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<p>John Tyler intended to show off the firepower of the <em>USS Princeton </em>to boost his abysmal popularity and scare foreign goverments into letting him annex Texas. He nearly got more than he bargained for in one of the biggest close calls of presidential history. </p>
<p>John Tyler intended to show off the firepower of the <em>USS Princeton </em>to boost his abysmal popularity and scare foreign goverments into letting him annex Texas. He nearly got more than he bargained for in one of the biggest close calls of presidential history. </p>
Artist's rendering of the explosion of the Peacemaker gun on the USS Princeton on February 28, 1844. “Never in the mysterious ordinance of God has a day on earth been marked in its progress by such startling and astounding contrasts — opening and advancing with hilarity and joy, mutual congratulation and patriotic pride, and closing in scenes of death, and disaster, of lamentation and unutterable woe.” [1] –Virginia Congressman W.C. Rives February 28, 1844 was a cold, clear day in Washington and it marked a momentous occasion. The USS Princeton, a newly designed vessel for the U.S...