CASTINE, Maine - Chrissy Allen of Blue Hill will be among those excited to see the arrival today in Castine of a French ship, Hermione - though perhaps not as excited as George Washington was when he saw the original, 32-gun frigate.
Chrissy Allen is an event coordinator for the visit of the replica French frigate, Hermione. It will arrive in Castine as part of a parade of sail this afternoon between 2 and 4 o'clock.
Chrissy Allen: "The French were coming. And the French were going to bring support to aid America's fight for freedom. At the time, the Hermione was state-of-the-art. It was one of the fastest warships. And, so, it came across (the Atlantic) in record time with more ships on its tail, and she was very critical in us gaining our freedom."
Irwin Gratz: "Of course, this is a replica of the original ship. How did it come to be built?"
Chrissy Allen: "There is a small group in France, about 20 years ago, who decided that they really wanted to rebuild this ship in celebration of the remaining friendship between France and the United States. And so, with a lot of hard work, and a lot of fundraising, they built this ship. The ship originally, back in 1780, only took one year to build, but this time around it took them closer to 20 years, because they did it by the same methods that they would have used during the Revolutionary War, so, they had to relearn how to do some of those things."
Irwin Gratz: "Yeah, just a little bit rusty, I guess."
Chrissy Allen: "A little bit (chuckles)."
Irwin Gratz: "What's bringing it to the United States this year?"
Chrissy Allen: "Well, they decided they really wanted to recreate the journey of the original Hermione and go to some of those ports that were so critical during the Revolutionary War. So, when she came across, her first stop was in Virginia. And she went to places like Yorktown and Mount Vernon, of course, and she traveled up the coast. She's been in Boston and she's coming to Castine, because a local, by the name of David Adams who's on the board of the Castine Historical Society, had seen a map that showed the Hermione in the Castine Harbor. And so he went to a fundraiser for Friends of Hermione and made a proposal that they should come to Castine as well, which, by comparison to Boston and New York, is a pretty small stop. But they agreed that it was really important because Castine had such a history with France, and with the Revolutionary War."
Irwin Gratz: "Is the area going to do something special for her arrival?"
Chrissy Allen: "Yes. We already have events underway, which started on Saturday. And, of course, Bastille Day is when she's arriving. She'll be ushered into the harbor with a big parade of boats and greeted at the town dock with lots of music celebrating the French and Acadian heritage of this area. We have lots of local musicians, which is really fabulous, we'll have fireworks that evening, we'll have a parade downtown, so any families with young people in town who'd like to be part of our parade are welcome to join us on the town commons. And then we're also going to continue the celebration on Wednesday to further explore the cultures of this area, like the Penobscot Nation, and to celebrate the maritime history with lots of different performance groups, so we're very excited. Lots of events, all free and open to the public. We'll have parking and we'll have free shuttles from Bucksport High School and Middle School as well, and people can find out about those on our website."
Irwin Gratz: "Now, as you may know, she may have done this elsewhere, but I have read that when she arrived in New York, she fired off a couple of cannon salutes."
Chrissy Allen: "Yeah, the crew really likes shooting off those cannons. It's kind of a fun and startling thing to have happen at the ports of call, for sure."
Irwin Gratz: "Do you know where Hermione is going after she leaves Castine?"
Chrissy Allen: "Yes. She's going to Lunnenberg, in Nova Scotia, and then she will go on to sail across the Atlantic."
Learn more about the Hermione visit to Castine.
Learn more about the replica of the Hermione.
