Ghosts of the USS Constellation
War Ship in Baltimore Harbor Haunted by Known and Unknown Phantoms
Aug 22, 2008
The USS Constellation, the U. S. Navy’s first ship, was built in 1797. The frigate, with 38 guns, was originally commissioned to protect United States’ vessels from pirates. She was nicknamed the Yankee Race Horse because of her speed. The Constellation served in all major wars including World War II. She was the oldest commissioned warship in the world until her retirement in 1955 when she was permanently docked at Pier 1 in the Baltimore Harbor. Visitors and ghosts mingle on her deck and within her halls. Sightings of wraiths and odd noises have been witnessed by many.
Identified Phantoms
- Neil Harvey was found guilty for being a coward and a traitor when he was court-martialed after he either left or fell asleep at his station during a battle with a French ship. The sentence was death. Captain Thomas Truxtun ordered him to be executed by being bound in front of a cannon, then shot. His ghost is seen on the orlop, the lowest deck.
- Ironically, Captain Truxtun is another haunter. His shade regularly appears as an officer wearing a Revolutionary War era Navy uniform on the forecastle deck, the short one at the forward end, above the first full deck. Lieutenant Commander Allen Ross Brougham took a picture of his shade. Truxtun’s ghost is wearing a Revolutionary War era Navy uniform with ruffled shirt, gold striped adorned pants and a cocked hat, holding a sword.
- Carl Hansen was the Constellation’s watchman until 1965. He loved the ship so much that he did not want to leave. A priest who saw him thought he was a living person. Hansen's ghost was sighted, sitting next to a girl, at a shipboard Hallowe’en party.
Miscellany of Anonymous Phantoms
- The first report of ghostly sightings happened in 1955 after the Constellation was docked in Baltimore Harbor. The crew of the USS Pike, (SS-173), a diesel submarine, was moored next to her. The crew saw phantoms walking and gliding on the decks and ghostly lights. Eerie noises emanated from her.
- A specter of a boy, believed to have been the surgeon’s assistant, has been sighted aboard the Yankee Race Horse.
- A mournful seaman’s ghost has been spotted hovering around the gun and forecastle decks. Some believe he was so depressed about the frigate’s then condition that he killed himself.
- Witnesses have seen a sailor running, as if in fear for his life on one of the decks.
- The odor of gunpowder precedes the sightings of some other ghosts. These entities are the most active at midnight and, usually, between Christmas and New Year’s Day.
Related articles:
Edgar Allen Poe's Grave is Haunted
Ghosts and Legends: USNA Annapolis
Sources:
Haunted Houses, Winer, Richard and Nancy Osborn, (Bantam Books, 1979)
http://www.history.navy.mil/books/nnv/dh.htm#F
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