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21 January 2025
Welcome back to our National Maritime Historical Society members and friends who share a love for naval history!
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Thank you Dr. Michael Verney, who tipped us off about another conference this fall where Navy and Marine Corps history takes center stage. The conference “Navigating the Past: Histories of the US Navy and Marine Corps, 1775–2025” will be held in Philadelphia in mid-October. The call for papers is our lead item. As with the NASOH conference in May and the McMullen Naval History Symposium in September, the deadline for paper proposals is February 15.
We salute Rear Adm. Sam Cox (Ret.), director of the Naval History and Heritage Command, who has taken on the task of providing senior naval leadership well-written obituaries of those who contributed to the transformation of the Navy to what we have today. The links to his salutes to those who passed on over 2024 is provided below.
The latest Western Naval History Association newsletter can be found HERE.
For this week’s book review, we thank Thomas Duffy for his review of a study on the Iran-Iraq naval war. Check our book list for new titles are awaiting review. Speaking of Dr. Verney, the University of Chicago sent us a review copy of his A Great and Rising Nation!
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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 and naval history news items are welcome at nmhs@seahistory.org.
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Navigating the Past: Histories of the US Navy and Marine Corps, 1775–2025 | |
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Call for Proposals
October 9–11, 2025 | Philadelphia and Camden
Proposal deadline: 15 February 2025
The US Navy and the Marine Corps were founded in Philadelphia in 1775 and they will mark their 250th anniversary in the city of their birth in October 2025 (see www.homecoming250.org). To coincide with the anniversary, this conference will bring together scholars from the whole sweep of US history to discuss the Navy and Marine Corps in their various contexts. While these branches of America’s military forces have primarily served to project national power on and across the seas, their importance to our understanding of the nation’s past goes far beyond naval yards, sailors, or fleets. We welcome proposals from scholars researching any topic related to the US Navy and Marine Corps over their long history.
The inaugural day of this conference will be held at The McNeil Center for Early American Studies, University of Pennsylvania, and focus on the era spanning from 1775 to 1850. The second session, including papers concerned with 1850 to the present, will take place at Rutgers University-Camden and on the storied battleship New Jersey (BB-62). An opening reception will be held at the Library Company of Philadelphia on the evening of 9 October.
We invite proposals for papers and roundtables on the following themes:
- Maritime strategy, tactics, logistics, and diplomacy
- Chronologically and thematically comparative analyses of US maritime power
- Leadership and education within the Navy and Marine Corps
- Explorations of the social, medical, and environmental histories of these branches, including with respect to race and gender
- The Navy Department and the US economy
- Science, technology, and maritime power
- The histories of the Navy and Marine Corps in Philadelphia and Camden
Prospective presenters are invited to submit abstracts of 300 words that outline the research question and anticipated contributions to the conference. Submissions should be uploaded here by 15 February 2025. Accepted presenters will be asked to prepare a paper of no more than 9,000 words, which will be pre-circulated to participants, as well as a ten-minute PowerPoint surveying the main contributions of these papers. Roundtable submissions will not require papers or PowerPoints.
This conference will be chaired by Emma Hart, director of the McNeil Center, and Katherine Epstein, associate professor of history at Rutgers-Camden.
