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30 April 2024
Welcome back to our National Maritime Historical Society members and friends who share a love for naval history!
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Today is the deadline for the CNO’s Naval History Essay contest! Last Call!
We are pleased to report the latest quarterly edition of Topmasts, the newsletter of the
British-based Society for Nautical Research, is available HERE. Of note in this edition to folks on this side of the Atlantic is a an offering of “Some Aspects of the Franco – American Quasi War” by H. J. K. Jenkins. There are several other short articles and notes on upcoming books, exhibits, and talks in this gem of a publication that is seeing an editorial turnover with the retirement of Nigel Blanchford, who took the editorial helm in 2015 and brought Topmasts into the digital age. He is being relieved by Bill Lindsay, who, after retirement from the pharmaceutical industry, turned to researching his ancestor William Schaw Lindsay, the eminent mid-Victorian shipowner and entrepreneur. Best wishes to Bill. In addition to publishing Topmasts and the journal Mariner’s Mirror, the Society produces a podcast and the latest on the Dreadnought Hoax is well worth a listen. Details below.
This week’s British focus continues with Dr. John Satterfield’s review of James Davey’s Tempest: The Royal Navy and the Age of Revolutions. We still have a good number of titles on our book-for-review opportunity list. Check it out!
Tuesday Tidings is compiled by Dr. David F. Winkler and Jessie Henderson as a benefit for members of the National Maritime Historical Society and friends of naval history.
As always, comments are welcome at nmhs@seahistory.org.
| ITEMS OF IMMEDIATE INTEREST | |
1 May 2024 – National World War II Museum
Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, a Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor co-authored by actor Mark Harmon
With co-author and former actual NCIS agent Leon Carroll Jr.
9 – 10 AM (CDT) (Free Webinar)
8 May 2024 - US Naval Institute Annual Meeting
Jack C. Taylor Center, Annapolis, MD
10 May 2024 – Last Days of CSS Virginia
With John Quarstein
Noon–1 PM EDT (in person streaming)
Mariners’ Museum, Newport News, VA
19 May 2024 – The History of Moffett Field
With Capt. Tom Spink, USN (Ret.)
3–4 PM PDT (in person) Mare Island Historical Foundation, CA
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Mariner’s Mirror Podcast spotlights the Dreadnought Hoax!
After a brief hiatus the award-winning Mariner’s Mirror Podcast is back! The podcast is approaching 500,000 downloads, so please be sure to download the latest episode, search through the back catalogue and share with your friends!
All content can be found here and browsed by topic.
The first podcast of 2024 features the Dreadnought Hoax, one of the most fantastical events of all naval and maritime history. In 1910 four white English people—three men and one woman—pretended to be members of the Abyssinian royal family, complete with black face make up, false beards and magnificent robes, and were given a tour of HMS Dreadnought, the most powerful battleship ever built, the pride of the Royal Navy and the pride of the British Empire. The hoax worked like a dream. No-one suspected a thing. Even more remarkable, one of those people was none other than the young Virgina Woolf, yet to be married and take the name of Woolf and yet to amaze with world with her intellect and literary skill. It is a story that touches on questions of race, gender and empire; on credulity, outrage and humor; on cultural norms and expectations; and all wrapped in ideas about seapower. To find out more Dr. Sam Willis spoke with Danell Jones, author of the excellent new book The Girl Prince: Virginia Woolf, Race and the Dreadnought Hoax.
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Parting Shots On SMH and Conferences in General
Once again, kudos to the Society for Military History for a well-attended conference this past 19–21 April. Of note was a decision to rotate the conference every other year through the nation’s capital, which will be sure to draw additional naval historian participation. Unlike the Army—a garrison-based organization that has historians assigned to various forts/posts across the nation (along with a good number of military historians teaching at academic institutions across the land), the Navy has bundled most of its historians on the East Coast. For the majority of the naval historian community, this decision assures an annual nearby major conference, with the SMH conferences falling on even years and the USNA McMullen Naval History Conferences on the odd years.
