by the entire glittering assemblage of Washington society, with cabinet members, congressional leaders and Supreme Court justices in attendance, the ballroom dominated by the battle flag of the Guerriere festooned across one wall, with the orchestra playing a festive air beneath it, when with a flurry of excited voices and ladylike chirps and gasps, the attention of the entire room is suddenly directed to a young man in a lieutenant's uniform, exhausted and still covered with dust of the road, standing in a doorway and carrying an immense bundle. The dancers stop. The musicians, sensing the significance of the moment, put down their instruments expectantly. The voices rise as the young man is recognized as the son of the Navy Secretary. The senior naval officers being honored that night rush to his side, and the crowd gives way before them as they escort the young man and his large package to the First Lady, standing at the center of the floor. Stooping before her, the young man opens the bundle, and unfurls another British battle flag upon the floor, as large as that of the Guerriere . There is a rapturous shout of triumph and the ecstatic guests burst spontaneously into "Hail Columbia". Never for the rest of their lives, would any of the onlookers that night forget the name Macedonian. From Chronicles of the Frigate Macedonian 1809 to 1922 by James Tertius de Kay

That is a better way to get the word than from Tom Brokaw.

LOVE

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