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Fleet Adm. Chester W. Nimitz burial at Golden Gate National Cemetery, 24 February 1966; Courtesy Naval History and Heritage Command | |
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In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Brian L. Davies, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Stephen K. Chadwick, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral George A. Aitcheson Jr., USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Admiral Bruce DeMars, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Jimmie B. Finkelstein, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Vice Admiral Richard H. Truly, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Admiral Joseph F. Frick, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Robert P. Caudill Jr., USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Lieutenant Louis A. Conter, USN (Ret.) The Last Living Survivor of USS Arizona (BB-39) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral E. Inman Carmichael, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Vice Admiral Joseph S. Mobley, USN (Ret). > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Kenneth William “Pete” Pettigrew, USNR > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Donald L. Sturtz, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Jerry R. Kelley, MC, USNR > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Vice Admiral Robert Rawson “Bob” Monroe, U.S. Navy (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Noel Kennedy Dysart Jr., U.S. Navy (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral James R. Fowler, MC, USNR (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Richard L. Becker, USNR (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Danelle M. Barrett, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Virgil L. Hill Jr., USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Robert L. Hanley, USN – Last Living Survivor of USS Houston (CA-30) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Mark W. Balmert, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Bernard J. Smith, USN (Ret.) > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Paul L. Foster, SC, USN > The Sextant > Article View
In Memoriam: Rear Admiral Thomas C. “Tom” Watson Jr., USN > The Sextant >
Article View
Passing of President Jimmy Carter > The Sextant > Article View
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NAVAL HISTORY BOOK REVIEWS | |
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Iran-Iraq Naval War, Volume 2: Convoy Battles, 1981–1984, Middle East at War Series Volume 63, by Tom Cooper, Sirous Ebrahimi, and E. R. Hooton. Helion and Company, Warwick, UK (2024).
Reviewed by Thomas M. Duffy
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Well away from the major battlefields on the ground in the Iran-Iraq War, and hidden from the gaze of the curious public, the navies and air forces of the two belligerents contested the waters of the Persian (or Arabian) Gulf. This naval aspect of the war still remains largely unknown and hugely underreported in the West other than in terms of the “Tanker War” and the impact upon international shipping.
Thus begins Iran-Iraq Naval War, Volume 2: Convoy Battles, 1981–1984, which is the second of a planned multivolume series of books to deeply examine that underreported naval aspect of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War. The volume is largely based on Iranian documentation—especially naval sources—identified by Ebrahimi, an Iranian veteran of the war who subsequently served as a ship’s pilot with the Iranian Port and Maritime Organization, the entity involved in sailing convoys into the northern Persian Gulf in the face of Iraqi opposition.
And what convoys they were. The Iranians—perhaps revealing their Continentalist orientation—refer to the operations as “caravans:” running groups of ships with fuel, food, and military supplies to support the Iranian military fighting along the extensive shared border between Iran and Iraq. The stories recall British naval operations in the support of Malta in World War II except that, in place of German submarines, the threat to merchant shipping came from Iraqi helicopters armed with Exocet missiles. In response, the Iranians sortied F-4Es and F-14As. The latter was famously featured in the movie Topgun II: Maverick, where one of the young American aviators—who has only flown F-18s—looks discombobulated as they fly out in a captured enemy aircraft and asks the character played by Tom Cruise: “Why are the wings coming out, Mav?”
Yes, F-14s; in practice, only the Americans and the Iranians would end up flying the “Tomcat” in combat, and the F-14s of the Iranian Revolutionary Air Force ended up seeing a lot more action than did those of the United States Navy. The Tomcat’s AWG-9 radar and AIM-54A long-range missiles played prominent roles in Iranian air battles with the Iraqis. The front-line American aircraft were a vestige of extensive American arms sales to the Shah’s Iran, still new and in the Iranian arsenal at the time of the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The book touches on Iranian smuggling operations and engineering ingenuity needed to avoid American arms embargoes and the Iranians end up firing some 62 Phoenix air-to-air missiles over the course of the war, including one reported incident where a single Iranian Phoenix took out three tightly bunched Iraqi Sukhoi Su-22 aircraft. The authors also record that the Iraqis were the first to use the AM.39 Exocet in combat (in 1981, some six months before the much better known use of the weapon by the Argentines in the Falklands War) and that the Iranians were the first to use the RGM-84A Harpoon surface-to-surface missile in war: “Far from being a backwater, this was the testing ground for many cutting-edge technologies.”
In another analogue with World War II and the Allies’ ability to penetrate German and Japanese military codes, the authors write that the Iranians were one of the beneficiaries of the “Crypto AG” operation, in which the Swiss company sold coding machines completely visible to American intelligence. In a sign of just how close American ties were to pre-Revolutionary Iran, the Shah’s intelligence services were also read-in to the program and Revolutionary Iran “was capable of reading all the Iraqi military communications in real time.”