To illustrate the benefit of having the conference in the DC region, one of the better-attended naval history panels featured Heather Haley, a rising star at NHHC, who spoke on how Admiral Zumwalt was pragmatic in pushing reforms to open more opportunities to women thanks to the anticipated passage of the Equal Rights Amendment; Trent Hone, a critically acclaimed author, who spoke on the raising of the submarine S-51 off Long Island in the mid-1920s, a technically challenging project overseen by Ernest J. King, who happens to be the subject of a forthcoming biography; and Frank Blazich, a well-respected Smithsonian American Museum of History curator, who discussed the US Navy’s misguided decision to implement Army guidance with regards to the management of African-Americans who were assigned to the Seabees during World War II. Local younger scholars such as George Mason University’s Haley Smith and USNA midshipman Nicholas Blauth also had the opportunity to present their research and have their findings scrutinized. Smith was looking at how Japan influenced US Navy shipbuilding programs during the early decades of the 20th century, and Blauth introduced Rear Adm. Augustus L. Case as the first flag officer to command a US Navy fleet assembled in the wake of the 1873 seizure of the American-owned gun-runner Virginius by Spanish authorities in Cuba. The attempted fleet maneuvers off Key West would not go well.
Naval historians desiring to present at SMH next year will need to travel to Mobile, Alabama, for the conference that will be held next 27–30 March. We will post the Call for Papers once it comes on line. Besides having the opportunity to visit the battleship Alabama, attendees might desire to visit the nearby National Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola. In addition to SMH, naval history scholars will have opportunities to present their research at the annual North American Society for Oceanic History conference (dates/place TBD), the USNA McMullen Naval History Symposium, and the 12th Maritime Heritage Conference, scheduled for the 24–28 September in Buffalo, New York, in the wake of the World Canal Conference celebrating the bicentennial of the Erie Canal.
However, when considering a forum to present new scholarship, we also recommend looking at other associations that may not have a maritime-naval history focus. For example, much recent maritime-naval scholarship touches economic, diplomatic, and social history themes. Doing research on shipbuilding/acquisition? Perhaps present at the annual Business History Conference. Studying the Commodore Matthew Perry expedition to Japan? Consider participating in the annual Society for the History of Foreign Relations conclave. As for social history, ideally Frank Blazich may want to present at the Association for the Study of African American Life and History. For even broader themes, there is the American Historical Association meeting scheduled for New York next January. Cross-pollination is a good thing! The scholar gains access to ideas and sources that may benefit his/her work and scholars from other fields gain an appreciate of maritime/naval history.
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New USNI CEO and Publisher Ray Spicer introduces moderator Taylor Kiland, author Randy Goguen, Matice Wright-Springer, and Peg Klein at the “Warrior Women” panel discussion held last week at the US Naval Institute. Photograph courtesy Sam Caggiula. | |
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A Huzzah to retired Cdr. Randy Carol Goguen, PhD! The former historian with the Office of Naval Intelligence and author of From Yeomanettes to Fighter Jets (Naval Institute Press, 2024 – available for review!!!) anchored a stellar panel last Wednesday at the US Naval Institute that was ably moderated by Taylor Baldwin Kiland in a program titled “Warrior Women, Fighting to Serve, Serving to Fight!” Joining Goguen on the Jack C. Taylor Center stage were Rear Adm. Margaret “Peg” Klein, who graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1981 as part of the second class to include female midshipmen, and Lt. Matice Wright-Springer, who graduated from Annapolis seven years later. Both would become naval flight officers, with Wright-Springer becoming the nation’s first African-American to earn the NFO Wings of Gold. Whereas Klein served 36 years on active duty and then went on to be a Dean at the Naval War College, Wright-Klein progressed through a number of challenging positions within government and the private sector and is currently a senior vice president in Booz Allen’s aerospace business.
Following Dr. Goguen’s opening remarks SEE HERE, Ms. Kiland led an engaging roundtable that captivated the audience with sea stories of overcoming adversity. Leadership! Leadership! and Leadership! were named as the three components that facilitated the integration of females into what had been once an all-male domain. A Bravo Zulu (well done) to the US Naval Institute for an excellent program.
For a link to the recent Proceedings Podcast featuring Dr. Goguen CLICK HERE.
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NAVAL HISTORY BOOK REVIEWS | |
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Tempest: The Royal Navy and the Age of Revolutions
By James Davey, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT (2023)
Reviewed by John R. Satterfield
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The British public favored the mutineers at first and supported their aims as articulated in petitions, position papers and newspaper articles. The RN’s leaders in the Admiralty listened to the sailors’ grievances, issued a general pardon, and approved some reforms including a pay raise, removal of unpopular officers and more equitable ration distribution. In contrast, the Nore ringleaders found no leniency for their actions. Twenty-nine were hanged, the same number imprisoned, nine were flogged and others were transported to distant colonies. Most mutineers accepted some concessions and returned to work.
