Somers Affair
Alleged US naval mutiny / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Somers Affair was an incident on board the American brig USS Somers while on a training mission in 1842 under Captain Alexander Slidell Mackenzie (1803-1848). Midshipman Philip Spencer (1823-1842) was accused of plotting a mutiny that would kill those who opposed him and then use the Somers as a very fast, well-armed pirate ship. Spencer was arrested and executed, along with two other alleged co-conspirators, Samuel Cromwell and Elisha Small, when the Somers was thirteen days away from shore. The three were hanged without a court-martial following a hastily assembled shipboard meeting. The ship then returned to New York. An inquiry and a court martial both cleared Mackenzie. There was enormous public attention, most of it unfavourable to Mackenzie.[1][2]
The case is particularly notable since Philip Spencer was the son of Secretary of War John C. Spencer.