The HARTFORD arrived in Charleston in October of 1912. She became a fixture on the waterfront at the Navy Yard, as station ship and receiving ship for the Sixth Naval District. She remained at the yard until 1938.
She was a big vessel for a wooden man-of-war, 225 feet long with a forty-four-foot beam and a displacement of 2,900 tons. Built in the boston Navy Yard in 1858, she served in the Far East until the Civil War began. In January of 1862, she became Farragut's flagship of the West Gulf Blockading Squadron. Her wartime exploits made her one of the most famous American vessels of the period.
When the war ended, she returned to the Far East and later served as flagship of the North Atlantic Station. The last thirteen years before the turn of the century she spent at Mare Island, where she was used as a training ship and later completely rebuilt. In October of 1899, she returned to the Atlantic coast where she was used to train midshipmen until being transferred to Charleston in 1912, replacing the Baltimore as station ship.
At Charleston, she served as a home for officers and crewmen of ships at the yard and as headquarters for the Commandant of the Sixth Naval District.
In 1918, the young artist Norman Rockwell stayed aboard for a few weeks during his brief tour of duty at the Navy Yard.
The HARTFORD stayed at the yard through the twenties and the Depression years. In 1937 and 1938, she was extensively refurbished with funds provided by the WPA. The old vessel spent the next seven years in Washington, DC. In 1945, she was moved to the Norfolk Naval Shipyard where she sank at her berth in 1956 and was subsequently dismantled.
