The Jeffersonian Gunboats No. 137 and No. 138 Shipwrecks, submerged in the waters of Calvert County, Maryland, are of exceptional historical significance as rare physical remnants of the United States' early naval defense strategy and the War of 1812. Constructed under President Thomas Jefferson's gunboat program, which favored a defensive, cost-effective coastal defense force of small, shallow-draft vessels over a large blue-water navy, these gunboats embody the political and military philosophies of the early Republic. During the War of 1812, these vessels were integrated into Commodore Joshua Barney's celebrated Chesapeake Bay Flotilla, which engaged in a series of daring skirmishes against the vastly superior British Royal Navy. In August 1814, as British forces advanced toward Washington, D.C., Barney ordered his flotilla scuttled in the Patuxent River to prevent the vessels from falling into enemy hands, securing their place in the dramatic climax of the Chesapeake Campaign.

From an archaeological perspective, the shipwrecks of Gunboats No. 137 and No. 138 serve as invaluable time capsules of early 19th-century American maritime technology. Preserved beneath the protective, anaerobic silt of the riverbed, the structural remains offer researchers rare, direct evidence of the design, construction techniques, and materials utilized in the Jeffersonian gunboat program-details that are largely absent from surviving historical blueprints. As highly intact underwater archaeological sites, these wrecks provide crucial insights into the daily lives of early American sailors and the tactical realities of the War of 1812, representing a vital resource for understanding the nation's naval heritage.