USS Constitution

USS Constitution

Constitution fires a 17-gun salute near U.S. Coast Guard BaseBoston during the ship's Independence Day underway demonstration in Boston Harbor.
Career (U.S.)
Name:	USS Constitution
Namesake:	United States Constitution
Ordered:	1 March 1794
Builder:	Edmund Hartt's Shipyard
Cost:	$302,718 (1797)
Laid down:	1 November 1794
Launched:	21 October 1797
Maiden voyage:	22 July 1798
Renamed:	Old Constitution 1917 Constitution 1925
Reclassified:	IX-21, 1941 No classification, 1 September 1975
Homeport:	Charlestown Navy Yard
Nickname:	"Old Ironsides"
Status:	In active service
Badge:
General characteristics (As built ca. 1797)
Type:	44-gun frigate
Tonnage:	1,576
Displacement:	2,200 tons
Length:	304 ft (93 m) bowspirit to spanker 207 ft (63 m) billet head to taffrail 175 ft (53 m) at waterline
Beam:	43 ft 6 in (13.26 m)
Height:	foremast: 198 ft (60 m) mainmast: 220 ft (67 m) mizzenmast:172.5 ft (52.6 m)
Draft:	21 ft (6.4 m) forward 23 ft (7.0 m) aft
Depth of hold:	14 ft 3 in (4.34 m)
Decks:	Orlop, Berth, Gun, Spar
Propulsion:	Sail (three masts, ship rig)
Sail plan:	42,710 sq ft (3,968 m2) on three masts
Speed:	13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph)
Boats & landing craft carried:	1 × 36 ft (11 m) longboat 2 × 30 ft (9.1 m) cutters 2 × 28 ft (8.5 m) whaleboats 1 × 28 ft (8.5 m) gig 1 × 22 ft (6.7 m) jolly boat 1 × 14 ft (4.3 m) punt[2]
Complement:	450 including 55 Marines and 30 boys (1797)
Armament:	30 × 24-pounder (11 kg) long gun 20 × 32-pounder (15 kg) carronade 2 × 24-pounder (11 kg) bow chasers
USS Constitution
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
Location	Boston Naval Shipyard, Boston, Massachusetts
Area	less than one acre
Built	1797
Governing body	Federal
NRHP Reference #	66000789
Added to NRHP	15 October 1966

USS Constitution is a wooden-hulled, three-masted heavy frigateof the United States Navy. Named by President George Washingtonafter the Constitution of the United States of America, she is the world's oldest commissioned naval vessel afloat.Launched in 1797, Constitutionwas one of six original frigatesauthorized for construction by theNaval Act of 1794 and the third constructed. Joshua Humphreysdesigned the frigates to be the young Navy's capital ships, and so Constitution and her sisters were larger and more heavily armed and built than standard frigates of the period. Built in Boston, Massachusetts, at Edmund Hartt's shipyard, her first duties with the newly formed United States Navy were to provide protection for American merchant shipping during the Quasi-War with France and to defeat the Barbary pirates

in theFirst Barbary War.

Constitution is most famous for her actions during the War of 1812 against Great Britain, when she captured numerous merchant ships and defeated five British warships: HMS Guerriere, Java,Pictou, Cyane and Levant. The battle with Guerriere earned her the nickname of "Old Ironsides" and public adoration that has repeatedly saved her from scrapping. She continued to serve as flagship in the Mediterraneanand 

African squadrons, and circled the world in the 1840s. During the American Civil War, she served as a training ship for the United States Naval Academy. She carried US artwork and industrial displays to the Paris Exposition of 1878.

Retired from active service in 1881, Constitution served as areceiving ship until designated amuseum ship in 1907. In 1934 she completed a three-

year, 90-port tour of the nation. Constitution-sailed under her own power for her 200th birthday in 1997, 

and again in August 2012, to commemorate 

the 200th anniversary of her victory overGuerriere.

Constitution '​s stated mission today is to promote understanding of the Navy's role in war and peace through educational outreach, historic demonstration, and active participation in public events. As a fully commissionedUS Navy ship, her crew of 60 officers and sailors participate in ceremonies, educational programs, and special events while keeping the ship open to visitors year round and providing free tours. The officers and crew are all active-duty US Navy personnel and the assignment is considered special duty in the Navy. Traditionally, command of the vessel is assigned to a Navy Commander. Constitutionis berthed at Pier 1 of the former Charlestown Navy Yard, at one end of Boston's Freedom Trail.

