Posts Tagged ‘Navy/Coast Guard’
Poyer, David
by Joseph Navratil (2000) POYER, DAVID [ANDREISSEN] (1949- ). David Poyer graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1971 and is a naval reserve captain, experienced sailor, and underwater diver. Poyer adapted his active-duty navy experiences to write best-selling sagas of naval fiction. The Med (1988), The Gulf (l990), The Circle (1992), The Passage (1995), Tomahawk…
Read MorePorter, David
by Udo Nattermann (2000) PORTER, DAVID (1780-1843). The son of a veteran of the American Revolution, David Porter was born in Boston and grew up in Baltimore. He began his naval career as a midshipman in 1798 and became master commandant in 1806. In the War of 1812, Porter was captain of the frigate Essex (1799)…
Read MorePeterson, Charles Jacob (“J. Thornton Randolph” or “Harry Danforth”)
by Robert L. Gale (2000) [PETERSON, CHARLES JACOB], “HARRY DANFORTH,” “J. THORNTON RANDOLPH” (1819-1887). Charles Jacob Peterson was an editor, publisher, and historian, born in Philadelphia, where he worked all his life. Once he acquired an ample fortune, he and his wife purchased a mansion in Newport, Rhode Island, enjoyed its summer beach and coastal…
Read MorePerry, Commodore Matthew
by Nathaniel T. Mott (2000) PERRY, COMMODORE MATTHEW [CALBRAITH] (1794-1858). Commodore Matthew Perry served a long and distinguished career in the U.S. Navy, which began in January 1809, when he was commissioned as a midshipman. Perry is best known for commanding an 1853 expedition of four vessels, including the steam frigates Mississippi (built 1841) and Susquehanna…
Read MoreWouk, Herman
by Laurence W. Mazzeno (2000) WOUK, HERMAN (1915-2019). Herman Wouk, author of the best-selling sea novel The Caine Mutiny (1951) and other works about the navy in World War II, was born in New York City, eldest son of Russian Jewish immigrants. Educated at Columbia University, Wouk spent the years before World War II working in…
Read MoreWilson, Sloan
by Robert Shenk (2000) WILSON, SLOAN (1920-2003). Sloan Wilson was a Coast Guard officer before he became a novelist and a yachtsman before he gained a commission in the Coast Guard. He came to regard his Coast Guard experience as more educative than his B.A. from Harvard; the latter two of the three novels that…
Read MoreWilkes, Charles
by Jason Smith (2013) WILKES, CHARLES (1798-1877). Charles Wilkes was an American naval officer, hydrographer, and writer. He commanded the United States Exploring Expedition, 1838 to 1842, wrote its five-volume Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition (1844), edited the expedition’s eighteen scientific volumes, and wrote the last of these, Hydrography (1861). He is also known…
Read MoreWhitman, Walt
by Philip A. Greasley (2000) WHITMAN, WALT[ER] (1819-1892). Walt Whitman was born in West Hills, near Huntington on northwestern Long Island. With almost two centuries of ancestral residence on the island and some seafaring tradition in his family, Whitman was naturally attuned to the ocean and its related occupations. Not until 1848 did he venture for…
Read MoreWarner, William W.
