Published: March 29, 2008 08:27 am         

'Traitor' will find a measure of dignity 147 years later

SALEM, Mass. — The visitors from Virginia climbed the stairs of the Hawthorne Hotel and entered a sanctuary few have seen — the Salem Marine Society.



Formed in 1766 by Salem sea captains, the world's third-oldest marine society still meets inside a replica ship's cabin on the hotel roof. The visitors undoubtedly cast their eyes on the teak floor, the faux mast encircled by a rack of wine glasses, portraits of old sea captains and, on the far wall, a painting of navigator Nathaniel Bowditch, a Salem legend.



But its' not likely any of that caught their eye. What they saw, and may never forget, was the portrait of Virginia native Matthew Fontaine Maury.



It must have been, for them, a horrifying spectacle. Maury's picture was on the wall, but facing backward and hanging upside down. Next to it was a plaque with the word "traitor."



"I felt sorry for him," said Rebecca Starling, who organized the trip for members of the Mary Washington Branch of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities, which is based in Maury's hometown of Fredericksburg, Va. "I felt sorry that after so long he couldn't have a little bit of respect."



That moment in the fall of 2006 was something of an epiphany for the visitors from Virginia. It triggered a Maury research project by their organization and a campaign to restore the "pathfinder of the seas" to some degree of dignity in Salem, a city where he was once revered and later stricken from the records.



Although Maury is an obscure, neglected historical figure, even in his native South, make no mistake — he was once a hero of the first rank.



There is a monument to him in Richmond, Va., a large edifice in a row of monuments to the Confederate pantheon — Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Jeb Stuart. There were a school, street, stadium and Civil War Roundtable named for Maury in Fredericksburg. There is even a Maury Hall at the U.S. Naval Academy.



Fittingly, he is buried between two presidents — James Monroe and James Tyler.





Worldwide stature



"Arguably, he was one of the best-known Americans in the world," said G. Scott Walker, the research historian on the Maury project for the Virginia historical group.



As far as anyone knows, Maury never visited Salem, but he was as important in this seafaring city as any ship's captain or owner, maybe even as important as Bowditch.



Maury, a mathematical genius, was the first superintendent of the U.S. Navy Department of Charts, which became the U.S. Naval Observatory. In that role, he studied the dusty captains' logs that piled up over decades and were largely ignored.



From that information, he published his own seminal works on navigation and sailing directions, along with charts on wind and ocean currents. His "Treatise on Navigation" replaced Bowditch's book as the U.S. Navy's bible. His work was shared with marine societies around the world.



His findings revolutionized ocean travel, officials said, saving valuable days — and dollars — for merchant ships, along with countless lives. So revered was Maury that in 1859, the Salem Marine Society voted him its first honorary membership, an honor also bestowed just days earlier by the East India Marine Society, the forerunner of the Peabody Essex Museum.





'Traitor'



At the start of the Civil War, however, Maury fell from grace in the North. When Virginia seceded from the Union in 1861, its native son resigned his naval commission and joined the Confederacy.



He was put in charge of harbor and river defenses, engineered the mining of Southern waterways, and designed small armed vessels known as "Maury boats." Later he was sent to England, where he acquired vessels that preyed on Union ships — including Salem vessels.



"As much as Maury helped us make an awful lot of money, the Confederate raiders had a huge (role) in destroying us," said Allan Vaughan, clerk of the Salem Marine Society.



On May 30, 1861, the Marine Society proclaimed Maury a traitor who had "deserted his post" and ordered that his picture "be reversed & that it be hung in our room head down." The East India Marine Society also revoked his membership and banished his portrait to "some obscure corner of the building," according to its records.



Maury continued in that unflattering pose until the bicentennial of the Salem Marine Society in 1966. Noting that the Civil War had been over for a century, a member boldly called for Maury to be pardoned and his picture turned around. The member was shouted down.



"The room instantaneously erupted into an uproar," according to a history of the Salem Marine Society. "Volatile expressions of indignant outrage. Sardonic laughter. Vitriolic explosions of wrath. Boos. Hisses. Bronx cheers. No! No! No! Never!"



The controversy was laid to rest until now — until visitors from Virginia, staying at the Hawthorne Hotel, ventured to the roof and found their hero upside down.





Room for compromise



After months of research and correspondence with the Salem Marine Society, the Mary Washington Branch of the APVA offered a compromise. Keep Maury as he is, but hang a second portrait and display a small exhibit detailing his accomplishments in navigation and science.



On Jan. 31, the Salem Marine Society approved the proposal, giving Maury his first measure of dignity here in 147 years. But it was done with the clear understanding that the original action would not be rescinded.



After all these years, there are still strong feelings. There will be no about-face on Mr. Maury.



"If it does come up for a vote, I'm going to blackball him," Vaughan said.



Two ceremonial events are scheduled this year to mark the Maury-torium. In two weeks, Vaughan and another official from the Salem Marine Society will attend a reception in Fredericksburg. In October, representatives from the APVA will come to Salem to present the new Maury portrait and exhibit materials at the annual dinner of the Marine Society.



And so, next fall, there will be two portraits of Maury at the Salem Marine Society — one hanging right-side-up and facing forward, and the other upside-down and backward.



As much as the Virginia group wants Maury's good name restored, there appear to be no hard feelings that "the pathfinder of the seas" will remain upside down. Neither side, it seems, wants to tamper with history.



"Our letter wasn't: 'Turn that damn thing back around, you Yankees!'" said Scott, the APVA's research historian. "It wasn't anything like that. It was: 'Keep the original turned around because it's a great story. My God, what a story!'"



Tom Dalton writes for The Salem (Mass.) News.