TRACING THE PATH PODCAST

This episode details the strained relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom from 1717 to 1850, highlighting key historical friction points like Britain’s use of America as a penal colony and later naval conflicts.

It then intricately weaves in the story of the HMS Resolute, a British ship abandoned in the Arctic, salvaged by an American whaling captain, and subsequently purchased and refurbished by the U.S. government as a gesture of goodwill to the British Crown.

This act of diplomatic generosity, culminating in Queen Victoria’s gift of the Resolute Desk to the U.S. President, served as a crucial symbol of reconciliation and strengthening alliance between the two nations, despite their difficult past. The source emphasizes the long-term historical context, the importance of raw materials like oak for shipbuilding, and the eventual transformation of conflict into cooperation.

British / US Relations

The relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom had a rocky start from 1717 all the way to 1850. Could one man, one tree, or one boat be responsible for fixing that and becoming America’s strongest ally today?

Our story begins in 1584 when the British established a colony in Virginia and then 23 short years later began creating permanent English settlements.

For 120 years, these new lands served Great Britain well until one day the settlers began to feel like Great Britain was taking advantage of them. While most history books point to the Stamp Act of 1765, creating the no taxation without representation movement, the ill feelings began100 years earlier when Great Britain was using America as its dumping ground for its criminals.

Between 1615 and 1699, English courts sent approximately 2,300 criminals to the American colonies. And then in the 1700s, another 52,200.

But at no point did the colonies want the criminals. In fact, Benjamin Franklin threatened to send rattlesnakes back in exchange. For the colonies, it was hard to fight because the criminals did assist solving the labor shortage for tobacco farmers, for example.

 They were filling the US with criminals from the UK and slaves from Africa and the Caribbean. In 1717, American ports refused to accept anymore.

So, the British passed new legislation in 1718, which paid independent merchants to take criminals with them. For Britain, overcrowded prisons was a problem that the colonies were solving and allowed British courts to avoid the death sentence.

But that all changed in 1776 when America declared its independence, starting a war and completely shutting out British ships. Not being able to transport convicts was only a temporary speed bump; however, they’d soon find another place.

In 1807, tensions between the two nations heated up again.

The British and French had friction, this time resulting in Britain blockading French ports. Even though Britain was trying to hurt France, it also hurt the United States’ UK relationship because Americans relied on the French consumers to buy their products.

British ships also stopped American ships, boarded them, and impressed American soldiers into their army, starting the War of 1812 and further exacerbating the rift between the US and the UK.

And with Canada under British rule, America also battled the UK over the Great Lakes, the Maine/ New Brunswick border, and the Oregon/British Columbia boundary. And then in 1848, to make things even worse, the California Gold Rush spawned America to seek permission from Nicaragua to build a canal across Central America.

But the British didn’t like it and blocked it.

Needless to say, by 1850, the US UK relations were strained.

The Van Diemen’s Land Penal Colony

That brings us back 257 years to 1593 and the Holy Roman Empire. 

Anthony Van Diemen was the son of a Dutch Colonial Governor.

At the age of 23, he left home for Amsterdam and found work with the Dutch East India company. It didn’t take long for people to discover Van Diemen was smart. So they moved him first to Director of Commerce and then at age 42, he excelled to the Governor General of the Dutch East India Company.

During his 9 years tenure, Van Diemen truly broadened his reach, especially into the South Seas and coasts.

In 1642, he sent Abel Tasman in search of more great southern land to do business. On a trip traveling east from Mauritius to Australia, Tasmin’s route took him too far south to a new coast of Australia.

There he planted the Dutch East India Company flag and declared the area to be called Van Diemen’s Land. While Tasman believed he had found the West Coast of Australia, he actually had found an island, but it wouldn’t be for another 150 years before that discovery was made.

Even though America was the first British colony to declare independence, Britain’s hunger for expansion did not slow. In 1793, a mere 17 years after America declared its independence, Britain’s HMS Adventure landed at Van Diemen’s Land, where they once again moved the native population out to create a permanent English settlement.

