Portsmouth

In 1752, Col. William Crawford founded a town called Portsmouth after his hometown in England. He envisioned his new town as a place "very convenient for trade and navigation." The early settlers were merchants and ship owners who traded by the sea...or were craftsmen who built and rigged ships.

The world witnessed the ingenuity and industry of Portsmouth's shipbuilders, many of them descendants from those who had built the first sail frigates, the first ironclad, and the first battleship.

The first dry-docking in America occurred in 1833 at the Gosport Navy Yard in Portsmouth, now called the Norfolk Naval Shipyard-Portsmouth. The drydock is still in use today. The blue and white barge docked next to the battleship is put there to house the ship's crew and is called a quarter boat. 

Lightship Portsmouth was commissioned in 1915 and restored to it's original condition. Lightships were used as floating lighthouses off the shores along the Atlantic coast and in the Great Lakes. Men of the Lightship Service lived many months at sea. The official use of Lightships ended in 1985.

This Lighthouse Lens is housed in a 16-foot-wide pavilion. This lens is one of a few displayed outside a museum setting.This type of lens was invented in 1822 by French physicist Augustin Jean Fresnel. Rather than merely reflecting light, a Fresnel lens uses hundreds of prisms to bend and concentrate the light in a powerful beam. 

We take our bikes into the Olde Town Historic District which dates back into the 1700's.

Trinity Episcopal Church was erected on it's present site in 1762 as part of the original plan for Portsmouth. Many patriots dating back to the American Revolution are buried in the church graveyard.

The Confederate Memorial was completed in 1881. There are four statues which represent each branch of the Confederate military-Calvary, Artillery, Infantry and Navy.

We take a lunch break for some real homemade Italian cooking.

Bob reviews where we have been where we are going next.

Portsmouth seems to be a sleepy little seaport town that has managed to hold on to it's 18th and 19th-century history and charm. Even though we are on the road, it's nice to stop for a while and just look out the window.