Samuel Francis du Pont was born on September 27 at Bergen Point, New Jersey, United States. His father was Victor Marie du Pont head of the importing house of V du Pont de Nemours & Company of New York. His paternal grandfather was the distinguished French statesman and author, Du Pont de Nemours. His mother was Gabrielle Josephine de la Fite de Pelleport, a French woman of unusual mental and literary ability, and the youngest daughter of the Marquis de Pelleport.
From the age of nine to fourteen Du Pont attended a boarding school at Mount Airy, Philadelphia, near Germantown.
In December 1815, Du Pont de Nemours, having emigrated to America on Napoleon’s return from Elba, wrote to Thomas Jefferson requesting an appointment of midshipman for his grandson. Jefferson replied that he had written to Madison on the subject, and that he hoped that the grandson would in time become “one of our high admirals. ”
On December 19 Madison appointed young Du Pont a midshipman, on waiting orders, and accompanied the appointment with another to the Military Academy at West Point. The son was permitted by his parents to choose between the two services. Influenced, doubtless, by the popularity of the navy, following the War of 1812, the youth chose that sendee, notwithstanding the fact that his maternal ancestors had been soldiers for generations. Du Pont’s first sea service was in 1817 on the Franklin, 74, Commodore Charles Stewart, under orders to proceed to the Mediterranean. As there was no naval academy at this time, young midshipmen were instructed in navigation and mathematics by naval schoolmasters on shipboard, and probably Du Pont was so instructed on his first cruise. A portrait of him painted at this time depicts him as a tall and strikingly handsome youth. At maturity his height was six feet, one inch.
In 1820 he returned home on the Erie. In the following year he was again in the Mediterranean, this time on the Constitution. After serving in the West Indies and on the coast of Brazil, he was in 1824 for the third time sent to the Mediterranean where he served as sailing-master on the North Carolina. In 1826 at the age of twenty-two years and seven months he was promoted to a lieutenancy.
From 1829 to 1832 he was employed on the Ontario, cruising in European waters. During the decade previous to the Mexican War, Du Pont was employed first in the Gulf of Mexico, part of the time in command, successively, of the Grampus and the Warren, and later in European waters on the Ohio, the flagship of Commodore Hull. Promoted commander on January 10, 1843, taking rank from October 28, 1842, he was assigned to the command of the brig Perry, which that year sailed for China. Stricken with illness, he was invalided home from Rio de Janeiro. After serving as a member of Secretary Bancroft’s board on the organization of the naval school at Annapolis, he sailed from Norfolk in October 1845 as commander of the frigate Congress, flagship of Commodore Stockton, with the American commissioner and the consul-general to Hawaii on board. He arrived at San Francisco, by way of Honolulu, about July 1, 1846. The Mexican War was in progress, and Stockton proceeded to Monterey where he took charge of the naval forces in the Pacific and placed Du Pont in command of the sloop-of-war Cyane. Taking on board John C. Fremont’s battalion, Du Pont disembarked it three days later at San Diego. Proceeding thence down the coast, he reached San Bias, where a landing party spiked the guns of the Mexicans. Entering the Gulf of California, he seized La Paz and at Guaymas burned, or caused the Mexicans to burn, the small fleet there. Within a few months he cleared the Gulf of hostile ships, destroying or capturing thirty of them. On November 11, 1847, he aided Commodore Shubrick, who had succeeded Stockton, in the occupation of Mazatlan. When later the enemy attempted to recover Lower California, Shubrick ordered Du Pont to proceed at once to the Gulf. At San Jose, on learning that a party of Americans were besieged in a mission house three miles inland, he organized a detachment of two provisional companies, led it against the besiegers, and rescued his fellow countrymen. Subsequently he organized several similar expeditions and succeeded in clearing the country of hostile troops.
On his arrival at Norfolk in October 1848, the secretary of the navy congratulated him on his “safe return after a long cruise, in which the services of the officers and crew of the Cyane were so highly distinguished for gallantry, efficiency, and skill”. Du Pont now began a tour of shore duty which lasted upward of ten years and which was concerned with some of the most important improvements in naval and marine affairs made in the two decades preceding the Civil War.
In 1849 he served as a member of a board appointed by the secretary of the navy to consider a course of study appropriate to a naval academy and to prepare proper regulations for the government of the same. The report of this board, which went into effect on July 1, 1850, provided for a “Naval Academy” comparable to the Military Academy at West Point. Du Pont was appointed superintendent, but after a month the appointment was revoked. His lively interest in naval education led, however, to his frequent selection as a member of the examining board at Annapolis.