Author Davey has produced what may be the definitive volume of the Royal Navy’s checkered history in the Age of Revolutions. His scholarship, based on exhaustive research in naval and personal archives from the period, firmly establishes that the RN was by no means invincible. In fact, Britain’s ultimate victory in the wars against France is more of a testament to a remarkable institution that overcame inertia and human fragility to act responsibly in the face of enormous, chaotic changes in military, social and political cultures.
Read review>>
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NAVAL HISTORY BOOKS AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW | |
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In this recent edition of the Proceedings Podcast Bill Hamblet talks with Retired Navy Captain
George Galdorisi about his writing career, his latest book, and tips for aspiring writers.
Listen here>>
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Kings Maritime History Seminars
9 May 2024 – The Ordered Sea: Naval diplomacy in the Mediterranean, 1815–1911
Erik de Lange, King’s College London
23 May 20 23 May 2024 – The Post-Napoleonic Employment of Former Warships in the British Southern Whale Fishery, 1815–1845
Julie Papworth and Roger Dence, King’s College London
Seminars for 2023–24 will continue as hybrid events, which means that they may be attended in person or online (with the exception of the entirely online event on the 21st of March). As always, attendance is free and open to all. To take part, you must register by visiting the KCL School of Security Studies Events page. Those of you attending online will receive instructions shortly before the event, by email, about how to join. Otherwise, we will meet in person, as usual, in the Dockrill Room, K6.07, at King’s College London. Papers will begin at 17:15 GMT. The King’s Maritime History Seminar is hosted by the Laughton Naval Unit and the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. It is organized by the British Commission for Maritime History in association with the Society for Nautical Research. For further information contact Dr. Alan James, War Studies, KCL, WC2R 2LS.
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International Maritime History Association - Frank Broeze Prize for Outstanding Doctoral Thesis in Maritime History
Professor Frank Broeze was one of the leading maritime historians of his generation. In his honor, the International Maritime History Association has instituted the Frank Broeze Prize to be awarded to the author of a doctoral thesis which, in the opinion of the panel, makes the most outstanding contribution to the study of maritime history.
As befitting Frank’s visionary approach to the field, maritime history encompasses all aspects of the historical interaction of human societies and the sea. The panel of judges will therefore consider works that focus on the maritime dimensions of economic, social, cultural, political, technological and environmental history.
The Frank Broeze Prize carries with it a cash award of €500 and reimbursement of the registration fee at the Ninth International Congress of Maritime History in Busan, South Korea, August 2024.
To be considered for this prestigious award, those who have completed a doctoral thesis between 1 September 2019 and 31 August 2023 are invited to submit a copy of their thesis for consideration. If the thesis is written in a language other than English, the entrant should provide a summary of their work (minimum 10,000 words) in English.
The judges will apply the following criteria in deciding the winner of the prize:
• Contribution to knowledge and understanding of the maritime past;
• Originality of approach, source material and/or findings;
• Depth and coherence of argument;
• Choice and application of methodology;
• Presentational and stylistic quality.
Eligible candidates should submit their entries, including a letter of support from their supervisor, via e-mail attachment to Prof. Ingo Heidbrink (iheidbri@odu.edu) president of the IMHA, no later than 15 May 2024. The prize will be awarded at the Congress in Busan.
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2024 CNO Naval History Essay Contest – Last Call!
The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) announces the 2024 CNO Naval History Essay Contest and calls for the submission of papers no later than 30 April 2024. The Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) is the lead for the contest, and the US Naval Institute (which has been sponsoring essay contests since 1878) is supporting.
The Challenge
The CNO invites entrants to submit essays that apply lessons from throughout naval history to solving today's Navy challenges. Entrants should consider that today’s era is marked by:
a. Determined and increasingly aggressive efforts by China and Russia to coordinate their respective instruments of power (e.g., economic, political, and military) to compete for commercial, geostrategic, political, and military advantage and access.
b. Chinese and Russian expansion across the spectrum of military operations (competition, crisis, and contingency) and domains (sea, air, land, space, cyberspace, and electromagnetic spectrum).
c. The rise of China as an economic and maritime power and the importance of the maritime domain as well as the need for the US to integrate Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard operations and multi-domain operational concepts and capabilities.
d. The increased importance of navies, sea control, and allies and partners in a globalized world where 90 percent of world trade (by volume) and information travels via the seas or undersea cables.
e. The proliferation of advanced weaponry and the erosion of key US technological advantages that make it difficult for the US to project power to manage crises, deter aggression, and reassure allies and partners.
f. Fundamental strategic and technological shifts and advances that promise to change the character and conduct of naval warfare and challenge the Navy’s ability to adapt conceptually and materially.
