Dewey and Other Naval Commanders

I purpose telling you in the following pages about the exploits of the gallant men who composed the American Navy, beginning with the Revolution and ending with the story of the...

The name of Vermont recalls the gallant "Green Mountain Boys," who proved their sturdy patriotism not only in the Revolution, but before those stormy days broke over the land. I...

No one needs to be reminded that the War for the Union was the greatest struggle of modern times. The task of bringing back to their allegiance those who had risen against the a...

While engaged with his duties in Washington, Commodore Dewey found his close confinement to work had affected his health. Naturally strong and rugged, accustomed to the ozone of...

When, on April 19, 1775, the battle of Lexington opened the Revolution the Colonies did not possess a single ship with which to form the beginning of a navy. They had for many y...

Paul Jones waited until midnight. Then, when no one was dreaming of danger, his men silently pulled away from the _Ranger_ in two boats, one commanded by himself and the other b...

I have taken Paul Jones as the highest type of the infant American navy. There were others who fought with great bravery and did much to aid in the struggle for American indepen...

Now I suspect that if my young readers were asked to name the nations with which, at one time or another we have been at war, they would not be likely to include France in the l...

Andrew Sterrett was executive officer of the _Constellation_, which captured the French frigate _L'Insurgente_, in 1799, and _La Vengeance_, in 1800. It fell to his lot, while i...

The Bashaw of Tripoli was not yet subdued. He treated his American prisoners with greater harshness and refused to believe their nation was strong enough to bring him to terms.

Whenever a war is under way a number of persons on each side are certain to come forward with ingenious schemes for injuring their opponents, through improvements upon the accep...

Now, as to the cause of the war between England and our country: Great Britain was engaged in a tremendous conflict with France, at the head of which was the greatest military l...

I must now tell you something about another gallant young officer who entered the American navy at the close of the century, when he was hardly thirty years old. He was Jacob Jo...

Before the war broke out between England and the United States the naval officers naturally were on the best of terms with one another. They exchanged visits, had dinners togeth...

You would gain a wrong impression if my account of the leading naval events in the War of 1812 were made up wholly of American victories. It was inevitable that our gallant offi...

David Porter was born in 1780 and died in 1842. He came from a seafaring family, and, entering the navy at an early age, did gallant service in the war with France and Tripoli....

Oliver Hazard Perry was born in Rhode Island in 1785, and entered the American navy as midshipman when fourteen years old, under his father, Captain Christopher Raymond Perry, w...

During the early days of President Lincoln's administration, before the firing upon Fort Sumter by the Confederates, the all-absorbing question was as to whether or not the fort...

The treaty of peace between Great Britain and the United States was signed December 24, 1814, at the city of Ghent, in Belgium. Had the submarine telegraph been known at that ti...

It was not alone in our wars with the leading nations that the American navy won glory. Wherever there arose a demand for its work, its patriotism, skill and bravery were instan...

We hear little of pirates in these days, but for ten years or more after the close of the War of 1812 the West Indies were infested by them. Our Government saw that in self-defe...

Qualla Battoo is the name of a small Malay town, which stood on the northwestern coast of Sumatra. In the month of February, 1831, the _Friendship_, a trading vessel from Salem,...

Perhaps my young readers have wondered over the same fact that used to puzzle me when a boy. While the civilized world was interested, as it has been for hundreds of years, in t...

The War for the Union ushered in a new era for the American navy. Steam navigation had been fully established some years before. As all my readers no doubt know, the first succe...

The reader will not forget the exploits of Captain David Porter, in command of the _Essex_ in the War of 1812. Contrary to the rule that great men never have great sons, Captain...

When the gallant Lawrence, mortally wounded on the _Chesapeake_, was dying, he called out in his delirium, "Don't give up the ship!" thus furnishing a motto that has served time...

A few weeks ago I had as guests at my house two young men who were graduates of the West Point Military Academy in 1889. One was my son, at present an instructor in the Academy,...

One Sunday morning early in the Civil War a large assemblage had gathered in a prominent church in a Western city for the purpose of worship. But the hour for opening the servic...

If ever man lived who knew not the meaning of fear, he was William Barker Cushing, born in Wisconsin in 1842. He entered the Naval Academy in 1857, remained four years, received...

David Glasgow Farragut was the greatest naval hero of modern times. There are many honored names connected with the American navy, but his towers above them all. The highest hon...

Since the war with Spain was undertaken for the liberation of Cuba from the most frightful atrocities that mind can conceive, it was natural that the chief attention of our Gove...