from jamming them as had happened during the First Battle of Charleston Harbor in April 1863. Construction and career Miantonomoh, named after the Narragansett chief, Miantonomoh, was laid down in 1862 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, New York, launched on 15 August 1863, and commissioned on 15 September 1865 with Commander Daniel Ammen in command. Miantonomoh was assigned to the North Atlantic Squadron and made a brief cruise along the East Coast before she was decommissioned at the Washington Navy Yard. In late April 1866 she steamed to New York and was overhauled there in preparation for a voyage across the North Atlantic on a diplomatic visit to Russia. Now under the command of Commander John Beaumont, the monitor departed on 6 May escorted by the paddle steamers and . After a brief stop at Halifax, Nova Scotia, the ships reached St. John's, Newfoundland, on 23 May. There Miantonomoh embarked the Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Gustavus Fox on 3 June and the British naval attaché, Captain John Bythesea, VC. The nominal reason for the voyage was an instruction by Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles that Fox was to deliver to Tsar Alexander II of Russia a copy of a Joint Resolution of the Congress which expressed "deep regret" at the recent attempt by Dmitry Karakozov on the Tsar's life and congratulations on his escape from harm. The voyage was also intended to reciprocate lengthy visits by squadrons of the Imperial Russian Navy to New York and San Francisco during the Civil War and to enhance the prestige of the United States among the European powers. Welles also requested that Fox collect information on naval developments in Europe. Departing St. John's on 5 June, the three ships crossed the Atlantic in less than 11 days. Fox described the first ocean crossing of an ironclad monitor as "a pleasant trip." During much of the voyage she was towed by Augusta "as a matter of convenience and precaution rather than necessity", although a shortage of coal may have played a role. Bythesea thought that the weather was almost too fine to test the monitor's seaworthiness and found that her interior was very dry. After reaching Queenstown on 16 June, where the ships were met by the British broadside ironclads and , they proceeded to Portsmouth, arriving on the 23rd. Miantonomoh was an object of great curiosity to the British public and