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Nicholson, Reginald (Reggie), RADM USN(Ret).
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Contact Info
Home Town Washington, DC
Date of Passing Dec 19, 1939
Location of Interment Arlington National Cemetery (VLM) - Arlington, Virginia
Rear Admiral Reginald Fairfax Nicholson, U.S.N. (Ret.) American Civil War, Spanish American War, Great White Fleet, World War I
Commanded: USS Rowan (TB-8), USS Farragut (TB-11), USS Tacoma (CL-20), USS Nebraska (BB-14), Yangtze Patrol, and the United States Asiatic Fleet.
Battles/wars: American Civil War the Union Blockade, Spanish–American War the Battle of Santiago de Cuba, and World War I.
Rear Admiral Reginald Fairfax Nicholson fought in the American Civil War and Spanish-American War, was Commander-in-Chief of the United States Asiatic Fleet, and came out of retirement during World War I to serve as the first U.S. naval attaché to Ecuador and Peru. He retired as the last active-duty U.S. Navy officer to have served in the American Civil War.
Naval career:
Nicholson was born in Washington, D.C., on 15 December 1852, the son of U.S. Navy Commodore Somerville Nicholson (1822-1905) and the former Hannah Maria Jones (1837-1897). His first U.S. Navy service came in 1864, when at the age of 12 he left school to enlist in the Navy as an orderly for his father, Somerville Nicholson, who was the commanding officer of the steamer USS State of Georgia, then operating as part of the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. While Nicholson was aboard State of Georgia, the ship blockaded Wilmington, North Carolina, and fought engagements with Confederate fortifications guarding the city. After 30 days, Nicholson left the ship and returned to school.
Five years later, Nicholson was appointed from the District of Columbia as a midshipman on 30 September 1869 and entered the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. He graduated on 31 May 1873 with the rank of midshipman.
Nicholson's first assignment was to the signals office in 1873. Promoted to ensign on 16 July 1874, he served aboard the sidewheel steam frigate USS Powhatan in the North Atlantic Squadron from 1875 to 1877. He then had ordnance duty at the Washington Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., from 1877 to 1878.
From 1878 to 1882, Nicholson was aboard the sloop-of-war USS Portsmouth, then serving as a training ship, and was promoted to master on 22 January 1880. He then performed duty at the United States Hydrographic Office from 1882 to 1885, being promoted while there to lieutenant, junior grade, on 3 March 1883. He returned to sea aboard the new steam sloop-of-war USS Mohican in the Pacific Squadron from 1885 to 1888, and was promoted to lieutenant on 17 January 1886. After leaving Mohican, he reported to the Washington Navy Yard for another tour of ordnance duty in 1888.
Nicholson was assigned to the new monitor USS Monterey in February 1893, and to the steamer USS Thetis in January 1895. He returned to the Washington Navy Yard for a third tour there in December 1895.
In December 1897, Nicholson reported for duty aboard the battleship USS Oregon, and he served as her chief navigation officer during her spectacular voyage from the United States West Coast around Cape Horn to Cuba at the outset of the Spanish-American War in 1898. On 1 October 1898, he was assigned to the new torpedo boat USS Farragut, then fitting out. Promoted to lieutenant commander on 3 March 1899, he became the first commanding officer of the new torpedo boat USS Rowan on 1 April 1899, then took command of Farragut when she was commissioned on 5 June 1899. He remained in command of Farragut until 1901.
Nicholson next served in the Bureau of Navigation and was promoted to commander on 17 September 1902. In 1903 he was assigned to the new protected cruiser USS Tacoma, then under construction at Union Iron Works in Mare Island, California, and became her first commanding officer when she was commissioned on 30 January 1904, remaining aboard her until December 1905. He began another tour of duty in the Bureau of Navigation on 22 June 1906, remaining there into 1907. He was promoted to captain on 1 July 1907.
Nicholson took command of the battleship USS Nebraska in 1907 and commanded her during Nebraska's participation in the 1907-1909 round-the-world cruise of the U.S. Navy's Great White Fleet, which she joined in May 1908. After the conclusion of the voyage in 1909, President William Howard Taft appointed him on 1 December 1909 for a four-year tour as Chief of the Bureau of Navigation in Washington, D.C.
Nicholson was promoted to rear admiral on 19 May 1911. In mid-1911, he was chosen to end his tour at the Bureau of Navigation early and succeed Rear Admiral Joseph B. Murdock as commander-in-chief of the U.S. Asiatic Fleet as of November 1911, but United States Secretary of State Philander C. Knox requested that Murdock be kept on as fleet commander to allow continuity during unrest in China related to the Xinhai Revolution of that year. Meanwhile, United States Secretary of the Navy George von Lengerke Meyer had already selected Nicholson's successor as Chief of the Bureau of Navigation. President Taft explained the situation to Nicholson, who was dispatched to the Asiatic Fleet to command its Yangtze Patrol. In February 1912, with the Chinese crisis having abated, it was again proposed that Nicholson succeed Murdock, but Knox again asked that Murdock stay on as fleet commander-in-chief. On 20 July 1912, Nicholson finally received orders to take command of the fleet, and he relieved Murdock on 24 July 1912.
