Showing off a bit of history

Paul Clinton

Parallels between the war on terrorism and the War of 1812 weren’t

lost on Marcus De Chevrieux, the curator of the Newport Harbor

Nautical Museum.

De Chevrieux’s inspiration has resulted in a summer exhibit at the

museum called “First Defense of Freedom,” the opening of which

corresponded with the May arrival of the Lynx, a replica privateer

ship, to Newport Harbor.

Both the current and past conflict involved an attack on the

nation’s governmental institutions -- terrorists flying a United

Airlines jet into the Pentagon and British troops setting fire to the

White House and Capitol.

And in both cases, the country rediscovered its patriotism, De

Chevrieux said. Famously, a 35-year-old Georgetown lawyer named

Francis Scott Key scribbled out the Star Spangled Banner on a napkin

after a British naval attack on Baltimore. Key looked out the window

of a ship to see “that our flag was still there” and quickly scrawled

out his inspiration words.

“The 9-11 attacks were what motivated me to do an exhibit with a

patriotic theme,” De Chevrieux said. “America is now defending its

freedom. It did it for the first time in the War of 1812.”

While the early 19th Century conflict may be little remembered, it

was an important rebuff to a British Navy that still controlled the

high seas. The exhibit, which runs until Oct. 30, includes an example

of the “Letters of Marque,” licenses from the federal government to

merchant “privateer” ships allowing them to raid and harass British

ships.

The Lynx, scheduled to return to Newport Beach in September, is a

replica of an actual privateer from that time. Balboa Peninsula

resident Woodson Woods commissioned the boat.

A ship’s log, borrowed from Costa Mesa’s Apollo Bookstore,

documents many of the events of the time. And several oil paintings

-- including Thomas Whitcombe’s “Chesapeake and Shannon” from 1813 --

depict naval battles from the conflict.

Many artifacts from the time period have also been pulled together

for the exhibit, including replica muskets, flintlock pistols and an

American boarding cutlass.