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1658 Battle of the Dunes.

1658 Battle of the Dunes, fought on June14th. (Gregorian calendar)1658, also known as the Battle of Dunkirk, was a victory of the French army, under Henri de la Tour d' Auvergne,Vicomte de Turenne, against the Spanish army, led by John of Austria the Younger and Louis II de Condé. It was part of the Franco-Spanish War and the concurrent Anglo-Spanish War, and was fought near Dunkirk.
 1658 Prelude: 18,000 French supported by 3,000 troops from the English Commonwealth besieged Dunkirk's garr- ison of about 3,000 in May 1658. A Spanish army of about 15,000 men was divided in two corps,the Spanish Army of Flanders on the right and the small corps of French rebels, of the Fronde, on the left under the command of Louis II de Condé, the Spanish corps included a force of 2,000 English/Irish royalists–formed

as the nucleus of a potential army for the invasion of England by Charles II with Charles' brother James Duke of York)(James II) amongst its commanders was sent to relieve the town.
1658 Battle: June14th, leaving some men to continue the siege, Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne advanced to meet the Spanish army. The battle on which resulted from this manoeuvre, became known in England as the Battle of the Dunes because the red-coats of the New model army under the leadership of Sir William Lockhart, Lord-Protector Oliver Cromwell's ambassador at Paris, Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne's army astonished both armies by the stubborn fierceness of their assaults particularly with a successful assault up a sand hill 150 feet high and strongly defended by Spanish veteran, the battle lasted for about two hours and ended with a rout of the Spanish forces,who lost about 6,000 killed, wounded, and captured with their opponents losing about 400; the French corps of rebels on the left under the command of Louis II de Condé retreated in good order.
English involvement: When the Lord-Protector Oliver Cromwell formed an alliance with France's Louis XIV, 

Dekulakization

Holodomor topics
Historical background
Famines in Russia and USSR · Soviet famine of 1932–1933
Soviet government
Institutions: All-Union Communist Party (Bolshevik) ·Communist Party (Bolshevik) of Ukraine ·Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic ·Government of the Soviet Union · Secret police
Policies: First Five-Year Plan · Collectivization in the Ukrainian SSR ·Dekulakization · Law of Spikelets  ·Reversal of Ukrainization policies  ·Propaganda in the Soviet Union
Responsible parties
Soviet Union: Joseph Stalin · Vyacheslav Molotov ·Lazar Kaganovich · Pavel Postyshev · Stanislav Kosior ·Vlas Chubar · Communist Party · NKVD ·
Investigation and comprehension
1984 International Commission  · 1985 USA Commission  ·Causes of the Holodomor  · Denial  · Genocide question  ·Holodomor in modern politics
v   t   e

Dekulakization (Russian:раскулачивание, raskulachivanie,Ukrainian: розкуркулення,rozkurkulennia) was the Sovietcampaign of political repressions, including arrests, deportations, and executions of millions of the better-off peasants and their families in 1929–1932. The richer peasants were labeled kulaks and considered class enemies. More than 1.8 million peasants were deported in 1930–1931. The stated purpose of the campaign was to fight the counter-revolutionand build socialism in the countryside. This policy was accomplished simultaneously withcollectivization in the USSR and effectively brought all agriculture and peasants in Soviet Russia under state control.

Away with private peasants!

The "liquidation of the kulaks as aclass" was announced by Joseph Stalin on 27 December 1929. Stalin had said that "Now we have the 

opportunity to carry out a resolute offensive against the kulaks, break their resistance, eliminate them as a class and replace their production with the production ofkolkhozes and sovkhozes." The decision was formalized in a resolution "On measures for the elimination of kulak households in districts of comprehensive collectivization" on 30 January 1930. All kulaks were divided into three categories: (I) to be shot or imprisoned as decided by the local secret political police; (II) to be sent to Siberia, North, the Urals orKazakhstan, after confiscation of their property; and (III) to be evicted from their houses and used in labour colonies within their own districts. OGPU secret police chief Efim Georgievich Evdokimov (1891–1939) organized and supervised the roundup of peasants and the mass executions.

A combination of dekulakization, collectivization, and other repressive policies led to mass starvation in many parts of the Soviet Union and the death of at least 14.5 million peasants in 1930–1937, including five million who died in Ukraine during the Holodomor. The results were soon known outside the Soviet Union. In 1941, the American journalist H. R. Knickerbocker wrote "It is a conservative estimate to say that some 5,000,000 [kulaks] ... died at once, or within a few years."