PORTER, DAVID (178o-1843), American naval officer, was born in Boston (Mass.), on Feb. 1, 1780. His father, David, and his uncle, Samuel, commanded American ships in the War of Independence. In 1796 he accompanied his father to the West Indies ; on a second and on a third voyage he was impressed on British vessels, but he escaped. He became a midshipman in the U.S. Navy in April, 1798; served on the "Constellation" and was midshipman of the foretop when the "Constellation" defeated the "Insurgente"; was promoted lieutenant in October, 1799, and was in four successful actions with French ships in this year.
In 1803, during the war with Tripoli, he was first lieutenant of the "Philadelphia" when that vessel grounded ; he was taken, prisoner, and was not released until June, 1805. He was com missioned master commandant in April, 1806; from 1807 to 1810 he served about New Orleans, where he captured several French privateers, and in 1812 was promoted captain. He commanded the frigate "Essex" in her famous voyage (1812-14). In the At lantic he captured seven brigs, one ship, on Aug. 13, 1812, the sloop "Alert," the first British war vessel taken in the War of 1812. Without orders from his superiors he then (February, 1813) rounded Cape Horn, and in the South Pacific captured many British whalers and took formal possession (November, 1813) of Nukahivah, the largest of the Marquesas islands. The United States, however, never asserting any claim to the island, it was in 1842, with the other Marquesas, annexed by France.
During most of February and March, 1814, he was blockaded by British frigates in the harbour of Valparaiso, and on March 28 was defeated. Released on parole, he sailed for New York.
He was a member of the new board of naval commissioners from 1815 until 1823, when he commanded a squadron sent to the West Indies to suppress piracy. One of his officers, who landed at Fajardo (or Foxardo), Porto Rico, in pursuit of a pirate, was imprisoned by the Spanish authorities on the charge of piracy. Porter, without reporting the incident or awaiting in structions, forced the authorities to apologize. He was recalled (December, 1824), court-martialled, and suspended for six months. In August, 1826 he resigned his commission, and until 1829 was commander-in-chief of the Mexican navy, then fighting Spain. President Andrew Jackson appointed him consul general to Algiers in 1830, and in 1831 created for him the post of chargé d'affaires at Constantinople, where in 1841 he became minister. He died in Pera on March 3, He wrote a Journal of a Cruise made to the Pacific Ocean in the U.S. Frigate "Essex" in 1812-13-14 (1815; 2nd ed., 1822), and Con stantinople and its Environs (1835), a valuable guide-book. See the Memoir of Commodore David Porter (Albany [N.Y.), 1875), by his son, Admiral David D. Porter.