The contest seeks submissions from professional historians, midshipmen and cadets, and rising historians. Guidelines for each group below.
2024 CNO Naval History Essay Contest - Professional Historian | US Naval Institute (usni.org)
2024 CNO Naval History Essay Contest - Midshipmen and Cadets | US Naval Institute (usni.org)
2024 CNO Naval History Essay Contest - Rising Historian | US Naval Institute (usni.org)
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The Australian Naval Institute Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize | |
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Inaugurated in 2021, the Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize is awarded annually by the ANI to recognise excellence in books making a major contribution to the study and understanding of naval and maritime matters. The Prize is sponsored by the National Shipbuilding College.
The Prize is named after Commodore Sam Bateman AM RAN (1938–2020), a former ANI Councillor and strategic thinker in recognition of his efforts to raise greater awareness of naval and/or maritime matters and progressing the understanding and value of navies in society.
Award of the Prize
The winner of the ANI Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize is announced on the second Wednesday of each December. It is awarded in a ceremony in Canberra in March the following the year where the author will be asked to deliver the Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize Lecture.
Entries are now being received for the 2024 Sam Bateman Book Prize
Entries are to be in the English language and will:
- Raise the understanding of naval and/or maritime affairs,
- Have been published from 2 November 2023 to 1 November 2024 and received between 1 April and 1 November 2024, and
- Be of high literary quality and style
Books can be nominated for consideration by either ANI book reviewers or publishers.
For further information or to submit a book first email books@navalinstitute.com.au for dispatch details.
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UPCOMING NAVAL & MARITIME HISTORY GATHERINGS | |
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18 May 2024: Naval Dockyards Society 28th Annual Conference
From Yards to Hards: Preparing Allied Naval Forces for the 1944 Normandy Landing
The D-Day Story, Portsmouth - Partner and Venue: Clarence Esplanade, Southsea, Portsmouth PO5 3NT
23–26 May 2024: 75th Annual Conference of the Company of Military Historians, Augusta, ME
3 June 2024: Battle of Midway Dinner, Washington, DC
3–5 June 2024: Warships Resting in Peace, Suomenlinna, Helsinki, Finland
6 June 2024: 80th Anniversary of D-Day at Museum Dedicated to D-Day Veteran Yogi Berra, Yogi Berra Learning Center and Museum, Little Falls, NJ
20–23 June 2024: Joint NASOH/CNRS Conference, St. Catharines, Ontario
16–19 September 2024: Historic Naval Ship Association (HNSA) Symposium, USS Midway, San Diego
24–28 September 2025: 12th Maritime Heritage Conference, Buffalo, NY
| PREBLE HALL NAVAL HISTORY PODCAST | |
A naval history podcast from Preble Hall – the United States Naval Academy Museum in Annapolis, Maryland. Preble Hall will interview historians, practitioners, military personnel, and other experts on a variety of naval history topics from ancient history to more current events.
Click here for the latest episode: 229: Dr. Jeremy Stöhs: European Naval Power>>
Click here for all Preble Hall Podcasts >>
| DRACHINIFEL YOUTUBE CHANNEL | |
Welcome to Navy History Matters, Naval History and Heritage Command’s biweekly compilation of articles, commentaries, and blogs related to history and heritage. Every other week, they gather the top-interest items from a variety of media and social media sources that link to related content at NHHC’s website, your authoritative source for Navy history.
Click here for most recent article>>
| INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF NAVAL HISTORY | |
The International Journal of Naval History (IJNH) provides a preeminent forum for works of naval history, researched and written to demonstrable academic standards, with the goal of stimulating and promoting research into naval history and fostering communication among naval historians at an international level. IJNH welcomes any scholarly historical analysis, focused on any period or geographic region, that explores naval power in its national or cultural context. The journal is independent of any institution and operates under the direction of an international editorial board that represents various genres of naval history.
Click here to read the February 2023 edition and archived issues on the IJNH website >>
| SUPPORTING US NAVAL HISTORY & HERITAGE | |
With the 250th anniversary of the US Navy on the horizon, NMHS seeks your support as we plan to honor those who have provided for our maritime security.
Click here to donate today >>
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