The Fatal Cruise of the Argus

The Fatal Cruise of the Argus
Author: Ira Dye
Publisher: US Naval Institute Press
Total Pages: 416
Release: 1994
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN:

A richly detailed story about two naval officers whose separate paths converge during a fierce battle between the Argus and the Pelican.

Ships of Oak, Guns of Iron

Ships of Oak, Guns of Iron
Author: Ronald Utt
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 699
Release: 2012-12-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 1621570088

The War of 1812 is typically noted for a handful of events: the burning of the White House, the rise of the Star Spangled Banner, and the battle of New Orleans. But in fact the greatest consequence of that distant conflict was the birth of the U.S. Navy. During the War of 1812, America’s tiny fleet took on the mightiest naval power on earth, besting the British in a string of victories that stunned both nations. In his new book, Ships of Oak and Guns of Iron: The War of 1812 and the Birth of the American Navy, author Dr. Ronald Utt not only sheds new light on the naval battles of the War of 1812 and how they gave birth to our nation’s great navy, but tells the story of the War of 1812 through the portraits of famous American war heroes. From the cunning Stephen Decatur to the fierce David Porter, Ships of Oak and Guns of Iron relates how thousands of American men and boys gave better than they got against the British Navy. The great age of fighting sail is as rich in heroic drama as any epoch. Dr. Utt’s Ships of Oak and Guns of Iron retrieves the American chapter of that epoch from unjustified obscurity, and offers readers an intriguing chronicle of the War of 1812 as well as a unique perspective on the birth of the U.S. Navy.

1812

1812
Author: Jon Latimer
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 664
Release: 2009-07-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780674039957

Listen to a short interview with Jon Latimer Host: Chris Gondek - Producer: Heron & Crane In the first complete history of the War of 1812 written from a British perspective, Jon Latimer offers an authoritative and compelling account that places the conflict in its strategic context within the Napoleonic wars. The British viewed the War of 1812 as an ill-fated attempt by the young American republic to annex Canada. For British Canada, populated by many loyalists who had fled the American Revolution, this was a war for survival. The Americans aimed both to assert their nationhood on the global stage and to expand their territory northward and westward. Americans would later find in this war many iconic moments in their national story--the bombardment of Fort McHenry (the inspiration for Francis Scott Key's Star Spangled Banner); the Battle of Lake Erie; the burning of Washington; the death of Tecumseh; Andrew Jackson's victory at New Orleans--but their war of conquest was ultimately a failure. Even the issues of neutrality and impressment that had triggered the war were not resolved in the peace treaty. For Britain, the war was subsumed under a long conflict to stop Napoleon and to preserve the empire. The one lasting result of the war was in Canada, where the British victory eliminated the threat of American conquest, and set Canadians on the road toward confederation. Latimer describes events not merely through the eyes of generals, admirals, and politicians but through those of the soldiers, sailors, and ordinary people who were directly affected. Drawing on personal letters, diaries, and memoirs, he crafts an intimate narrative that marches the reader into the heat of battle.

1812

1812
Author: George C Daughan
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 530
Release: 2011-10-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 046502808X

At the outbreak of the War of 1812, America's prospects looked dismal. It was clear that the primary battlefield would be the open ocean -- but America's war fleet, only twenty ships strong, faced a practiced British navy of more than a thousand men-of-war. Still, through a combination of nautical deftness and sheer bravado, the American navy managed to take the fight to the British and turn the tide of the war: on the Great Lakes, in the Atlantic, and even in the eastern Pacific. In 1812: The Navy's War, prizewinning historian George C. Daughan tells the thrilling story of how a handful of heroic captains and their stalwart crews overcame spectacular odds to lead the country to victory against the world's greatest imperial power. A stunning contribution to military and national history, 1812: The Navy's War is the first complete account in more than a century of how the U.S. Navy rescued the fledgling nation and secured America's future.

Liberty on the Waterfront

Liberty on the Waterfront
Author: Paul A. Gilje
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2012-04-17
Genre: History
ISBN: 0812202023

Through careful research and colorful accounts, historian Paul A. Gilje discovers what liberty meant to an important group of common men in American society, those who lived and worked on the waterfront and aboard ships. In the process he reveals that the idealized vision of liberty associated with the Founding Fathers had a much more immediate and complex meaning than previously thought. In Liberty on the Waterfront: American Maritime Culture in the Age of Revolution, life aboard warships, merchantmen, and whalers, as well as the interactions of mariners and others on shore, is recreated in absorbing detail. Describing the important contributions of sailors to the resistance movement against Great Britain and their experiences during the Revolutionary War, Gilje demonstrates that, while sailors recognized the ideals of the Revolution, their idea of liberty was far more individual in nature—often expressed through hard drinking and womanizing or joining a ship of their choice. Gilje continues the story into the post-Revolutionary world highlighted by the Quasi War with France, the confrontation with the Barbary Pirates, and the War of 1812.

