National Archives

On Our Scope

August 2017
The first U.S. Marine fighter pilots to arrive at Guadalcanal’s Henderson Field 75 years ago faced hard facts. For one, the Japanese flew the aerial equivalent of a hot rod—the ...

In Contact

August 2017
Fletcher Grades SpruanceCaptain Howard C. Cohen, JAGC, USNR (Ret.)In “Grading Midway’s Commanders” (June, pp. 14–19), Jonathan Parshall undertook an assessment of the leadership of the six most important ...

Talking Between Ships

By Lieutenant Commander Thomas J. Cutler, U.S. Navy (Retired)
August 2017
The U.S. Navy’s use of shipboard radiotelephone (RT)—also known as “voice radio”—for tactical communications began in 1916, when the first RT message was sent from ship to ship. During World ...
NAVAL HISTORY AND HERITAGE COMMAND

Naval History News

August 2017
What’s Up at the NHHC WWI Navy Uniform Gets New Lease on LifeJust in time for the 100th anniversary of U.S. entry into World War I, a junior naval officer ...
National Archives

Historic Aircraft - What's Out There?

By Norman Polmar
August 2017
When U.S. aircraft carriers are at sea, on their flight decks—or flying nearby—are Grumman E-2 Hawkeye airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft. Radar-equipped planes have been flying from U.S. carriers in ...
www.navsource.org

Voyage to War

By David C. Isby
August 2017
Six months before the Pearl Harbor attack, the destroyer USS Mayo set out to battle U-boats and hazardous weather in an undeclared war being waged in the North Atlantic.cetime ...
Naval History and Heritage Command

Portrait Perfectionist

August 2017
Renowned American portrait artist Albert K. Murray—viewed by many as being in the same league as John Singer Sargent—reflected on his art in an oral history published by the U.S ...
Kelly Oaks

The Cactus Air Force's Humble Home

By Colonel Richard Camp, U.S. Marine Corps (Retired)
August 2017
Henderson Field was located in a cleared area near the north coast of Guadalcanal, just east of the Lunga River and west of the Ilu River, nicknamed “Alligator Creek.” When ...
AUTHOR’S COLLECTION

A Sailor's Letters Home

By Vincent P. O’Hara
August 2017
The World War I correspondence between Engineman Second Class Robert Orville Carver and his family poignantly underscores how, even in a time of destruction on a grand scale, every life—and ...
U.S. Naval Institute Photo Archives

Leading the Charge at Savo Island

By Captain Toshikazu Ohmae
August 2017
About 40 hours after the first Marines splashed ashore on Guadalcanal, a Japanese cruiser force inflicted a crushing defeat on the U.S. Navy. A staff officer on board the Japanese ...
COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

Museum Report - Denmark's New Maritime Museum

By Andrew C. A. Jampoler
August 2017
Denmark’s Museet for Søfart, the Maritime Museum of Denmark, sits in the shadow of historic Kronborg Castle—the home of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, in Shakespeare’s brilliant tragedy—and is a must-see ...

Book Reviews

August 2017
As Good As Dead: The Daring Escape of American POWs from a Japanese Death CampStephen L. Moore. New York: Caliber, 2016. 358 pp. Plates. Maps. Appendices. Biblio. Endnotes. Index. $27 ...
National Archives

Pieces of the Past

Eric Mills
August 2017
It is an interesting irony of World War I that U.S. troops who showed up in mass numbers to defeat the Germans were transported in German ships. (See “A Sailor’s ...