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Cover Story |

JEWISH

PATRIOTS

As Baltimore and Maryland commemorate the American victory over the British in the War of 1812 and honor Francis Scott Key’s “The Star-Spangled Banner” — inspired by the sight of Fort McHenry’s tattered flag that “was still there” after the 1814 Battle of Baltimore — local institutions are shedding light on the contributions of Jewish patriots that helped secure the nation’s freedom. e Jewish Museum of Maryland’s new exhibit, “e A-Mazing Mendes Cohen, the Most Extraordinary Baltimorean You’ve Never Heard Of,” and the Levy Center and Jewish Chapel in Annapolis, in 22

Baltimore Jewish Times September 5, 2014

particular, are ensuring that these oen-overlooked heroes and their stories are remembered. Sometimes referred to as the second American Revolution, the War of 1812 permanently dissolved European strongholds on the United States and cemented the young nation as an entity in charge of its own destiny. In the years following it, a strong sense of American identity developed, and the flag became a powerful emblem of that identity. The Jewish museum casts the story of Mendes Cohen as paralleling that development of a national psyche, said its director, Marvin Pinkert. “Cohen is trying to answer for himself, ‘What

BALANCING JEWISH, AMERICAN IDENTITIES DURING THE WAR OF 1812 By Melissa Gerr

does it mean to be American and Jewish?’ He is the first generation [of his family] to be born in the United States of America,” said Pinkert. “That’s what the core [of the exhibit] is about, the process of finding one’s identity and the ways in which people build their identity.” Born in Richmond in 1796, Cohen died in Baltimore in 1879, living at the time a very long life. Of Sephardic descent, one facet of Cohen’s identity was that of soldier, and at the Battle of Baltimore — unlike Key, who viewed the engagement from a ship offshore — “Cohen wasn’t watching, he was in Fort McHenry,” said Pinkert. Cohen volunteered for Capt.

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Portrait of Mendes Cohen, 1818 by Joseph Wood. Courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

time as well,” explained Pinkert. “How did it happen that there was this tremendous transformation of life for Jews; the way the hope of equality and citizenship [arose] in both Europe and America?” The Cohen exhibit is interactive, and visitors are welcomed by a multimedia “ghost” of Cohen that ushers them through the journey; they have the opportunity to re-create some of Cohen’s experiences, such as the rescue of gunpowder during the Battle of Baltimore. But the message Pinkert hopes visitors come away with after seeing Cohen’s many incarnations unravel before them is to consider what comprises their own complex identity. “We started with what many people would consider an obscure piece of history,” said Pinkert, “and we ended with something that is focused on what touches our lives.”

Provided

‘SAVING MONTICELLO’

Mendes Cohen

Uriah Levy

Nicholson’s Baltimore Fencibles artillery unit (volunteers were not required to swear oath upon a New Testament Bible, something Cohen refused to do) and was one of three men who bravely retrieved the main supply of gunpowder from its storage inside the fort aer a bomb had landed in the magazine. Cohen and his fellow artillerymen saved the gunpowder supply — and the fort — from detonating. While his life story strongly relates to the wider regional commemoration of the War of 1812, the museum sees Cohen’s biography as a jumping-off point. The new exhibit urges visitors to consider the events after the war through the lens of American identity and the “light it casts on the entire century that follows,” said Pinkert, who curated the museum experience with Deborah Cardin. The physical exhibition space, designed as a spiral within a spiral, allows visitors to move through an outer loop that illustrates events in Cohen’s family life and that of his five brothers and a sister and an inner loop that displays simultaneous events in Baltimore and throughout the 19th-century Jewish world. Visitors can move back and forth between the storylines, which include hundreds of artifacts, letters and diaries from Cohen’s life, some on loan from the Maryland Historical Society and the Johns Hopkins University Archeological Museum. Pinkert described Cohen’s “almost unbelievable”

life experience as part “Forrest Gump” — he seemed to show up everywhere, including at London’s Westminster Abby for Queen Victoria’s 1838 coronation, at the Vatican for the installation of a new pope and even in Paris during the French Revolution. An adventurer, Cohen was also part “Indiana Jones,” said Pinkert with a laugh. Between 1829 and 1835, he visited England, Russia, Europe and Turkey, was the first American tourist in Jerusalem and even floated down the Nile River collecting Egyptian artifacts. Cohen seemed to repeatedly try on different identities, Pinkert said, as a businessman in the banking, lottery and railroad industries, and he was also a philanthropist as member of the Hebrew Benevolent Society, forerunner of today’s The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore. When Cohen returned from his travels, he became involved in politics and championed the Jew Bill, a law that dissolved the mandatory swearing-in upon a Christian Bible in order to take public office. He was a delegate in the Maryland General Assembly in 1847 and a delegate to the State Peace Convention during the Civil War. Cohen lived life as both a member of elite society as well as a persecuted minority. “The idea is to use Cohen’s adventure experience to illustrate the global experience of Jews of the

