the 12,000 miles to reach his declared goal in the Far East. DAN NEHRER San Diego, California In the process of "Rediscovering Columbus" I'm surprised Peter Stanford made no mention of National Geographic's momentous discovery that Columbus didn't land on Watlings but rather on little Samana Cay. In fact it was the Norsemen who discovered this continent, their only deficiency being that they didn't maintain archives as did the Spaniards. JERREMS c. HART Vero Beach, Florida The debate over Columbus's landing place continues, as will appear in our next. As to prior discovery by the Norse (and quite possibly by others), it may surely be said that Columbus's discovery was the one that "took."-Eo
Liberty Ship Identified I refer to the correspondence, some time ago, regarding the wartime photo of an anonymous Liberty ship in New York harbor which is used regularly in Bay Refractory advertisements in Sea History and was also used to illustrate the John W. Brown article inSeaHistory4 1. The question has always been the identity of this Liberty ship. At the same time it has been agreed that the original photo had been retouched, with the anchor chain painted out and a bow wave added, but the anchor ball not touched-out from the forestay. I recently purchased a number of ship photos: among them was an 8 by 10 unretouched print of this photo. The ship has her nameboard showing-high up on her bridgefront! Under a powerful glass, the name shows clearly as the Egbert Benson. In the Bay Refractory photo the ship's bridgefront nameboard has been censored-out, as well. I understand that bridgefront nameboards were used on some ships involved with the D-Day Normandy landing operations in June 1944, and this could be borne out by the fact that the Egbert Benson disappears from many of the ship movement lists around the time ofD-Day-though she is regularly li sted before this and again, subsequently, when she moved to Mediterranean operations. Thus, withherbridgefrontname board, it could be assumed that the photograph of the Egbert Benson was taken around the time of April/May 1944. SEA HISTORY 54, SUMMER 1990
Furthermore, although I agree with your correspondent's remarks (Sea History 43) that the Egbert Benson is flying the "explosives" flag , I disagree with his comments that her International Signal letters "are being hoisted" and show three flags as N-A-S. In fact, her signal letters, K-F-D-J, would be hoisted together, not one at a time, whilst the three-flag signal she flies would be a shore signal, this confirmed when we remember that the ship was photographed at anchor. LEN SA WYER Barnes, London Quite a Man aboard the Savage It is with considerable interest I read Mr. Saxe's comprehensive study of the battle of Valcour in the Spring issue of Sea History. Only one slight difference was discovered: my research shows that Arnold was aboard Royal Savage at the commencement of the battle and transferred to Congress when the former went ashore an Valcour's sloping rocks at the southwest comer of the island. My interest was piqued early in 1934 when a friend and I dove on the Royal Savage using an early "diving hood" my friend had rented in New York City. The water was cold and we could stay below only about ten minutes at a time. I brought up a few souvenirs despite the presence of Capt. Hagglund in a full diving suit with topside air pump; he was a member of a NYC corporation at the time, and we saw his take, a steamer trunk full of old rusty bayonets , guns, bullets, etc. from the wreck. I kept a piece of a stout rib until 1976, when I constructed a model of Royal Savage from it. Thi s model is on exhibit at the Allen Knight Maritime Museum in Monterey with appropriate legends. The English oak is in excellent condition despite its long submersion. HORACE S. MAZET Carmel, California
Where is America's Tall Ship? I am just an armchair sailor but have a big interest in ship restoration. I have a few questions for you: 1. What do you think about salvaging the lady Elizabeth? 2. Why does this country (the world 's greatest) have only the small ship Eagle to show, when other nations, even much poorer countries, have either larger or several "tall ships?" 3. Can we build one or two from scratch
or start a fund and in ten years buy the Sea Cloud which would be more fitting the grandeur of America? It doesn ' t seem that anybody has really got "cranked up" to do anything. Love all your articles in Sea History. DON BERNTSEN San Diego, California let us respond to your questions in order: I . Lady Elizabeth. The World Ship Trust aspires to restore her as a museum ship in Port Stanley. She's a beautiful vessel, and a remarkable survival! 2. There are plans for a big sail training ship on the boards-see page 13. 3. Sea Cloud. You are not the first to think of her-the late Barclay Warburton, founder of the American Sail Training Association, very much wanted to set her up as a national ship. l et us add that bigger isn't necessarily better. The 1634-displacement ton USCGC Eagle, while not the size of Russia's 3545-gross ton Kruzenshtem, does a superlative job in deep-sea sail training. The 489-gross ton bark Elissa of Galveston, Texas , and the 324-gross ton Gazela of Philadelphia (both handsome historic vessels supported by private donations) do good work in sail training as well.-Eo
ERRATA "Rig the gratings for punishment," commands Mike Cohn of New York, having spotted that we cited the arrival of USS Edison to join the aircraft carrier Intrepid in New York last year (SH 53, page 11). We meant to say, of course, Edson. But we got it wrong. The photograph on page 39 of Sea History 53 of the lovely Christeen in our last issue shows this historic oyster sloop at her berth in New London prior to her departure for exhibition and restoration at the Connecticut River Museum in Essex-not at Essex , as we had it. The text beneath the photograph of the Statue of Liberty celebration, showing the Gaze/a of Philadelphia (formerly Gaze/a Primeiro) in Sea History 52 "is in error," remarks David H. Frantz, Jr. , of Massachusetts. Somehow we said she was built in Spain ... but, of course, we meant Portugal! Mr. Frantz goes on to report that a memo by the former owners has been uncovered describing Gaze/a as a "Brigantine with running bowsprit of 180 gross tons, built in Cacilhas by J. A. Sampaia in 1883. Obtained by Ben-
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