by Brian Anderson (2000) WARNER, WILLIAM W[HITESIDES]. (1920-2008). Naturalist-author William W. Warner was born in New York City. From 1944 to 1946, he served in the U.S. Navy, where he rose to the rank of lieutenant, junior grade, and was awarded a Navy Commendation Medal. Warner is primarily known for his nonfiction work Beautiful Swimmers: Watermen,…
Read MoreTaylor, James Bayard
by James L. Gray (2000) TAYLOR, JAMES BAYARD (1825-1878). James Bayard Taylor, born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, launched his career as a travel writer with Views Afoot (1846), an account of a walking tour of Europe, and soon became probably the most popular and prolific American travel writer of his time. His accounts usually emphasize inland…
Read MoreSobel, Dava
by Marija Miklavčič (2020) SOBEL, DAVA (1947 – ). Dava Sobel grew up in the Bronx, NY, and received her college degree from the State University of New York at Binghamton. A journalist and science writer, Sobel has written six books and co-authored a half-dozen more, mostly centered around astronomy and the history of…
Read MoreSlocum, Joshua
by Haskell Springer (2000; rev. 2021) SLOCUM, JOSHUA (1844-1909). Joshua Slocum, the first singlehanded circumnavigator and author of the classic Sailing Alone Around the World (1900), was born in Nova Scotia. At about sixteen he left home to work as a deepwater sailor and by 1869 commanded his first vessel. In 1871 he married Virginia Walker,…
Read MoreSemmes, Raphael
by Anna E. Lomando (2000) SEMMES, RAPHAEL (1809-1877). A naval officer first in the United States and then in the Confederate navy, Raphael Semmes wrote two books on his naval adventures. The first, Service Afloat and Ashore during the Mexican War (1851), is an account of his service during that conflict. In the early portion of…
Read MoreSearls, Hank
by C. Herbert Gilliland (2000) SEARLS, HENRY HUNT “HANK,” JR. (1922-2017). Novelist and author of nonfiction and short fiction, Hank Searls was born in San Francisco 10 August 1922. Graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1944 with the wartime-accelerated class of 1945, he remained an active-duty naval officer until 1954. He served in the…
Read MoreRoberts, Kenneth
by Lawrence I. Berkove (2000) ROBERTS, KENNETH [LEWIS] (1885-1957). Chronicling the lives of Maine coastal families in most of his distinguished historical novels of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Kenneth Roberts acquired and put to use an impressive and detailed knowledge of nautical matters. Even when most of the action takes place on land, as…
Read MoreOlson, Toby
by Peter H. McCracken (2000) OLSON, [MERLE THEODORE] TOBY (1937- ). Poet and novelist Toby Olson was born in Berwyn, Illinois, but spent much of his childhood moving around the United States. This constant movement instilled a theme of travel into his work, particularly his novels. He spent four years as a medical corpsman in the…
Read MoreNordhoff, Charles, the younger AND James Norman Hall
by Grove Koger (2000) NORDHOFF, CHARLES [BERNARD] the younger (1887-1947) AND JAMES NORMAN HALL (1887-1951). Writers Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall were born the same year but worlds apart, Nordhoff in London of American parents and Hall in Colfax, Iowa. They met during World War I as members of the Lafayette Flying Corps, whose…
Read MoreNordhoff, Charles, the elder
by John B. Hattendorf (2000) NORDHOFF, CHARLES, the elder (1830-1901). A journalist, Charles Nordhoff was born in Erwitte, a village in Westphalia, Prussia. At five, he emigrated with his parents to Ohio, where they died. Left an orphan in the care of a family in Cincinnati, he was apprenticed to a printer at age thirteen. After…
Read MoreNelson, James L.
by John F. Hussey (2000, revised 2014, by Eleanore MacLean) NELSON, JAMES L. (1962- ). Born in Lewiston, Maine, James L. Nelson, a former professional square-rig sailor, traces his love of the sea to his earliest memories when he chose boats and model ships for boyhood toys. In college Nelson joined the sailing club at…
Read MoreMichener, James A.
