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Able Bodied Citizens In November of 1812, Secretary of the Navy Paul Hamilton ordered that "recruiting officers orders to enter none but white able bodies citizens." And in March 1813 Congress made it illegal to hire any "persons of color" to server on any public ship. No one paid any attention to these orders. 15 to 20 present of the crew of the U.S.S. Constitution consisted of black sailors. Capt. Isaac Hull official reported their presence in August 1812: "never had any better fighters . . . they stripped to the waist and fought like devils, . . . utterly insensible to danger and possessed with the determination to outfight the white sailors." In December of 1813 the all black crew of the privateer Patty sailed between Philadelphia and Puerto Rico. In 1814, three ships with all slave crews operated between New Orleans and Pensacola . . . despite the fact that they could have been freed just by sailing into an English port in Jamaica.
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