In 1891, seal poaching in the Bering Sea became so serious a matter that the U.S. dispatched small armed vessels with Marine Detachments to interrupt the seal hunters.  The first four of the five ships arrived in the Bering Sea by early July and stayed in the area until late September.  (Marines Stop Seal Poachers, 1891 by Sgt John Clymer, USMCR, Oil on Canvass, ca. 1945.  Art Collection, National Museum of the Marine Corps)