Because Van Diemen’s Land was so remote, it seemed like the perfect new place to create a penal colony for all the criminals that needed to be sent away, like public hanging, community service, and time in jail.

Transportation was a sentence.

Typically, transportation was handed down in lieu of a death penalty sentence or when the courts were trying to avoid overcrowding in the local prisons. Sadly, for many, Transportation actually was a death sentence. Many died en route and others while in the penal colonies because there was no real incentive for the leaders to keep them alive.

In 1839, the British government made one of their military war heroes the governor of Van Diemen’s Land, John Franklin.

The Story of John Franklin

Franklin had already served Britain in the Napoleonic Wars, the Battle of Copenhagen, the Battle of Poora and Trulgar. and in the War of 1812. He was the kind of rugged personality that would do well as Governor.

During his term, approximately 75,000 convicts served time on Van Diemen’s Land. The population had ramped up from 400 in 1816 to over 30,000 in 1847.

Transportation as a legal sentence officially ended in 1852 with the last ship arriving in 1862 when only a thousand serving convicts remained.

Just after Transportation ended, Van Diemen’s Land became a self-governing island.

One of the first acts of the new legislature there was to change the name.

All over the world, Van Diemen’s Land was only associated with horror and fear, so, in 1856, to honor the young explorer who first stepped onto the island, from Western civilization, Abel Tasmin renamed it Tasmania, which takes us back to Van Diemen Land’s third governor, John Franklin.

In 1843, at the end of his tenure there, Franklin was asked to spearhead a new role. It was too far for British crews to sail around Africa or South America to get to Asia. So Franklin was to head north and seek a new Northwest Passage. 

His path would cross into the Arctic Circle over Canada. But somehow this rugged captain, his ships, and crew of 129 sailors never made it and never returned.

Their fate was a mystery.

Franklin’s wife, Jane, demanded the government send a rescue party. She made so much noise about it they finally agreed to send a flotilla of five ships to find evidence of Franklin and keep looking for a Northwest Passage. 

In 1852, Sir Edward Belcher commanded five ships to head northwest towards Baffin Bay. The ships were the HMS Intrepid, the HMS Pioneer, the HMS Assurance, the HMS Northstar, and the HMS Resolute.

The ships were outfitted with additional oak timbers to make them ice ready and the installation of internal heating. To be safe, Belcher had the HMS Northstar docked at Beachy Island which was to act as a central base.

The other four ships were to split up and scout different routes heading northwest, but none of them could match up to Mother Nature, and all of them got stuck in the ice, frozen in place, their crews disembarked and set up winter camps, but all of them soon abandoned their camps and ships, trekking back to the home base on foot.

When they returned home on the HMS Northstar, the rescue for John Franklin was called off, and Belcher was court marshaled for abandoning his ships.

The Importance of Oak

Belcher’s court marshal was somewhat symbolic of the importance of oak. 

No one knew this better than Denmark.

For in 1807, at the second battle of Copenhagen, the British not only bombarded the city, but took all its ships, ships that required 90,000 massive oak trees to build. In order to rebuild, Prince Philip IV declared a ban on felling all oak trees. 

And thinking ahead, they planted 16,000 trees in North Zealand, north of Copenhagen.

France used the same strategy in their Fortiers as did the UK and their oaks of trafalgar. And surprisingly in 1828, John Quincy Adams set aside land for the first federal tree farm. It set aside thousands of acres along the Gulf Coast of Alabama, now known as the Naval Live Oaks Reserve.

But it was actually the Swedes, in the 1830s, that were truly forward thinking. After the devastating Napoleonic Wars, the Swedish Crown sent out delegations to find ideal spots to plant oaks for future ship production.

They settled on a small island in the middle of their second largest lake, Visingsö. Oak trees were already growing on the island, so they were sure it was a good place. 