The book is lavishly illustrated, with gorgeous line-drawings of American warplanes decked out in Iranian colors; the effect is quite jarring for an American reader. The mutual antipathy between the United States and Revolutionary Iran during the 1980s meant that the United States was not officially privy to all the possible lessons learned from the use of American warplanes in combat, but the book uses what sources it can to provide fascinating glimpses into how the Iranians operated these aircraft in their fights against Iraq’s mainly Soviet-supplied aircraft.
Iran-Iraq Naval War, Volume 2: Convoy Battles, 1981-1984 is a significant contribution to this forgotten part of the Iran-Iraq War, the naval aspect of which only heretofore came to the attention of Westerners when their warships started to enter the Persian Gulf in large numbers in 1987. The quality of the writing is quite good, although understandably very detailed. This is, after all, the story of hundreds of Iranian convoy operations. The authors caution that the sources are primarily Iranian—including from the “Sacred Defense Documents Center of the Navy,” a reminder of the religious orientation of the Iranian government. The maps and especially the line drawings of aircraft and ships are eye-catching and thought-provoking. The depth of the research brings in a number of Iranian sources into English.
Tom Cooper’s bio notes that, after a career in the world-wide transportation business, “he moved into narrow-focus analysis and writing on small, little-known air forces and conflicts.” Sirious Ebrahimi brings in exceptional sources and photographs. E. R. Hooten is a retired defense journalist who, among other works, wrote the “The Iran-Iraq Tanker War,” a standard reference on the conflict. Together, they have succeeded in writing an exceptional volume, one that will be of interest to Middle East hands, airpower enthusiasts, and those interested in the enabling role played by merchant ships and the challenges of convoy protection. One is immediately impelled to purchase Volume I and to eagerly await the issuance of Volume III, which promises to take up the story with the arrival of advanced French aircraft in 1984 and the subsequent internationalization of the Iran-Iraq War.
Thomas M. Duffy is a retired American diplomat and naval officer, at work on a book on Operation Earnest Will, the US Navy escort of Kuwaiti tankers in the Persian Gulf in 1987–88.
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NAVAL HISTORY BOOKS AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW | |
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Preble Hall Podcast
EP. 244: Operation Unified Assistance with Dr. John Sherwood
26 December 2024
On the 20th anniversary of the Boxing Day Tsunami, Dr. Stephen Phillips discusses the US Navy's humanitarian response, Operation Unified Assistance, with Dr. John Sherwood. This and other humanitarian responses are discussed in great detail in Sherwood's book, A Global Force for Good: Sea Services Humanitarian Operations in the Twenty-First Century.
Listen here>>
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2025 Call for Papers
Continental Connections: Inland Waters and the Shaping of Maritime North America. The North American Society for Oceanic History invites you to join us at the Grand Hotel in Natchez, Mississippi, for our 2025 conference from 15–17 May.
For thousands of years, a vast complex of inland waters shaped the lives and cultures of indigenous North Americans. These same waters allowed European states to establish and maintain outposts of empire thousands of miles from the Atlantic Ocean. During the early decades of the nineteenth century, inland waters made it possible for millions of Euro-Americans to move west and establish the cities and farms that became the foundations of North America’s modern agricultural and industrial economies.
This year NASOH is recognizing the complicated historical legacy of North America’s inland waters by meeting at Natchez, Mississippi. Located on the Mississippi River at the western terminus of the Natchez Trace, an overland trail connecting the Mississippi, Cumberland, and Tennessee rivers, Natchez was a natural point of exchange and location of important Indigenous ceremonial mounts. The French, recognizing the area’s importance, built Fort Rosalie in 1716. The present city is named after the Natchez Indians, and its subsequent culture and history are the products of Indigenous, French, English, Spanish, African, and American influences. A natural stopping place and base for keelboats and flatboats, and later steamboats, Natchez became the first capital of the Mississippi Territory and the second-largest slave trading market in the United States. Celebrated for its surviving antebellum architecture and southern heritage, Natchez is also a testament to the enduring and pervasive influences of maritime connections and inland waters in North America.
