The Journal
George Jellicoe: SAS and SBS Commander
George Jellicoe: SAS and SBS Commander, offers a biographical narrative of a leader that, while he is not as widely recognized as David Stirling or David Lloyd Owen, played an equally important role in the development of British special operations forces. Jellicoe was the son of Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, who commanded the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in 1916 and later became the First Sea Lord. George Jellicoe’s original plans to serve … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Dr. Frank Sobchk, PhD
Battleship Commander: The Life of Vice Admiral Willis A. Lee Jr.
While the most senior U.S. Navy admirals of World War II have been the subjects of biographical studies (King, Nimitz, Halsey, Spruance), mid-ranking admirals have been less well examined. Paul Stillwell seeks to correct that imbalance in this study of the Navy’s best known battleship commander of World War II, Vice Admiral Willis Lee, Jr. Stillwell relies on numerous oral histories and correspondence with members of Lee’s staff since Lee’s death in August 1945 made … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Dr. Corbin Williamson, PhD
How the Navy Won the War: The Real Instrument of Victory 1914-1918
Unsurprisingly, the centenary of the First World War witnessed an outpouring of commemoration to a conflict whose legacy shaped the contours of modern life with veneration reaching its apogee in 2018, as nations noted the stark sacrifices made by an earlier generation. Giving thanks to a peace at last secured, many could pray such a profound test not be faced again. A natural enough response by the heirs of the defeated, it is a stance … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Dr. Joseph Moretz, PhD, FRHistS
The Atlantic War Remembered: An Oral History Collection
The Atlantic War Remembered is a collection of 37 excerpts from oral histories that illuminate various aspects of the U.S. Navy’s role in the Atlantic and European theaters in World War II. Columbia University’s oral history program began conducting interviews with U.S. Navy veterans of World War II in 1960 and in 1969 the U.S. Naval Institute took over management of this oral history program. The resulting collection of oral histories is one of the … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Dr. Corbin Williamson, PhD
Abandon Ship: The Real Story of the Sinkings in the Falklands War
In Abandon Ship: The Real Story of the Sinkings in the Falklands War, maritime historian Paul Brown offers detailed accounts of the destruction of six British ships and the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano. Whether one is a serious student of naval affairs, or someone with a general interest in the Falklands War, reading this book will be time well spent. It is meticulous in its treatment of technologies and personalities, generally informative about the course … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Chuck Steele, PhD
British Naval Intelligence through the Twentieth Century
Professor Andrew Boyd (CMG, OBE, FRHistS, DPhil) initially served in the Royal Navy as a submarine officer and subsequently had a 25-year career in the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office. There he specialized in defense and security issues and undertook diplomatic postings in Ghana, Mexico, and Pakistan. In the latter part of his FCO career, and later while working for the defense contractor QinetiQ, he was closely focused on the application of technology and academic … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by CAPT Steven E. Maffeo, USN, Ret., MSSI
Warship Builders: An Industrial History of U.S. Naval Shipbuilding, 1922-1945
Naval construction requires diligent effort to both research and amalgamate to convey the complexities and costs of building naval warships. Thomas Heinrich explores the dynamics of both the Interwar Period and World War Two regarding the planning and construction of warships. The traditional narrative of the United States production during World War Two is of the overwhelming manufacture by production lines of small arms, vehicles, and aircraft. However, the work argues warship construction during the … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Sean Getway
Painting War: George Plante’s Combat Art in World War II
“[George] Plante…was looking at his watch when the torpedo hit…the force of the explosion threw him across the cabin…although very shaken he was not injured. He managed to send out SOS calls before grabbing a photograph of his wife and trying to leave.” When artist George Plante volunteered for service in the British Merchant Navy during World War II as a radio operator, he was aware of the danger to which he was exposing himself. … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Lt Col Nicolas Smith
Engines of Rebellion: Confederate Ironclads and Steam Engineering in the American Civil War
It’s good news to see that scholarship like Saxon T. Bisbee’s Engines of Rebellion continues on the Confederate Navy’s ironclad program. Contemporary naval histories of the American Civil War like Admiral David Dixon Porter’s (1886) rather downplayed the South’s effort to maximise the latest technological advances in the naval state-of-the-art—in an asymmetric war effort against the North’s overwhelming maritime, industrial and financial resources. But as later research by William N. Still, Jr. in the late … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by Dr Howard J. Fuller, PhD
To My Dearest Wife, Lide: Letters from George Gideon Jr. during Commodore Perry’s Expedition to Japan, 1853-1855
In 1852, the US Navy’s East India Squadron, under the command of Commodore Matthew C. Perry, was dispatched on a voyage to Asia that would last for three eventful years. The voyage of Perry’s squadron of steam-driven warships was the first significant manifestation of US military power in the Pacific, to which the US had gained access four years earlier with acquisition of California. Moreover, the main task of Perry’s mission, namely to sail to … CONTINUE READING ❯
Review by John M. Jennings