James Findlay Schenck (11 June 1807 – 21 December 1882) was a US Navy Rear Admiral during the Mexican-American War, Cochinchina Campaign, and American Civil War.
Biography[]
James Findlay Schenck was born in Franklin, Ohio in 1807, the son of William Cortenus Schenck and the older brother of Robert C. Schenck. He left West Point before graduation and instead joined the US Navy in 1825, serving under Commodore Robert F. Stockton during the Mexican-American War, personally raising the first US flag in California at Santa Barbara in 1846. Schenck went on to serve in the East Indies Squadron, and, when the Vietnamese fort at Qui Nhon fired on his ships as they searched for a missing American ship, he bombarded the fortress on 31 July 1861, destroying it. During the American Civil War, he commanded a division of David Dixon Porter's fleet at the Second Battle of Fort Fisher in 1865, and he was promoted to Rear Admiral on 21 September 1868 and retired on 11 June 1869. He died at Dayton, Ohio in 1882 at the age of 75.