The Alert (the ship made famous by the American author Richard Henry Dana, Jr.in his memoir Two Years Before the Mast), out of New London, shows no colors, and Semmes orders her to heave to, after demonstrating yet again the Alabama's 32-pounder.
The two had both read Two Years Before the Mast by fellow Massachusetts native Richard Henry Dana, Jr., about his voyage by sea to California, spending much time in San Diego, then a small Mexican pueblo.
In 1840, the American adventurer, writer and lawyer Richard Henry Dana, Jr. wrote of his experiences aboard ship off California in the 1830s in Two Years Before the Mast.
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San Diego during this period is vividly described by Richard Henry Dana, Jr. in his classic book Two Years Before the Mast.
Richard Henry Dana, Jr. in his novel Two Years Before the Mast commented on first coming ashore at San Diego that
Richard Henry Dana, Jr. (1815–1882), American lawyer and author of Two Years Before the Mast, son of Richard Henry Dana Sr. and father of Richard Henry Dana III,