Why is Annapolis Celebrating Navy’s Birthday?

Annapolis’ relationship with the Naval Academy goes WAY back to a mutiny by Midshipman Philip Spencer and two co-conspirators, their hanging on the yardarm and the subsequent decision to train midshipmen BEFORE they were sent out on ships. In 1845, the Secretary of the Navy, George Bancroft, decided that Annapolis was a “healthy and secluded” location to rescue midshipmen from the “temptations and distractions that necessarily connect with a large and populous city.”