While Cohen was on land fighting for freedom at Fort McHenry, his naval counterpart, Uriah P. Levy, was at sea battling British forces. There is no documentation that the two Jewish servicemen knew each other, noted journalist, historian and author Marc Leepson, but Levy’s story has also drawn local interest. Leepson himself decided to study the man because of a persistent uncle who shared a hunch for a good story. On a return trip from visiting Jefferson’s Monticello home in Virginia, Leepson’s uncle asked, “Did you know that Jews owned Monticello? You should write a book about it.” Leepson shrugged it off, but his uncle kept harping on it, so “I said I’d write a magazine article and [Preservation Magazine] gave me the cover,” recalled the historian. “Sometimes the articles turn into books. I got so much response to that article, I wrote the book in 2001.” Leepson’s book, “Saving Monticello,” is Uriah P. Levy’s story, beginning when he was born in Philadelphia in 1792 as a fifth-generation Sephardic Jewish American — unique for that time — from great-great-grandparents who escaped Lisbon during the Inquisition of 1733. Levy was fiercely patriotic — growing up, his heroes were George Washington and John Paul Jones — and he ran away from home at age 10 to be a cabin boy on a ship, allegedly promising his parents he’d be home in time for his bar mitzvah, which he celebrated on time. Levy cultivated great skills as a sailor and also bought in as part owner of a merchant ship at age 19. en in 1812 at age 20, Levy joined the Navy to help defend his country. jewishtimes.com

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Library of Congress/LC-USZ62-61

A painting of the bombardment of Fort McHenry by the British fleet, as seen from the observatory under the command of Admirals Cochrane and Cockburn.

WAR OF 1812 AT A GLANCE Deep resentment of Britain’s attempts to control and interfere with American international trade was a major impetus for the U.S. Congress to declare war on Great Britain in June 1812. After defeating Napolean in April 1814, Britain turned its full military force on battle with the United States, invading by land and by sea. Americans fought hard to maintain their independence but were left demoralized due to a long series of defeats to the British forces. Then came a crushing blow in August 1814, when British troops set fire to Washington, D.C., the new nation’s capital, including the Capitol building and White House. After destroying the capital, the British focused on taking Baltimore as a vital seaport and access farther inland. British warships, lined up in Baltimore’s harbor with guns aimed at Fort McHenry, began firing rockets and bombs at the fort on Sept. 13, 1814. At dawn on Sept. 14, after 25 hours of bombardment, British troops began to retreat because of a threat to their supply lines. The stars and stripes still waved above Fort McHenry, prompting Francis Scott Key, who had been detained aboard a ship offshore, to write “The Star-Spangled Banner,” a poem dedicated to the victory of the U.S. over Britain. The poem eventually was set to music and adopted as the national anthem in March 1931.

STAR-SPANGLED SPECTACULAR Baltimore and Maryland will commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Baltimore and the birth of the national anthem with dozens of events, many of them free, from Sept. 10 to 16. The week-long event features tall ships and Navy ships in the harbor, Blue Angels flight demonstrations and festival villages set up at the Inner Harbor, Fort McHenry and at the Martin State Airport. On Saturday, Sept. 13, there will be a commemorative fireworks display over Fort McHenry and the Inner Harbor with more than 95,000 pyrotechnic effects. For more information, visit starspangled200.com.

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Baltimore Jewish Times September 5, 2014

Very adept as a seaman, he became assistant sailing master on the USS Argus, the most feared U.S. ship during the War of 1812, having captured more than 20 British vessels. But Levy then became a prisoner of war, was held in Dartmoor, England for 16 months and returned to the United States in 1815. Ultimately Levy served a 50-year career in the Navy, but like his imprisonment, it wasn’t all smooth sailing. “For one thing, the Navy was noted as a hotbed of anti-Semitism,” said Leepson. “He was courtmartialed five times and thrown out of the Navy twice, then reinstated by two presidents.” Leepson said the incidents over which he was court-martialed were typically “someone calling him a dirty Jew and [Levy] punching him in the face.” He was tried, arrested, and to be fair, Leepson said, he had a temper. “So he overcame a lot to keep that Navy career and become a commodore,” said Leepson. Levy also fought tirelessly to win the battle to end flogging as corporeal punishment on board ships. He thought it inhumane and demeaning to treat fellow servicemen that way, and, Leepson argued, his push to buck naval tradition could have been another reason so many colleagues disliked him. He also wrote a code of conduct adopted by the Navy that, among other things, states that officers must learn the names of the sailors they command. In battle and as an officer, Levy is widely regarded as a Jewish American naval hero, but the military wasn’t a full-time job. He also invested in real estate and in the 1820s purchased “a farming village on the island of Manhattan” that eventually became Greenwich Village. A devout admirer of Thomas Jefferson, he believed much of his own success was due to the third president’s belief in separation of church and state as well as Jefferson’s defense of religious tolerance. In 1834, Levy learned that Jefferson’s home, Monticello, was in severe disrepair and bought the 218-acre estate for $2,700 to restore and preserve it, marking his place as the first architectural preservationist in U.S. history. Visitors to Monticello have Levy to thank for its existence and can visit his mother Rebecca’s gravesite on the grounds as well. She acted as caretaker for the last few years of her life while Levy was at sea. After Levy’s death in 1862 in Brooklyn, N.Y., his nephew owned Monticello for a short time, and in 1923, he sold it to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation.

