The First Papal Trip to "United States " resulted in a Court Martial Proceeding!!! ( AN Overview)

Update - It appears Vatican Radio also notes this in this short story here

If you have not read the talk that John Allen and George Weigel gave to the press a couple of weeks ago as to the this weeks Papal Visit do so. It is one of the best pieces produced so far that sort of gives an overview of Pope Benedict and what he might address. However John Allen of the National Catholic Reporter gives a little bit of history I was never aware of.

This trip actually will pull the United States into a tie with Poland for the most-visited country outside of Italy by popes in the modern era. It is also – and here is a bit of trivia that, if you’re blogging on this or if you have to do a box on, a kind of cover about the pope in America, this may be a good nugget – Benedict XVI will be the third pope to visit the United States, that is, Paul VI, John Paul II and Benedict XVI. But he will actually be the fourth pope to set foot onto American territory. And the way that works is this: In 1849, Pius IX was taking refuge in Naples because he had been kicked out of Rome by Garibaldi and the revolutionaries. And one bright spring day, King Ferdinand of Naples, who was his host, was invited to tour the USS Constitution, which happened to be anchored in a port near Naples.

Pius IX tagged along. It was actually a breech of protocol for the captain of the ship, a guy by the name of John Gwinn, to allow the pope on board because the United States was officially neutral on the contest between the pope and the Italian revolutionaries. The captain was actually submitted to a court martial for allowing Pius IX onto the ship, but he actually died of a cerebral hemorrhage before the trial could reach conclusion. One other footnote: Pius IX is reported to have become seasick while he was aboard the Constitution and actually had to take a nap in the captain’s quarters before he left. So the fourth pope to be in American airspace.

Good Grief!!!! This is of course the famous Ole Iron Sides that is still on display and available to be toured. A nice history of the ship is located here also at Wilki

The Captain of this Ship was Capt. John Gwinn. Captain John Gwinn was commander of the U.S.S. Constitution from 1848 to 1849. Captain Gwinn took the U.S.S. Constitution as a "ship of state" on a tour of the Mediterranean in an effort to protect U.S. economic interests and citizens. . Captain Gwinn actually died at Messina Italy on September 4, 1849.

The Painting you see above is called the "Ship of State" and was given to John Paul the II on 2002 that commemorates this event. This page talks about the painting and and gives us more detailed history of what went down. It is pretty fascinating and also gives us a glimpse how very important the Navy was at that time in Diplomatic relations. The article goes into great detail on what the events that led up to the Pope touring Ole Ironsides but let me excerpt the actual visit:

The King and the Pope visited every part of the ship. At the request of the Catholics in the crew, they were lined up on the gun deck and received the Pope's benediction as the Pontiff walked among them, escorted by the linguistically talented Surgeon Guillou. That done, the guests were led to the captain's cabin for refreshment, where it became apparent that Pius IX was seasick! The surgeon prescribed for him and soon had him feeling better. When the dignitaries departed, after nearly three hours on board, yards were again manned and two 21-gun salutes fired. The Constitution got underway late that afternoon and returned briefly to Naples to drop off Rowan (and fire a 21-gun salute in honor of the "Accouchement of the Queen of Naples") before proceeding southwest to Messina, in accordance with Commadore Morgan's orders. The Pope subsequently sent 150 rosaries for the 80 Catholics in the Constitution's crew(Opinionated Catholic Commentary here- That seems like a lot of Catholics to be part of a crew via their USA population demographic at the time.. Showing perhaps that the Navy was a huge Career option for American Catholics even at this early Stage), together with a silver medal bearing his image and coat of arms to Captain Gwinn. Commodore Morgan, on the other hand, was outraged by what he viewed as an outright violation of U.S. Neutrality and flagrant disobedience of orders. As a mark of his disapprobation, he recommended to Secretary of the Navy William B. Preston that the offending frigate and her captain be ordered "to the Brazil Station, or some other station" and another unit sent to the Mediterranean. As it turned out, no action was necessary: Captain Gwinn died at Messina on 4 September 1849, possibly of a slow cerebral hemorrhage. Pope Pius IX lived to become the longest-serving pope in history, and is remembered as the promulgator of the dogma of papal infallibility.

One note on the painting. The artist is quite well known and does a great bit of paintings with Naval Work. His paintings hang in the White House and he was the first artist in residence to the United States Naval Institute. Accordng to the Artist bio page the above painting can be viewed at the Pope Pius IX museum in Rome Italy

In this fascinating page that shows us how exciting( and how mischievous Navy people were it appears in the good ole days) there is an entry that detail the log entry of the USS Constitution for 06 Sep 1849:

Captain John Gwinn buried in Palermo, Sicily, in funeral attended by over 150 of the crew (required); 15 deserted from procession and many others got drunk.

However Captian John Quinn finally made it back to the USA. This Arlington Cemetery Website picks up the story. The History is detailed as you can see but it appears he spent less than a year in foreign soil . The body was brought from Sicily and buried in Philadelphia on September 19, 1850. However the Navy paid one final tribute to him. In 1931 his body as well as his wifes was buried At Arlington after Neglect of 80 Years with Grand Military Honors by the Navy Department in which the Secretary of the Navy attended himself

Also if you are a American History lover you might be interested in this post I did last week.Thoughts on Pope Benedict as American POW