Over the next 10 years, Sweden planted 300,000 oak trees. Knowing they would be slow growing, but would provide the needs until the end of the 20th century. Which brings us to the next hero of our story who may be responsible for repairing the US UK rift.

The Presidential Resolute Desk

A few years after Belcher’s attempted rescue of John Franklin, an American whailing ship, the George Henry, was heading up to Baffin Bay when it spotted a ship. The ship looked abandoned and no one would return signals. 

So, Captain Buddington of the George Henry approached, with no one on board they boarded the boat only to find out what it really was. It was the HMS Resolute, a ship owned by the Royal Crown that had gotten frozen during the Belcher Rescue.

Butington knew the salvage value of the ship per maritime law which would be much more lucrative than the whailing journey.

So he split his crew in two and took 5 days to pump out the water and make it seaworthy before sailing it back to Connecticut. He arrived in New London, Connecticut on Christmas Eve 1855.

Buddington knew a wealthy philanthropist, Henry Grinell, who understood both American and British maritime salvage laws. So Grinell sent word to the British that HMS Resolute had been rescued.

And through salvage laws, Buddington was the new owner.

But the British crown bulked, claiming the ship for themselves, and while their attachment was emotional, they eventually acquiesed and awarded title to the George Henry ship.

However, Buddington didn’t want a ship as payment, so he had an idea. With the British wanting it so badly, perhaps the US government would be willing to buy it.

As stated earlier, by this time, the US/UK relations had been truly strained and needed something to heal the scar.

Perhaps returning the HMS Resolute would be the gesture both countries needed.

He contacted Senator LaFayette S. Foster to broach the subject with the government of buying the HMS Resolute and giving it back to Britain as a sign of Goodwill. Foster put together legislation to create a committee to investigate the idea. Then he and Senator James Mason submitted a joint proposal to Congress to buy the boat, fix it up, and return it.

It passed unanimously on June 24th, 1856 with a $40,000 price tag. (In today’s dollars, that would be 1 million.)

The US government then harvested their own oak trees to make the wood necessary to return HMS Resolute back to its former glory. It was finished and sent back to Britain on November 13th, 1856.

Arriving at Portsmouth, the ship was brought to the aisle of Wright with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert personally accepting the gift.

British media made it a huge deal, fussing over all the things the boys at the Brooklyn shipyards did to refurbish it.

After that, the HMS Resolute served 23 more years in the Royal Navy, but never again left British international waters.

In 1879, HMS Resolute was decommissioned and dismantled at the Chattam dockyards. Because oak wood is so strong and durable, ships weren’t dismantled for refuse, but for reuse. And this time, the Queen had an idea.

On June 11th, 1879, the British Admiralty launched a contest to design a piece of furniture to be made from the oak of the HMS Resolute and sent to the US president.

All matters of suggestions came in from a pen to a bed, but the winning design came from Morren Boyd and Blandford, an interior decorator, painter, and cabinet maker company.

The design would be a double pedestal desk.

The queen ordered that two desks be made and one table.

Then the 1300 lb desk made entirely of oak was sent to the United States by steamship.

Unlike the US announcing to the queen that it was returning the HMS Resolute, a large crate arrived at the White House on November 2nd, 1880, completely unannounced.

President Rutherford B. Hayes stood by as workmen opened the mysterious package. Inside was the most beautiful desk the president had ever seen with repeated carved panels all the way around.

Even the sender remained a mystery until they found a brass plaque that went with it. The brass plaque told the story of the HMS Resolute and said it was a gift from the Queen of England and Ireland.

Just about every US president has used the Resolute desk. It is a symbol of the relationship America has with its allies. Being made of oak, it is reminiscent of the USS Constitution or Old Ironsides that has been in service since 1797.

Also built completely from oak.

The word resolute means admirably purposeful, determined, and unwavering words that describe America.

You can see the resolute desk every time the US president addresses the nation from the Oval Office. And for it to exist, It needed criminals, oak trees, a rescue, a salvage, a peace offering, and a diplomatic thank you.