In 1851 Du Pont made a valuable report to the secretary of war on the national defenses, in which he discussed the effect on them of the “new element, ” steam. This was highly commended by Sir Howard Douglas the British expert on naval gunnery. In the same year he was chosen by the secretary of the treasury as one of the members of a board provided for by Congress to inquire into the light-house establishment. The elaborate report of this board laid the basis of a new establishment, in which Du Pont played an important part during the years 1852-57 when he served as a member of the Light-House Board. At different periods he served on boards authorized to revise the rules and regulations of the navy, and he was frequently employed on courts martial and courts of enquiry. He was a member of the famous naval efficiency board of 1855, composed of fifteen naval officers and authorized to examine into the efficiency of all officers above the rank of midshipman. After deliberating for several weeks it reported that 201 officers were incompetent or incapacitated. Its report, which was approved by the secretary of the navy and the president, created a profound sensation. The cause of the affected officers was taken up by their friends both in and outside of Congress, by the public press, and by several state legislatures. The brunt of the criticism fell upon Du Pont. His zeal for naval reform, the excellence of his professional reputation, and his long and efficient service in the navy made him a shining mark for attack. Senator Houston of Texas championed the cause of the affected officers and assailed Du Pont in the Senate. The two Delaware senators, Clayton and Bayard, ably defended him. In the end the affected officers obtained a modification of the act creating the board and its objects were only partly attained.
On September 14, 1855, Du Pont was promoted captain. In 1857 he was ordered to command the new frigate Minnesota, one of the largest vessels in the navy, and to proceed to China with William Reed, recently appointed American minister to that country. The Minnesota was at the mouth of the Peiho River when the combined English and French fleets attacked and captured the Chinese forts there, giving Du Pont an opportunity to acquire information that was to prove useful in similar undertakings of his own during the Civil War. After visiting China, Japan, India, and Arabia, he sailed homeward, reaching Boston in May 1859.
In December 1860, he was made commandant of the Philadelphia navyyard, a post that he held at the outbreak of the Civil War. Du Pont’s first service in the war was performed in Washington as the senior member of the Commission of Conference, appointed by the secretary of the navy to prepare plans for naval operations, to devise methods for rendering the blockade effective, and to collect useful information. Meeting at various times during JuneSeptember 1861, it submitted several reports, then strictly confidential, embodying much information and many suggestions, and recommending the establishment of a large naval base on the Carolina or Florida coast, where naval supplies could be stored and warships could safely ride at anchor. Of the several locations that were suggested, Du Pont favored Port Royal.
On September 18 he was relieved from duty at the Philadelphia navy-yard and assigned to the command of the South Atlantic blockading squadron, at the time the most important post in the gift of the Navy Department. He was to have control of all naval operations on the Atlantic coast south of the boundary between the Carolinas. His official designation was “Flag Officer, ” and his courtesy title, “Commodore. ” The rendezvous of the squadron was Hampton Roads, where by the end of October a fleet of seventy-five vessels was assembled—the largest up to this time ever commanded by an officer of the navy. Du Pont’s flagship was the steam frigate Wabash, Commander R. P. Rodgers; and his chief of staff Commander C. H. Davis. A combined naval and military movement against Port Royal was decided upon. The military force, consisting of 14, 000 troops, was commanded by BrigadierGeneral Thomas W. Sherman. On October 29 the expedition sailed from Hampton Roads, and, after suffering considerable loss from a gale off Hatteras, reached its destination. By November 7 it was ready for battle. The defenses of the Confederates consisted of two forts, Walker and Beauregard, on opposite sides of the entrance to Port Royal, and of a small flotilla of schooners. Du Pont steamed up the channel in two columns. The main column, consisting of the ten larger vessels and led by the flagship, attacked the forts; the smaller one, consisting of five gunboats, engaged the flotilla. The battle lasted upward of five hours and ended with the abandonment of the forts by the Confederates and their occupation by the Federal troops. The loss of the Union forces was thirty-one; of the Confederates, sixty- three. Since forts have but seldom surrendered to ships, the capture of Port Royal is justly celebrated in the annals of naval warfare. It greatly encouraged the North, depressed by the misfortunes of the army. On February 22, 1862, on the recommendation of President Lincoln, Congress passed a resolution thanking Du Pont for his victory, and on July 30 he was made a rear admiral, taking rank from July 16. Following the success at Port Royal, Du Pont occupied Beaufort, South Carolina; and later captured Tybee Island, thus giving the army a base, from which, with the aid of the navy, in April 1862, it reduced Fort Pulaski. All the sounds of Georgia were occupied, and Jacksonville and St. Augustine were taken.