by Grove Koger (2000) MICHENER, JAMES A[LBERT]. (1907-1997). Prolific novelist James A. Michener was rescued as a foundling by a widow living in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. Years later, having taught high school and college, Michener found his nascent career as a textbook editor interrupted by World War II, an experience that altered his life dramatically. As a…
Read MoreMeredith, William
by Daniel W. Lane (2000) MEREDITH, WILLIAM [MORRIS] (1919-2007). With nine volumes of poetry to his credit, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Partial Accounts: New and Selected Poems (1987) and the National Book Award-winning Effort at Speech: New and Selected Poems (1997), William Meredith is also known for his critical studies and translations. While his earliest works…
Read MoreMelville, Herman
by Mary K. Bercaw Edwards (2000) MELVILLE, HERMAN (1819-1891). More than any other American author, Herman Melville used the sea as setting and concept to create great literature. With broad-ranging and deep philosophical interests, his books are far more than adventure stories. In his works, Melville struggles with human interactions in a diverse and complex world,…
Read MoreMcKenna, Richard
by Robert Shenk (2000) McKENNA, RICHARD [MILTON] (1913-1964). Richard McKenna was a career naval enlisted man whose 1962 novel The Sand Pebbles is a classic of naval fiction. McKenna’s childhood in Mountain Home, Idaho, was enriched by his great habit of reading, but when he entered the navy at age eighteen, he found it difficult to…
Read MoreMaury, Matthew Fontaine
by R. D. Madison (2000) MAURY, MATTHEW FONTAINE (1806-1873). The 1855 publication of Matthew Fontaine Maury’s Physical Geography of the Sea inaugurated the distinct discipline of oceanography, but earlier essays under the pseudonym “Harry Bluff” helped shape reform of the antebellum U.S. Navy. Born in Fredericksburg, Virginia, Maury pursued a career as an officer in the…
Read MoreMason, F. Van Wyck
by Boyd Childress (2000) MASON, F[RANCIS]. VAN WYCK (1901-1978). World War I and II veteran, importer, and ultimately writer, F. Van Wyck Mason was born in Boston on 11 November 1901. He was awarded a B.S. from Harvard University in 1924 after serving briefly with the U.S. Army in France during 1918-1919. After leaving Harvard, Mason…
Read MoreMartin, William
by Susan Raidy Klein MARTIN, WILLIAM (1950- ). History and the sea are the subjects of the fiction of William Martin, contemporary novelist and screenwriter. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and earning a B.A. from Harvard University (1972) and an M.F.A. from the University of Southern California (1976), Martin has spent much of his life on…
Read MoreJudson, Edward Zane Carroll (“Ned Buntline”)
by Margarita Rigal-Aragon (2000) [JUDSON, EDWARD ZANE CARROLL], “NED BUNTLINE” (1823-1886). Edward Zane Carroll Judson, better known by his pseudonym Ned Buntline, was born on the Atlantic coast in Stamford, New York. The family moved to Bethany, Pennsylvania, and then to Philadelphia about the time Judson was a teenager. The docks of this port impressed…
Read MoreJones, Justin (“Harry Hazel”)
by Boyd Childress (2000) [JONES, JUSTIN] “HARRY HAZEL” (1814-1889). Justin Jones, who wrote under the pseudonym Harry Hazel, authored more than forty dime novels about Boston, war, life at sea, and other adventure. His career as a fiction writer covered the 1840s and 1850s, for the most part, although he edited a newspaper as early…
Read MoreJones, John Paul
by Kay Seymour House (2000) JONES, JOHN PAUL (1747-1792). Born in Scotland, John Paul went to sea as an apprentice at age twelve. After inheriting property in Virginia, he added “Jones” to his name and became a lieutenant in the Continental navy in 1775. His was the first vessel to fly the Continental flag. After reporting…
Read MoreJohnson, Irving
by Mary K. Bercaw Edwards (2000) JOHNSON, IRVING [McCLURE] (1905-1991). Irving Johnson grew up on a farm in the Connecticut River valley of Massachusetts. Inspired by Jack London’s novels, he had an unswerving desire to go to sea and work with his hands. Johnson spent summers working aboard yachts along the New England coast. In 1929…
