Old Ironsides rang in its 225th birthday Friday with a cruise through Boston Harbor in a reunion with its past crew.
The U.S.S. Constitution launched in 1797, making it the oldest commissioned ship in the U.S. Navy, according to the National Parks Service. It would later earn its nickname while fighting off British frigates in the War of 1812 because, the NPS states, “it appeared as if enemy cannonballs could not penetrate the ship’s strong oak hull.”
The Constitution was one of the new nation’s first six warships, commissioned by Congress in 1794.
The Constitution, now based at the Charlestown Navy Yard, began its life not very far away at Hartt’s shipyard in the North End and participated the year after its launch in the Quasi-War against France, the NPS history states. It would later fight pirates off the Barbary Coast.
