A frequent and favored subject of C. Myron Clark's were the swift Yankee frigates of the early American Navy. Of the five paintings by Clark on permanent display in the Peabody Museum collection in Salem, Massachusetts, three depict "Old Ironsides", the U.S. Frigate CONSTITUTION. Renowned naval architect B.B. Crowninshield was a major collector of Clark's work and he is noted for donating the bulk of the Peabody's collection of canvases by this artist.
Although the ship portrayed in this painting is configured without readily shown identification, it is recorded in the verbal tradition as U.S.S. CONSTELLATION, one of the "fast Forty-Fours" of the First American Naval Squadron. Alongside PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES and CONSTITUTION, these frigates established America as a true naval power with their swift and lethal dominance in celebrated engagements against the Barbary pirates and later by successfully taking on the formidable British Navy. Here she embarks and disembark Marines in a formal changing of the force.p>