Read MoreJennings Jr., John Edward (“Bates Baldwin”)
by Debra Glabeau (2000) [JENNINGS, JOHN EDWARD, JR], “BATES BALDWIN” (1906-1973). John Edward Jennings Jr., historical novelist, was born in Brooklyn, New York. The son of a surgeon, he began his seafaring in 1925 as a foremast hand aboard a tramp steamer traveling in the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Jennings attended the Colorado…
Read MoreHine, Ephraim Curtiss
by Thomas Farel Heffernan (2000) HINE, EPHRAIM CURTISS (1818?-1853). Sailor and author raised in Genoa, New York, Ephraim Curtiss Hine is best known today as the model for the nautical poet Lemsford in Herman Melville’s novel White-Jacket (1850). Melville, who was Hine’s shipmate on the frigate United States during 1843-1844, treats the poet in the novel…
Read MoreHayden, Sterling
by James F. Millinger (2000) HAYDEN, STERLING [RELYEA WALTER] (1916-1986). Born in Upper Montclair, New Jersey, Sterling Hayden quit school at sixteen to join the crew of a sailing ship. He served as seaman aboard fishing vessels and sailing ships out of New England ports from 1932 to 1936, was first mate on Irving Johnson’s…
Read MoreHall, Lawrence Sargent
by Joseph Flibbert HALL, LAWRENCE SARGENT (1915-1993). Lawrence Sargent Hall was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts. Following completion of his Ph.D. at Yale University in 1941, he served for four years as an officer in the U.S. Navy, including three years of sea duty. In 1946 Hall took a teaching position at his undergraduate alma mater,…
Read MoreHaley, Alex
by Robert Shenk HALEY, ALEX (1921-1992). Alex Haley joined the Coast Guard as a “mess boy” at seventeen after two years of college. During World War II, aboard the cargo ship U.S.S. Murzim, he sent story after story to national magazines, with no luck. But an illiterate first-class steward’s mate set Haley to writing love…
Read MoreGoodrich, Marcus
by C. Herbert Gilliland (2000) GOODRICH, MARCUS [AURELIUS] (1897-1991). Novelist Marcus Goodrich was born 28 November 1897, in San Antonio, Texas. Enlisting in the navy in 1916, he served initially in the Philippines aboard the destroyer U.S.S. Chauncey. With the outbreak of World War I, the Chauncey was sent to the Atlantic, and Goodrich was…
Read MoreGallery, Daniel V.
by Robert Shenk (2000) GALLERY, DANIEL V[INCENT]. (1901-1977). Admiral Daniel V. Gallery, termed a “true original” by his friend Herman Wouk, was a brilliant career naval officer who published widely both during and after his naval duty. A 1920 Naval Academy graduate, Gallery first served on battleships and later volunteered for naval aviation. At the…
Read MoreFanning, Nathaniel
by Daniel E. Williams (2000) FANNING, NATHANIEL (1755-1805). Nathaniel Fanning’s Narrative of the Adventures of an American Navy Officer (1806) is one of the most reliable, graphic, and extensive eyewitness accounts of the famous battle between the Bonhomme Richard and the Serapis. Following the four-hour battle, in which both ships were devastated, and half of…
Read MoreFanning, Edmund
by Michael P. Dyer (2000) FANNING, EDMUND (1769-1841). Captain Edmund Fanning of Stonington, Connecticut, was the younger brother of naval officer Nathaniel Fanning. In a memorial to the U.S. Congress in 1833, Edmund Fanning urged the legislature to support funding for an exploring expedition to the high southern latitudes and the Pacific Ocean. He gave…
Read MoreEquiano, Olaudah
by Arnold Schmidt (2000, rev. 2021) EQUIANO, OLAUDAH (1745-1797). By the time he died at the end of the eighteenth century, mariner, author, and abolitionist Olaudah Equiano had likely become the wealthiest and most famous Black man in the Atlantic world. A widely travelled ex-slave who had sailed extensively on both naval and merchant ships,…
Read MoreEllsberg, Edward
by Robert Shenk (2000) ELLSBERG, EDWARD (1891-1983). Edward Ellsberg was a naval officer, diver, expert in ship salvage, and captivating storyteller. Graduating from the Naval Academy in 1914, Ellsberg served as a naval officer until 1926, when he went into the naval reserve and became chief engineer for Tide Water Oil. Before becoming a civilian,…
Read MoreCoxe, Louis O.
