Of the numerous manufacturers in Staffordshire, England that supplied ceramics for the American market, Enoch Wood and Sons produced the greatest variety. The view on this plate captures a moment from the War of 1812 when the unpopular English frigate Guerrière and the pride of the American navy, the Constitution, battled each other on August 19. In 1803, long after the war had ended, orders were given to dismantle the Constitution, but she was saved by the fervent protest sparked by Oliver Wendell Holmes’s "Old Ironsides," a poem dedicated to the beloved warship.

The source of the design is an 1815 engraving by Boston based artist Abel Bowen, also in the Gallery’s collection (inv. no. 1946.9.1709). Bowen based his engraving on an oil painting by Tuscan-born, New England based painter Michele Felice Cornè (now in the collection of the Peabody Essex Museum). The manufacturers of the plate have reversed the direction of the ships in Cornè and Bowen’s depictions. The shell border was taken from a stock design that could be reused for pieces of different sizes.