(Monitor and Merrimac) General Orders and Regulations on Board S. S. Frigate Minnesota

Description

The Minnesota was a wooden steam frigate that was grounded and greatly damaged with numerous casualties by the ironclad C.S.S. Virgina on the first day of this famous battle.  The next day the federal ironclad Monitor arrived to guard the Minnesota by engaging the Virginia in the first ever ironclad fight.

Presumably Navy Department procedures are followed herein.  Topics from officer duties, various deck watches, lamp lightings, and regs in the Hold and the Engine Room to Boat Salutes, General Duties in Port, and breakfast hours and cases of intoxication  are covered.  Fire prevention regs are paramount.  The engineering department is especially admonished that “noisy and profane language is forbidden.”

The book finishes with a 2-page holograph “Copy of Order concerning relative rank of different officers according to seniority” from “Navy Department / February 25^th, 1861″ and signed in type by Isaac Toucey, Secretary of the Navy. 

Sewn burlap covering over the original boards.  Hand-written title pasted onto front board; hinges cracked; some pages loose; quite readable writing throughout.

With a short provenance: Gifted by a direct descendant of Captain Van Brunt to our consignor’s mother, an art conservationist.

(Monitor & Merrimac) GENERAL ORDERS AND REGULATIONS ON BOARD S. S. FRIGATE MINNESOTA / G. J. VAN BRUNT CAPTAIN.  Manuscript Memorandum Book, Signed as Approved, “G. J. Van Brunt Captain”, on page 66.  6-3/4’ x 8-1/4”; 68 numbered pages.