1881 United States Senate special elections in New York March 4. On May 16, 1881, both U.S. Senators from New York resigned in protest against the distribution of federal patronage in New York by President James A. Garfield, a Half-Breed, without being consulted. The confrontation between the Stalwart and the Half-Breed (in the press now usually referred to as the "Administration men") factions of the Republican Party arose when the leader of the New Yorker Half-Breeds, President pro tempore of the State Senate William H. Robertson, was appointed Collector of the Port of New York, the highest paying federal office in New York. Conkling preferred that Collector Edwin Merritt
HMS Polyphemus (1881) were tested fortnightly. The ship was equipped with twin boiler and engine rooms, and a low turtle-back hull which was almost submerged when the vessel was travelling at speed, and had a normal bunker capacity of 200 tons of coal, and 300 tons maximum. The "Polyphemus" was ordered on 5 February 1878 and laid down on 21 September 1878 at Chatham Naval Dockyard. She was launched on 15 June 1881 and completed in September 1882. A second ship to the same design was ordered from Chatham on 30 December 1881 but was cancelled on 10 November 1882 without being either