Sea of Glory

United States.
    Martin Van Buren, known as “the little magician,” appeared quite pleased to see Wilkes. He quickly promised to get him his water casks. Then he asked a question: “Why is there such opposition against you?” Wilkes said he thought it had to do with his being so junior a lieutenant. Van Buren told him that over the last few weeks he had been visited by a virtual parade of captains protesting his appointment. Just that morning Commodore Isaac Chauncey, president of the Navy Board, had urged him to suspend Wilkes. The commodore had claimed that “this young Lieut[enant] did not ask nor would he receive any advice which had been proffered him. No one knew what he was doing.” Van Buren assured Wilkes that he had his total support and encouraged him to “come direct to me” if he encountered any more trouble.
    In addition to preparing six vessels for a voyage around the world and recruiting the necessary officers and men, Wilkes had to prepare the instruments, including twenty-four chronometers. As head of the physical sciences department, he also had several pendulum experiments to conduct before the Expedition could sail. A pendulum is used to determine the force of gravity; by comparing different readings at different locations around the globe, it is possible to determine the contours of the earth, as well as the density of its interior. In the grass field that stretched from the back of his house to the Capitol building, Wilkes erected “Pendulum Houses,” temporary shelters that would accompany them on their travels. To assist him, Wilkes assembled a group of six passed midshipmen, including William Reynolds, William May (who had successfully retaken his examination), and several others from the Porpoise. For Wilkes, this little community of science on a hill, so near to his own home (where Jane was now almost eight months pregnant), seems to have provided a haven from the storm.
    With departure set for August 10, Reynolds wrote his sister Lydia to ask for her help in preparing the clothing he would need. He had left a pair of his red cotton drawers at home, and he requested at least eight more just like it. He also put in orders for eighteen pairs of thin cotton socks, twelve calico shirts, two bedsheets, four pillowcases, and six woolen stockings. He asked that she find his white hat; he would need it to shield himself from the brutal Polynesian sun. He fully expected the voyage to transform him into “a weather beaten, wrinkled, uncouth savage. [M]ay you all have a pleasant time in civilizing me [on my return].”
    Every third night, Reynolds and May stayed up until four in the morning, assisting Wilkes with his observations while the other four passed midshipmen split the other two nights between them. “The nights pass most swiftly & pleasantly,” he wrote. “Everything is so interesting & occupies the attention so entirely that time flies. I breakfast at the fashionable hour of 12.” For Wilkes it meant that he was almost never asleep, and Reynolds and the others developed an almost reverential awe of their commander. “I like Captain Wilkes very much,” Reynolds wrote Lydia. “He is a most wonderful man, possesses a vast deal of knowledge, and has a talent for everything.”
    As he had told Poinsett, Wilkes planned to rely on a corps of young, energetic officers who had just passed their examinations. On most naval vessels, a passed midshipman was relegated to a subordinate role, but on the Exploring Expedition a different standard would prevail. “[T]he Passed Midshipmen will perform the duties of Lieutenants,” Reynolds excitedly wrote Lydia. Wilkes felt it was important that the more senior passed midshipmen be given acting appointments, temporary promotions that reflected their increased responsibilities during the voyage. Soon after Poinsett had been struck down by illness, Mahlon Dickerson was replaced by James Paulding as secretary of the navy. In July, Wilkes asked Paulding to grant the rank of acting lieutenant to ten of the passed midshipmen. Unfortunately Reynolds and May were too far down the list to be included.
    Wilkes was under the impression that Poinsett had already agreed that he and his second-in-command William Hudson would be given acting appointments as captains. Since it would leapfrog both of them past the rank of commander, the appointments would undoubtedly infuriate the already irate navy hierarchy. But it would have been just as scandalous to