by Robert Shenk (2000) COXE, LOUIS O[SBORNE]. (1918-1993). Louis O. Coxe was a student in Allen Tate’s Creative Arts program at Princeton when Pearl Harbor occurred. Having grown up in Salem, Massachusetts, Coxe joined the navy. He came to regard his wartime service at sea as the central experience of his life. Coxe’s naval service…
Read MoreCooper, James Fenimore
by Thomas Philbrick (2000) COOPER, JAMES FENIMORE (1789-1851). With The Pilot (1824) James Fenimore Cooper invented the sea novel, for the first time employing the dominant literary form of the nineteenth century as the vehicle for a fiction in which the sea and the ship provide the principal settings, and seamen become the chief characters. In…
Read MoreConnell, Evan S., Jr.
by Jeffrey Cass (2000) CONNELL, EVAN S[HELBY]., JR (1924-2013). Born in Kansas City and educated at Dartmouth, Columbia, and Stanford, Evan S. Connell Jr. remains best known for his novels Mrs. Bridge (1959) and Mr. Bridge (1969). Connell wrote the screenplay of the 1990 film adaptation that combined these two titles; it was directed by James Ivory and starred…
Read MoreCarlisle, Henry Coffin
by Dennis Berthold (2000) CARLISLE, HENRY COFFIN (1926-2011). Born in San Francisco, Henry Coffin Carlisle served in the U.S. Naval Reserve from 1944 to 1946, earned a B.A. and M.A. at Stanford University in 1950 and 1953, and entered the book trade as an editor in New York City. He now lives in San Francisco…
Read MoreBurts, Robert
by Peter H. McCracken BURTS, ROBERT (17??-1839). Robert Burts was born in Maryland and entered the navy in 1833 as a midshipman. He sailed to the Mediterranean on the sloop Ontario, but upon return in 1836 he began a string of extended leaves. After fourteen months of continuous leave he was assigned to the Navy…
Read MoreBrinkley, William Clark
by James F. Millinger (2000) BRINKLEY, WILLIAM CLARK (1917-1993). Two of William Clark Brinkley’s books, Don’t Go Near the Water (1956) and The Ninety and Nine (1966), are based on his four years of experience in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Don’t Go Near the Water is not a “sea” story exactly, but it is a navy story:…
Read MoreBridge, Horatio
by John B. Hattendorf (2000) BRIDGE, HORATIO (1806-1893). A naval officer, Horatio Bridge is most famous for his close friendship with Nathaniel Hawthorne, for whom he found a publisher for Twice-told Tales (1837) and to whom Hawthorne dedicated The Snow Image (1851). Born in Augusta, Maine, Bridge graduated from Bowdoin College in 1825 with Hawthorne. Upon graduation, Bridge attended…
Read MoreBrewer, Lucy
by Margherita M. Desy (2000) “BREWER, LUCY.” Lucy Brewer is the pseudonym of either Nathaniel Coverly Jr. (1775?-1824), an early nineteenth-century Boston broadside and pamphlet publisher, or a writer in his employ, Nathaniel Hill Wright (1787-1824). Brewer’s The Adventures of Louisa Baker (1815) is purportedly a “true” tale of Brewer/Baker’s seduction, pregnancy, abandonment, life of prostitution,…
Read MoreBrady, Cyrus Townsend
by C. Herbert Gilliland (2000) BRADY, CYRUS [TOWNSEND] (1861-1920). Author of some seventy volumes of fiction and nonfiction, some having to do with seagoing or naval heroes, Cyrus Brady was born 20 December 1861 in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. Graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy in June 1883, he resigned from the navy that October. Employed by…
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