Session and individual paper proposals are encouraged. Sessions should have no more than 4 papers.
Proposals should include: A) title; B) 150-200 word abstract; C) a 150 word (maximum) biographical statement; D) contact information, including phone number, address, affiliation, and email. This information should be submitted as a single Word document (not pdf), single-spaced, 12-point Times New Roman font.
Please note that conference registration is required for papers.
PowerPoint presentations are encouraged, and projectors will be provided. Please note that requests for specific audio-visual equipment, special outlets, or accommodation for disabilities should be included in the proposal.
The deadline for proposal submission is 15 February 2025. Please submit proposal packets electronically to NASOHconference25@gmail.com.
For general questions, please contact Dr. Amy Mitchell-Cook, amitchellcook@uwf.edu.
Additional information regarding accommodations and registration will be available on NASOH’s website, https://nasoh.org/.
Student Travel Grants
Students may apply for a Chad Smith Travel Grant to assist in travel to present a paper at the conference. Additionally, each year NASOH bestows the Clark G. Reynolds Student Paper Award to the author of the best graduate student paper delivered at the conference. Please see the awards section of the NASOH website for details. Students wishing to be considered for either award must indicate so as part of their paper proposal. For more information about these grants, please go to: https://nasoh.org/student-awards.
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McMullen Naval History Symposium: 18–19 September, 2025
The year 2025 marks many significant milestones for the United States and its navy. Of special note is the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution and the founding of the Continental Navy. Many other significant naval events celebrate lesser milestones this year as well, including the end of the First Barbary War and the War of 1812, the end of World War II, and the founding of the US Naval Academy. The History Department of the United States Naval Academy invites proposals for papers to be presented at the 2025 McMullen Naval History Symposium on these and any other topics related to the naval and maritime history of the United States or the world. While we encourage in-person attendance and participation, the 2025 McMullen will be equipped for very limited virtual participation for participants from outside the United States. Proposals should include a one-page curriculum vitae and an abstract of no more than 250 words that summarizes the research and its contribution to historical knowledge. Panel proposals that include three presenters and a chair are highly encouraged, and should include all relevant material on the presenters, as well as a one-page CV for the chair. The chair will function as a moderator for the panel; there will be no separate comment, apart from audience Q&A. When submitting proposals, either individual or panel, please put all materials into a single file.
Email proposals to navalhistorysymposium@gmail.com by midnight, 14 February 2025.
The program committee anticipates announcing a draft program by the end of April 2025. Online registration for the conference will begin in the spring of 2025. A small number of modest travel stipends are available to graduate students and recent PhDs who do not hold a tenure-track position or full-time employment. Support for these grants comes from the generosity of the McMullen Sea Power Fund established in honor of Dr. John McMullen, USNA Class of 1940. Please indicate your desire to apply for a travel stipend with your proposal. The committee will publish a volume of proceedings in the New Interpretations of Naval History Series, containing the best papers presented, at a future date. Further information on the 2025 McMullen Naval History Symposium, including hotel registration, will be available online at www.usna.edu/History/Symposium in early 2025. Specific inquiries may be directed to the director, Captain Stan Fisher, or deputy director, Dr. Abby Mullen, at the email address listed above.
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Maritime Communities Celebrating Milestones
SAVE THE DATES!
24–27 September 2025 • Buffalo, NY
We are delighted to be holding the 12th Maritime Heritage Conference in Buffalo in September 2025.
The conference brings together organizations and participants that engage in all aspects of maritime heritage. This includes maritime museums, historic lighthouses, tall ships for sail training and youth, small craft, marine art, sailing, naval and maritime scholars, advocacy, and more. It is also a gathering of the leadership of the maritime heritage community. Buffalo will host the first Maritime Heritage Conference to be held in the Great Lakes region.