Melissa Gerr

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THE A-MAZING MENDES COHEN Opens Sept. 14 The Jewish Museum of Maryland at the Herbert Bearman Campus 15 Lloyd St., Baltimore For information: 410-732-6400 jewishmuseummd.org

URIAH P. LEVY CENTER AND JEWISH CHAPEL Naval Academy, Annapolis (Photo ID required) Closed from Friday evening to Monday morning For information: 410-268-0169; fojcusna.org

THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN JEWISH MILITARY HISTORY 1811 R St. NW, Washington For information: 202-265-6280 nmajmh.org

BOOK SIGNING WITH MARC LEEPSON Sunday, Sept. 14, noon to 3 p.m. Barnes & Noble Power Plant 601 E. Pratt St., Baltimore For information: 410-385-1709

JEWISH CHAPEL There is a mandatory religious ritual requirement at the Naval Academy, and when the institution opened in Annapolis in 1845, there was only a Christian-faith chapel, recounted David Hoffberger, who was involved in the early development of the Jewish chapel there and now serves as facilities manager for all chapels on the Navy yard. For decades, said Hoffberger, Jewish students at the academy had no choice but to attend the Christian chapel, but in 1938, midshipmen Seymour Einstein and Howard Schoenbaum asked permission from the senior chaplain to attend Kneseth Israel Congregation just two blocks from the academy. The synagogue agreed to conduct a special service on Sundays for the academy, giving birth to the “Jewish Church Party.” “So on Sundays, the Jewish kids formed up at the [Naval Academy] gate to march and go to services,” said Hoffberger, a member of Temple Beth Shalom in Annapolis. “That was the beginning of the Jewish program.” In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional to mandate religious observance in state-run institutions, and shortly aer, the academy gave Jewish

The Uriah P. Levy Chapel in Annapolis commemorates the first American Jewish naval hero.

students access to a three-room storage area they reconfigured into a chapel. In 1986, the academy inducted its first rabbi, who oen conducted services in the All Faiths Chapel on the yard. “Then in 1994, Friends of the Jewish Chapel was formed to support the needs of the rabbi and Jewish students,” said Hoffberger. “It was proof that there was more than a passing interest of having a dedicated Jewish chapel.” Fundraising began, designers were chosen and construction for the chapel commenced in November 2003; the first service was held in September 2005. The Jewish chapel’s current rabbi is Lt. Joshua Sherwin. e decision to name the chapel aer Commodore Uriah P. Levy seemed obvious, said Hoffberger. “It makes a lot of sense; he was the first Jewish naval war hero in American history.” Perhaps a quote by Levy, inscribed on a wall in the chapel, makes the decision to honor his dedication to service and memory crystal clear: “What will be the future of our Navy if others such as I refuse to serve because of the prejudices of a few? There will be other Hebrews, in times to come, of whom America will have need. By serving myself,

I will help give them a chance to serve.” Upon entry, the center aisle of the chapel was designed to give an illusion of walking up, and the walls and ceiling tower three stories above, allowing natural light through architecture that resembles the inside of an upturned ship hull. e floor and main walls are hewn from Jerusalem stone quarries in Ashkelon, Israel, and the tiles used throughout the center come from quarries all over the Jewish state. Thousands of people attended the chapel’s dedication, including representatives from the Israel Defense Forces who presented a Torah, members of Congress, representatives from the city of Annapolis and many other community notables, said Hoffberger. The rest of the Levy Center contains a common study and reading area and a small museum that details the life and accomplishments of Commodore Levy, including many artifacts. The naval honor court is also housed on the second floor, and “the second level [of the chapel] is open 24 hours a day to talk, think, worship,” said Hoffberger. “It was designed so that all midshipmen would feel welcome.” JT [email protected]

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