Benjamin Franklin Tracy

Benjamin Franklin Tracy (26 April, 1830 – 6 August, 1915) served as the thirty-second Secretary of the Navy from 1889 through 1893.

Life & Career

This article includes text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships

Tracy was born on 5 April 1830, near Oswego, New York. He was reared on a farm and educated at Oswego Academy. Admitted to the New York Bar in 1851, Tracy served as district attorney of Tioga County, New York from 1853 to 1859. Elected to the State Assembly in 1861, he urged full support of the national government in the Civil War.

In the summer of 1862, Tracy raised the 109th and 137th New York Volunteer Regiments and took the field as a Colonel with the former. During the bloody Wilderness Campaign in the spring of 1864, he led his troops with conspicuous gallantry. Tracy's bravery and steadfastness in the arduous and difficult campaign won him the brevet rank of Brigadier-General, and the Medal of Honor for his actions on 6 May, 1864. His citation reads as follows: "Seized the colors and led the regiment when other regiments had retired and then reformed his line and held it." His successor as Secretary of the Navy, Hilary A. Herbert, was also present at the battle fighting for the Confederacy.

For the remainder of the war, Tracy served as a colonel in the 127th Regiment and commanded the military prison and recruiting camp at Elmira, New York.

In 1866, after the end of the Civil War, President Andrew Johnson appointed Tracy district attorney for the eastern district of New York. In 1873, he resumed his private practice in Brooklyn. From 1881 to 1882, he assumed duties as judge of the New York Court of Appeals.

In 1889, President Benjamin Harrison appointed the lawyer to the post of Secretary of the Navy. Kenneth Hagan described Tracy "an ardent imperialist and navalist of the Mahanian stripe." To this end, Tracy was determined "to end the policy of building small, substandard capital ships" such as the Texas and Maine. Tracy entered at once into the program of building up the Navy with new, modern ships and of enacting much-needed reforms. During his administration, battleships Iowa, Indiana, Massachusetts, and Oregon and cruiser Brooklyn were completed or authorized. He also organized the naval militia and established the Board of Construction and Repair to correlate the work of various bureaus.

Following an active career in public service and leaving the Navy in better shape than he had found it upon taking office as Secretary, Tracy retired to his Tioga County farm where he raised horses until his death on 6 August, 1915. The Navy named the new Destroyer No. 214 in honor of the late Secretary of the Navy in 1919.

See Also

• Wikipedia

Bibliography

• Cooling, Benjamin F. (1973). Benjamin Franklin Tracy: Father of the American Fighting Navy. Hamden, CT: Archon Books.
• Friedman, Norman (1985). U.S. Battleships: An Illustrated Design History. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-715-1. (on Amazon.com).
• Hagan, Kenneth J. (1992). This People's Navy: The Making of American Sea Power. Paperback ed. New York: The Free Press.

Papers

• Papers in possession of the United States Library of Congress

Naval Appointments
Preceded by William C. Whitney	Secretary of the Navy 6 Mar, 1889 – 4 Mar, 1893	Succeeded by Hilary A. Herbert