AMERICAN SAILOR'S DIARY AND PHOTO ALBUM
Excellent content diary and photo album kept by Gregory C. Davison during his time as a cadet at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland, and his subsequent naval service. The diary gives a thorough, candid, and at times humorous account of life as a cadet, and recounts many of Davison's disciplinary infractions and disagreements with instructors. He graduates in 1892, although the diary skips from summer of 1891 to fall of 1893, where we find him on a cruise of the West Indies aboard the protected cruiser U.S.S. SAN FRANCISCO. He describes various ports of call, including Grand Cayman, Cartagena, Trinidad, Bahia, and Rio de Janeiro. He describes all of these ports in detail, as well as relating such events as the discovery and sinking of an abandoned schooner. In Brazil, the San Francisco takes part in suppressing a naval revolt, which had prevented American merchant ships from unloading their cargoes. The American ships in the harbor, which also included the U.S.S. DETROIT and the U.S.S. NEWARK, were charged with escorting the ships to their wharves. Shots were exchanged between the Detroit and the Brazilian cruiser TRAJANO, after which the Brazilian admiral in command offered a cease-fire, and allowed the American ships to dock without further harm. The altercation would come to be known as the Rio de Janeiro Affair. Davison describes these events in great detail, and goes on to relate the destruction of several insurgent ships by the Brazilian government. The diary stops abruptly in April of 1894, while the San Francisco is in the harbor at St. Lucia. Davison has filled the diary with a number of pieces of ephemera, including two Naval Academy Christmas cards, several portraits of himself, a photograph of his family's home, his wedding announcement, diagrams and sketches of various parts of his training ship, and a newspaper pictorial with photographs of the DETROIT and the TRAJANO. Also included is Davison's photo album, which contains numerous snapshots of his friends and comrades, ships that he served on (including the monitor U.S.S. WYOMING), one of the Navy's then-brand new torpedo boats, fishing trips, boating excursions, his wife, and their home. Altogether, the collection offers an interesting view of the U.S. Navy immediately preceding the Spanish-American war, and especially the nascent policy of gunboat diplomacy. Very good.