"Sailors Can Only Be Made Aboard Sailing Ships"
Stephen B. Luce and the Federal Act of 1874 by Norman
In his first installment of the history of sail training in the United States (see SH3I, p49), Mr. Brouwer traced the early efforts ofIsaac Coffin, beginning in I 820, and other philanthropists to set up nautical schools for boys, both to train the boys for a livelihood and, often, to remove them from unhealthy influences of their lives ashore. Later efforts by Thomas Goin and Henry Eckford of New York (1837) persuaded the US Navy to institute apprentice training programs for youth. It was in one of these programs, aboard the USS North Carolina at the Brooklyn Navy Yardin1841, that Stephen B. Luce began his career. In the firm belief that nautical schools and a supply of competent graduates would help rebuild the American merchant marine, Captain Luce succeeded in involving the Federal government in the establishment of such schools and a program ofofficer certification. As result, thousands of boys and young men received educations and went on to productive lives. Yet, this did not result in the rebirth of America's merchant service, as Captain Luce had believed it would. By the early 1870s, deep concern was being expressed over the future of the American merchant marine. The clipper ship era, already in decline by 1855 , had died in the depression of 1857. Then the Civil War had come in 1860. The threat of Confederate commerce raiders drove up insurance rates and large numbers of American ships were transferred to neutral flags as a result. Protective laws prevented their return to the American flag when peace was restored. Prior to the Civil War, two-thirds of our foreign trade was handled by American ships. Afterthe War, the figure was onethird, and the situation steadily worsened until the outbreak of the First World War. The initiative and the capital , which in the first half of the 1800s had flowed into shipping, was now going into railroads and settlement of the vast territory west of the Mississippi. The manning situation had been a cause for concern since the 1830s. Now it was seen as an important symptom and , to some extent, cause of the overall sickness afflicting the shipping industry. In 1867, the Price Current of Portland, Maine, had this to say: "There is an utter destitution of system in the officering of our vessels, and the want of accountability in both officers and men ... is rapidly deteriorating the whole mercantile marine of the country. Things have come to such a pass that not many young men of intelligence and character will continue in our merchant service. Numbers of them will make a voyage or two and then abandon the service in disgust. Why? Because it has become the receptacle for the refuse of almost every nation upon the earth." 1 During April 1872, Commander Stephen B. Luce was at Marseilles preparing to return to the United States in command of the USS Juniata. On the 29th , Captain Schufeldt of the USS Wabash presented him with a letter of introduction to Isaac Bell, Commissioner of Charities of the City of New York. Schufeldt cited Luce ' s "laudable intention of interesting the government and the people of the country in the establishment of a training school for seamen," adding, "our citizens are lamenting the loss of American commerce, but in their efforts __ to restore it they seem to have lost sight of the fact that good sailors are getting as scarce as good ships and that for future prosperity one is quite as much needed as the other." 2 12
J. Brouwer Luce was detached from the Juniata on July 1, 1872, assigned to the Boston Navy Yard, and promoted to captain on December 28. On February 15 of the following year, he published an article in the Nautical Gazette on the subject of schoolships. In it he reviewed the efforts of Goin and Forbes, and declared that the reason earlier efforts had failed was the lack of laws requiring trained officers and seamen: "If Congress enacts that al I officers of the merchant marine shall come up to a certain standard of proficiency, and attaches proper penalties to the employment of those who do not come up to that standard, it is very evident that there will be at once created a demand for a certain amount of nautical instruction, and until there is such a demand, nautical schools may be established in vain." 3 On April 24, 1873, at the encouragement of " prominent merchants, underwriters and shipowners ," 4 the New York State legislature adopted "An Act to authorize the Board of Education for the City and County of New York to establish a Nautical School." The executive committee of the school was to consist of three members chosen by and from the Board of Education, and a "Council of the Nautical School" was to be created by the Chamber of Commerce, " to advise and cooperate with the Board of Education in the establishment and management of such school , and from time to time to visit and examine the same, and to communicate in respect thereof with the Board."5 The law also empowered the Board of Supervisors of the County of New York to raise, through taxes, $50,000 to be turned over to the Board of Education for the purpose of creating the school , and authorized the Board of Education to apply to the United States government for the loan of " vessels and supplies." Without appropriate Federal legislation, the Navy was unwilling to loan any of its ships to state or local governments. The executive committee of the proposed schools, appointed by the Board of Education less than a week after passage of the State law, now turned to Admiral J. L. Worden , Superintendent of the United States Naval Academy for advice. Worden recommended that they consult with Stephen B. Luce.6 Captain Luce had, on April I , been appointed to the Board of Visitors of the Naval Academy . Traveling back and forth between his duties at Boston and Annapolis gave him the opportunity to meet with people in New York and with appropriate officials in Washingrton . On July 11 he received from C. R. P. Rodgers, Chief of the Bureau of Navigation , formal written orders to "Proceed to New York without further delay for the purpose of consultation with the Board of Education in reference to the establishment of a Nautical School for the training of seamen. " 7 On August 20, the Nautical School executive committee wrote requesting Luce to prepare "a bill forthe encouragement of Marine schools" to be presented to the next session of Congress, and a plan of organization for a school of the type I
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