On February 28, 1863, one of the vessels of the squadron destroyed the privateer Nashville, a highly creditable performance. Du Pont, who was an excellent organizer, established fourteen blockading stations, on thirteen of which the blockade was effective. On the fourteenth, the Charleston station, however, the Confederates frequently at night eluded the Union vessels. In the meantime an event had taken place which was destined to influence subsequent naval operations in the war, as well as to affect the rest of Du Pont’s naval career. By the success of the Monitor over the Merrimac in Hampton Roads on March 9, 1862, public attention was directed to the ironclad vessel, and many persons, including the secretary and the assistant secretary of the navy, were led to exaggerate its offensive powers. The capture of Charleston, strongly defended by Fort Sumter, now appeared feasible, and a fleet of monitors was assembled under Du Pont with a view to taking that city. With less faith than the Navy Department in the new vessels, Du Pont tested them in ail engagement with Fort McAllister and reported that they were deficient in “aggression or destructiveness as against forts” and that in order to secure success in such operations troops were necessary. He and his officers, however, were of the opinion that Fort Sumter could be reduced. On April 7, 1863, he attacked the defenses of Charleston. The battle fleet consisted of seven monitors, the ironclad New Ironsides (the flagship), and an armored gunboat. It advanced into action led by the Weehawken, Captain John Rodgers. The battle began at 2. 50 p. m. and ended at 4. 30 p. m. , when Du Pont signaled his ships to withdraw from action, intending to resume the attack the following morning. He had suffered a severe reverse, the worst naval defeat of the Civil War. The armored gunboat was so damaged that she sank the next day. Five of the monitors were temporarily put out of action. The loss of the fleet w'as about fifty; of the forts fourteen. When in the evening Du Pont learned from his captains the extent of the damage suffered by their ships, he decided not to renew the attack, since it would be futile, a conclusion concurred in by all his leading officers. The failure of Du Pont was a great disappointment to the North, which had entertained hopes of a brilliant success. On Apr. 13, and again on the following day, the President ordered him to hold his position off Charleston. Rendered unduly sensitive by his defeat and fancying that the President’s order implied a censure, he wrote to the secretary of the navy requesting the department not to hesitate to relieve him by an officer who in its opinion was more able to execute the service in which he had failed, the capture of Charleston.
While the department was choosing a relieving officer, Du Pont kept his station, and on June 17 two of his ships, the Weehawken and the Nahant, captured the ironclad Atlanta, one of the chief naval prizes of the war. On July 6, on the arrival of the new commander-in-chief, Rear Admiral John A. Dahlgren, Du Pont hauled down his flag and with this act terminated not only his active service during the war but also the active part of his naval career. Meanwhile an acrimonious correspondence had been begun by Du Pont with the Secretary. He believed that Welles was trying to shift to the commander of the fleet the blame that should fall upon the Department. Later, Congress made an investigation. Neither the correspondence nor the investigation sheds much light. Naval officers hold, although not unanimously, that their colleague was badly treated. It would appear that the responsibility for the battle should be shared by Du Pont and the Navy Department, and that any other commander might have failed in the hazardous enterprise. The chances of success, however, w'ould have been considerably increased with Farragut in command. On leaving the squadron, Du Pont retired to his home at Louviers, on the Brandywine River, near Wilmington.
In March 1865, he was in Washington as a member of a naval board charged with recommending for advanced rank those officers who had distinguished themselves in the war. This wras his last professional employment. His long service in the hot malarial climate off the Southern coast had impaired his health. His death occurred in Philadelphia, after a brief illness. He was distinguished in appearance and polished in manners, a dignified gentleman and officer.
In 1882 Congress provided that the circle at the intersection of Massachusetts and Connecticut Avenues in Washington should be called Du Pont Circle and that a statue of the admiral should be erected thereon. Two years later a memorial statue, the work of Launt Thompson, was unveiled in the presence of the secretary of the navy, a committee of naval officers, and members of the Du Pont family. In 1921 this memorial was removed and an artistic fountain, executed by Daniel Chester French, was erected in its place.
Deeply religious, Du Pont was an active worker in the Protestant Episcopal Church.
On June 27, 1833 Du Pont married his first cousin, Sophie Madeleine du Pont, youngest daughter of Eleuthere Irenee du Pont de Nemours, founder of the powder works. Of great strength of character and of deep sympathies, she was a worthy companion of her husband, whom she long survived, guarding to the end his professional reputation.
