Stern decorations on Revell's 1:96 USS Constitution

Len, nice model and I like your workbench, it looks so much like mine
Scott

Hello all!

The USS Constitution and her sister 44-gunners actually had 30-32 long guns on their main deck and a mixture of long guns and carronades totalling 20-25 on their spar decks. The 30 or so 24-pounders were a good match for any other frigates from moderate range. Not so for the USS Essex, which unfortunately for her was armed with almost all carronades, and was picked to pieces from long range in her final battle.

Jose

Hello all!

Here is a link to an article by William Gilkerson and Commodore Tyrone G. Martin, usn Ret.. The latter is the author of "A Most Fortunate Ship", a definitive biography of the USS Constitution. The article itself is a recounting of the many changes in appearance that Old Ironsides has undergone.

http://www.nwc.navy.mil/press/Review/1997/summer/s&dsu97.htm

I hope you all find it interesting.

Jose Gonzales

Just seen your model and I have to say that that is one sleek ship.

Hope that I can do just tice to her when I try.

Beautiful, simply beautiful!!!

And yes, your article is a great help. thanks for that too.

Regards..

Ian B.

Wow thanks for the compliments guys!

Jake- yup the green (Testors Leaf Green in small bottle) was a bit of a pain but I am not the smartest modeler!

For the deck hatch and pinrail colors- I used:

Testors Military Brown, Testors Dark Brown in small bottle and
Testors Flat Brown- in the small bottles for pinrails.

I was just trying to vary the shades of wood to simulate different levels of wear and grain...

Thanks again...

Len

To lenroberto,

I looked at the pictures of your work, very impressive, nice work.

However, in the text you keep referring to "carronades", now I have never seen the actual USS Constitution, but I don't think that she was fully equiped with carronades in the US-English war, if she would have been, the English wouldn't have so scared of her as they were.
A carronade is a very horrible weapon at close range, but also ver unaccurate at longer range, and since the Royal Navy was using almost exclusively cannons instead of carronades, well, then the Constitution would have long been resting on the bottom of the sea.

Len,

SUPER OUTSTANDING JOB!!!!

Althought I have to ask, I noticed that you have the lower deck in-place BEFORE you painted the upper bulwarks green , Man that must have been a pain in the stern, huh?

BTW what was the color you used to paint the deck pin rails and main hatch edge rails?

Jake

Len,

I just wanted to tell you that I love your ship kit builds on the Modeling Madness web site!

Regards,

Jose-

I left the stern as is on mine- click or cut and paste here to see my recent build:

http://www.modelingmadness.com/reviews/misc/robertoconst.htm

Len

As I understand it, the kit is based on the model the Smithsonian commissioned quite a few years back and the carvings duplicate the ones on that model. I believe the plans for it were done by George Campbell, an extremely knowledgable an conscientious researcher, back in the 1960s (or maybe a little earlier). He clearly relied heavily on the "Isaac Hull model," now in the Peabody-Essex Museum of Salem, Massachusetts, which I mentioned earlier in another thread. I haven't looked at that model for quite a few years, but I suspect the carvings on its stern are pretty crude. (All the other woodwork on it is.)

As you probably know, the Constitution has undergone lots of changes during her career; about the only thing we can be sure of regarding the decorations she wore during the War of 1812 is that they didn't look much like the ones she wears now. Any attempt to reconstruct her appearance during her glory years has to rely on research and guesswork.

In recent years some enthusiasts have cast some doubt on Campbell's work. That's probably inevitable, and no reflection on him; our understanding of historical subjects is always changing and, we hope, improving. I haven't read anything specific about the carvings. You might want to get in touch with the ship model club that meets at the Constitution Museum; I think it may have a website. (Another way to get in contact with it might be through the Nautical Research Guild.) I suspect the folks in that club have studied this subject pretty thoroughly.

I have a lot of respect for Campbell, and almost as much for the first-rate artisans at Revell who made the masters for those carvings. My inclination would be to leave the carvings as-is unless I found a mighty convincing reason to change them.