The 12th Maritime Heritage Conference (MHC) will bring together nautical heritage organizations and individuals for an information-packed conference encompassing a broad array of topics on the banks of Lake Erie at historic Buffalo, New York. Following in the wake of the World Canal Conference, which concludes with a bicentennial celebration of the opening of the Erie Canal, the 12th MHC will use that historic milestone to open a three-day program that invites attendees to consider other historic nautical milestones worthy of broader public attention.
The MHC has earned a reputation for its high take-away value, networking opportunities, and camaraderie. The conference steering committee invites you to become involved as a presenter; both session and individual proposals are encouraged. Don’t miss this opportunity to gather with individuals from all segments of the maritime community.
Call for Papers & Session Proposals
Papers and session topics include, but are not limited to:
• Inland Water Commerce and Seaport Operations (Erie Canal bicentennial!)
• Maritime and Naval History (2025 marks USN/USMC 250th Birthday)
• Maritime Art, Literature, and Music
• Education and Preservation
• Underwater Archaeology
• Trade and Communications
• Maritime Libraries, Archives, and Museums
• Marine Science and Ocean Conservation
• Historic Vessel Restoration
• Maritime Heritage Grant Program
• Maritime Landscapes
• National Marine Sanctuaries
• Small Craft
• Shipbuilding
• Marine Protected Areas
Focus sessions include, but are not limited to:
• Non-Profit administration
• Event Management
• Fundraising
• Media and Publications
• Media and Social Media
Submissions
Individual paper and session proposals should include a 250–400 word abstract and a one-paragraph biography about each presenter.
Please e-mail proposals and other queries to Dr. David Winkler at: MHC@seahistory.org
Deadline for proposals for papers and sessions is 31 May 2025.
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Society for Nautical Research Winter Lecture Series 2024–25
The Society for Nautical Research is delighted to announce the schedule for the forthcoming winter lecture series. These online talks will highlight new and ongoing research being undertaken by members of the society and its affiliations. The series aims to promote research into economic, social, political, military and environmental aspects of nautical history, drawing on British, European and international experience.
The 12-part lecture series will be held fortnightly on Wednesday evenings at 6:30PM (UK) between October 2024 to March 2025. Lectures will only be available online (via Zoom) and will be FREE to paying members of the SNR.
Not yet a member?
Sign up now from as little as £22.50 a year. Get access to exclusive events and talks, quarterly editions of the Mariner’s Mirror, and discounts at affiliated museums and gift shops! https://snr.org.uk/become-a-member/
Dates for your calendar:
29th January 2025: Dr. Alan James (King’s College London), (full title TBC)
12th February 2025: Dr. Matthew Heaslip (University of Portsmouth), (full title TBC)
26th February 2025: Dr. Michael Roberts (University of Bangor), Archaeological exploration of historical shipwrecks in the Irish Sea (full title TBC)
12th March 2025: Dr. Jo Stanley (independent scholar), “Diversity at Sea: How sharing historical research can make a difference to the present and future of the maritime industry and public understanding”
19th March 2025: Dr. Cathryn Pearce (University of Portsmouth), “‘Bandied about for a place of refuge’: Extreme Weather, Coastal Shipping, and the Loss of Lord Nelson, 1840”
How to attend the lectures?
Zoom details will be circulated prior to each of the lectures but details can also be found in the “events” section of the members area of the SNR website (Click Here).
For any questions or queries please contact the convener (daisy.turnbull@myport.ac.uk).
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UPCOMING NAVAL & MARITIME HISTORY GATHERINGS | |
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31 January–2 February 2025: Western Naval History Association Symposium (WNHA), San Diego, CA
27–30 March 2025: Society for Military History (SMH) Annual Meeting, Mobile, AL
9–11 April 2025: Council of American Maritime Museums Annual Meeting, Pensacola, FL
22–25 May 2025: Canadian Nautical Research Society Annual Conference Port Hope,
Ontario
18–19 September 2025: McMullen Naval History Symposium, US Naval Academy
24–27 September 2025: Historic Naval Ship Association (HNSA) Symposium/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 interviews 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: 245 - Brian Dickinson: Calm in the Chaos>>
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| 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 >>
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