Relinquishing command of the Asiatic Fleet on 3 May 1914, Nicholson became a member of the General Board of the United States Navy until he retired from the Navy upon reaching the statutory retirement age of 62 on 15 December 1914. At the time, he was the last U.S. Navy officer on active duty to have seen service in the American Civil War.
When the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Nicholson was recalled to active duty. He headed a naval mission to Chile and served as the first American naval attaché to Ecuador and Peru from 7 November 1917 to 25 November 1919 before returning to retirement.
Personal life:
Nicholson's first wife was the former Annie Ellen Heap (1855-1889), whom he married on 7 July 1877. They had two children, Mary Jane Nicholson Durell (1878-1962) and Reginald Fairfax Nicholson (1879-1890). After the death of his first wife, Nicholson married the former Elizabeth Code (26 July 1877 - 20 September 1955) on 2 June 1900.
Death:
Nicholson died of a heart attack at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, on 19 December 1939. He is buried with his second wife at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.
Commemoration:
It was reported in January 1918 that after purchasing the steamer Northland, the Pacific Steamship Company had renamed her Admiral Nicholson in honor of Nicholson.
Other Comments:
Last Naval Officer Of Civil War Dies WASHINGTON, December 19, 1939, UP
Rear Admiral Reginald Fairfax Nicholson, retired, last naval officer surviving from the Civil War, died today at the age of 87. Admiral Nicholson was a youthful captain's clerk in 1864 aboard the USS State of Georgia and later served in both the Spanish-American and World Wars. He was navigator of the Oregon on its famous dash around Cape Horn in 1898 to join the Atlantic squadron and took part in the subsequent battle of Santiago, Cuba. Before his retirement in 1914, Admiral Nicholson was chief of the Navy's Bureau of Navigation and commander-in-chief of the Asiatic Fleet. He was recalled to duty in the World War as naval attache at Santiago Chile, Lima Peru, and Quito Ecuador.
Description The Spanish–American War (Spanish: Guerra hispano-estadounidense or Guerra hispano-americana; Filipino: Digmaang Espanyol-Amerikano) was a conflict fought between Spain and the United States in 1898. Hostilities began in the aftermath of the internal explosion of the USS Maine in Havana harbor in Cuba leading to United States intervention in the Cuban War of Independence. American acquisition of Spain's Pacific possessions led to its involvement in the Philippine Revolution and ultimately in the Philippine–American War.
Revolts had been occurring for some years in Cuba against Spanish rule. The U.S. later backed these revolts upon entering the Spanish–American War. There had been war scares before, as in the Virginius Affair in 1873. In the late 1890s, US public opinion was agitated by anti-Spanish propaganda led by newspaper publishers such as Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst which used yellow journalism to call for war. The business community across the United States had just recovered from a deep depression, and feared that a war would reverse the gains. They lobbied vigorously against going to war.
The US Navy battleship Maine was mysteriously sunk in Havana harbor; political pressures from the Democratic Party pushed the administration of Republican President William McKinley into a war that he had wished to avoid.[9] Spain promised time and time again that it would reform, but never delivered. The United States sent an ultimatum to Spain demanding that it surrender control of Cuba. First Madrid declared war, and Washington then followed suit.
The main issue was Cuban independence; the ten-week war was fought in both the Caribbean and the Pacific. US naval power proved decisive, allowing expeditionary forces to disembark in Cuba against a Spanish garrison already facing nationwide Cuban insurgent attacks and further wasted by yellow fever. Numerically superior Cuban, Philippine, and US forces obtained the surrender of Santiago de Cuba and Manila despite the good performance of some Spanish infantry units and fierce fighting for positions such as San Juan Hill. Madrid sued for peace with two obsolete Spanish squadrons sunk in Santiago de Cuba and Manila Bay and a third, more modern fleet recalled home to protect the Spanish coasts.
The result was the 1898 Treaty of Paris, negotiated on terms favorable to the US which allowed it temporary control of Cuba and ceded ownership of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippine islands. The cession of the Philippines involved payment of $20 million ($575,760,000 today) to Spain by the US to cover infrastructure owned by Spain.
The defeat and collapse of the Spanish Empire was a profound shock to Spain's national psyche, and provoked a thorough philosophical and artistic revaluation of Spanish society known as the Generation of '98.[ The United States gained several island possessions spanning the globe and a rancorous new debate over the wisdom of expansionism. It was one of only five US wars (against a total of eleven sovereign states) to have been formally declared by Congress.