Farragut: Where America's First Admiral Was Born
Near Knoxville, Tennessee
The community just west of Knoxville takes its name from David Glasgow Farragut, the first admiral in the history of the United States Navy, who was born near here on July fifth, eighteen oh one, at Lowe's Ferry along the Holston River.
His father, George Farragut, was a Spanish-born merchant captain who had fought for the American colonies in the Revolution and received land grants along the Tennessee frontier. David was commissioned a midshipman at the age of nine and went on to a career spanning the War of eighteen twelve through the Civil War.
He is remembered most for two things: the Battle of Mobile Bay in eighteen sixty-four, where he reportedly ordered his fleet forward past Confederate mines with the line 'Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead,' and for receiving the newly created rank of Vice Admiral in eighteen sixty-four and full Admiral in eighteen sixty-six. The community incorporated in the nineteen eighties decided to take his name, making this one of the few American suburbs named for a naval officer born close to the ground it occupies.
