Background
Coe was born in Springfield Township, Union County, New Jersey, in 1805.
Coe was born in Springfield Township, Union County, New Jersey, in 1805.
In Peruvian waters
In 1824, at the age of 18, Coe joined the Chilean fleet, then commanded by Lord Cochrane, and served on board the brig Protector during the campaign of Peru. Cisplatine War
Service in the Uruguayan Navy
After the war with Brazil, he moved to Montevideo and became a partisan of Fructuoso Rivera and the Colorado Party. At the beginning of the Uruguayan Civil War, he was given the rank of Commodore and placed in command over the fledgling Uruguayan Navy"s Escuadra Oriental, consisting of the flagship Cagancha.
The corvettes Constitución, Sarandi, and 25 de Mayo.
The brig Pereyra; and the schooner General Rivera. Although Brown"s fleet was of similar size, Coe remained in harbor at Montevideo under the protection of the shore batteries for two months.
On May 24, 1841, thinking Brown"s forces to be scattered, he sailed out of the harbor only to be forced to retreat back in at dusk. He remained in harbor until August 3, when the Battle of Santa Lucía River saw the General Rivera sunk.
In his third engagement on December 9, the Argentine brig Belgrano captured the Cagancha and all her crew.
Following these reverses, President Rivera appointed Italian skipper Giuseppe Garibaldi to the rank of Colonel and created the command of the 2ª División de la Escuadra Oriental, transferring most of Coe"s ships to the new fleet. After this, the war simply became a siege of Montevideo, with Argentina and the Blancos in control of the sea, but the supply to the port was granted by Britain. Return to Argentina
With the war in Uruguay over and Rosas overthrown in Argentina, Coe was appointed by Justo José de Urquiza commander of the Confederation fleet which blockaded the city of Buenos Aires, after the later seceded from the central government in September 1852.
On June 26, however, Coe deserted to the United States aboard the American sloop United States Ship Jamestown after being bribed by Buenos Aires" citizens.
Coe eventually returned to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he died on October 30, 1864, the father of ten children. His remains were buried at the family"s grave in Louisiana Recoleta cemetery.
He is the namesake of the ROU Comodoro Coe (07), a French-designed Vigilante-class patrol boat of the Uruguayan Navy commissioned in 1981.