Millions for Defense

Millions for Defense
Author: Frederick Leiner
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Total Pages: 251
Release: 2014-07-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1612513484

The title of this book comes from a toast popular with Americans in the late 1790s—“millions for defense, not a cent for tribute.” Americans were incensed by demands for bribes from French diplomats and by France’s galling seizures of U.S. merchant ships, and as they teetered towards open war, were disturbed by their country’s lack of warships. Provoked to action, private U.S. citizens decided to help build a navy. Merchants from Newburyport, Massachusetts, took the lead by opening a subscription to fund a 20-gun warship to be built in ninety days, and they persuaded Congress to pass a statute that gave them government “stock” bearing 6 percent interest in exchange for their money. Their example set off a chain reaction down the coast. More than a thousand subscribers in the port towns pledged money and began to build nine warships with little government oversight. Among the subscription ships were the Philadelphia, later lost on the rocks at Tripoli; Essex, the first American warship to round the Cape of Good Hope; and Boston, which captured the French corvette Le Berceau. This book is the first to explore in depth the subject of subscribing for warships. Frederick Leiner explains how the idea materialized, who the people were who subscribed and built the ships, how the ships were built, and what contributions these ships made to the Quasi-War against France. Along the way, he also offers significant insights into the politics of what is arguably the most critical period in American history.

The Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Early American Republic, 1783–1812 [3 volumes]

The Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Early American Republic, 1783–1812 [3 volumes]
Author: Spencer C. Tucker
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 1134
Release: 2014-06-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1598841572

Relatively little attention has been paid to American military history between 1783 and 1812—arguably the most formative years of the United States. This encyclopedia fills the void in existing literature and provides greater understanding of how the nation evolved during this era. This encyclopedia offers a comprehensive examination of U.S. military history from the beginning of the republic in 1783 up to the eve of war with Great Britain in 1812. It enables a detailed study of the Early Republic, during which ideological and political divisions occurred over the fledgling U.S. military. The entries cover all the important battles, key individuals, weapons, Indian nations, and treaties, as well as numerous social, political, cultural, and economic developments during this period. The contents of the work will enable readers at the high school, college, university, and even graduate level to comprehend how political parties emerged, and how ideological differences over the organization, size, and use of the military developed. Larger global developments, including Anglo-American and Franco-American interactions, relations between Middle Eastern states and the United States, and relations and warfare between the U.S. government and various Indian nations are also detailed. The extensive and detailed bibliographies will be immensely helpful to learners at all levels.

Our Country, Right Or Wrong

Our Country, Right Or Wrong
Author: Leonard F. Guttridge
Publisher: Macmillan
Total Pages: 318
Release: 2007-09-04
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780765307026

"Decatur not only proved dauntless on the quarterdeck but amazingly effective in Mediterranean diplomacy. His spectacular dealings with Islamic powers presaged America's twenty-first century involvement in the region." "Readers will also learn the identity of the woman he forsook for a sophisticated beauty pursued by suitors as varied as Napoleon Bonaparte's brother and Aaron Burr. Through freshly discovered documents, many official, some intensely personal, biographer Leonard Guttridge traces the elements that sped Decatur inexorably into the shadow of murder."--BOOK JACKET.

A Rage for Glory

A Rage for Glory
Author: James Tertius de Kay
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2010-05-11
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1439119295

Stephen Decatur was one of the most awe-inspiring officers of the entire Age of Fighting Sail. A real-life American naval hero in the early nineteenth century, he led an astonishing life, and his remarkable acts of courage in combat made him one of the most celebrated figures of his era. Decatur's dazzling exploits in the Barbary Wars propelled him to national prominence at the age of twenty-five. His dramatic capture of HMS Macedonian in the War of 1812, and his subsequent naval and diplomatic triumphs in the Mediterranean, secured his permanent place in the hearts of his countrymen. Handsome, dashing, and fearless, his crews worshipped him, presidents lionized him, and an adoring public heaped fresh honors on him with each new achievement. James Tertius de Kay is one of our foremost naval historians. In A Rage for Glory, the first new biography of Decatur in almost seventy years, he recounts Decatur's life in vivid colors. Drawing on material unavailable to previous biographers, he traces the origins of Decatur's fierce patriotism ("My country...right or wrong!"), chronicles Decatur's passionate love affair with Susan Wheeler, and provides new details of Decatur's tragic death in a senseless duel of honor, secretly instigated by the backroom machinations of jealous fellow officers determined to ruin him. His death left official Washington in such shock that his funeral became a state occasion, attended by friends who included former President James Madison, current President James Monroe, Chief Justice John Marshall, and ten thousand more. Decatur's short but crowded life was an astonishing epic of hubris, romance, and high achievement. Only a handful of Americans since his time have ever come close to matching his extraordinary glamour and brilliance.