This html article is produced from an uncorrected text file through optical character recognition. Prior to 1940 articles all text has been corrected, but from 1940 to the present most still remain uncorrected. Artifacts of the scans are misspellings, out-of-context footnotes and sidebars, and other inconsistencies. Adjacent to each text file is a PDF of the article, which accurately and fully conveys the content as it appeared in the issue. The uncorrected text files have been included to enhance the searchability of our content, on our site and in search engines, for our membership, the research community and media organizations. We are working now to provide clean text files for the entire collection.
Both regular and associate members of the Institute may save by ordering books through the Book Department. A discount of 20% or more is allowed on books of the Naval Institute and a discount of 10% on books of other publishers (except on foreign and government publications, and on books on which publishers do not give a discount). Allow reasonable time for orders to be cleared and books to be delivered directly to you by publishers. Address. Secretary-Treasurer, U. S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, Maryland.
U-BOAT 977. By Heinz Schaeffer. W. W.
Norton & Company, Inc., New York:
1952, 260 pages. $3.50.
Reviewed by Commander Edward L.
Beach, U. S. Navy
(Commander Beach has served in submarines since 1^41, liis latest assignment being as Commanding Officer, V.S.S. Trigger. In 1952 he published Submarine!, an account of the exploits of the first V.S.S. Trigger and some of her sisters during World War II. lie has recently reported to Washington as Naval Aide to the President of the United States.)
The Professional Naval Officer, in particular the United States Submariner, will find much to interest his technically trained mind when he reads the story of U-977 as written by her only skipper. Heinz Schaeffer has given us a part of that popular history which we have awaited these eight years—- how it felt to fight the losing war in the Atlantic in a German U-boat.
It is by no means strange that the deadly war under the sea should have so captured our interest that several books dealing with different phases of it have been written in recent years. Two world conflicts have proved the ability of the submarine to destroy nations dependent upon ocean commerce for their life’s blood. There is, furthermore, something relentless about the torpedo launched unerringly without warning or the submarine rising irresistibly out of the depths. And there is a fascination inherent in the life of the men beneath the surface, those hunted beings at the other end of the periscope.
Schaeffer begins his story with a nostalgic trip back to Germafiy, wherein he again encounters the “Hitler is alive” myth. This particular phase of the book is somewhat confusing so far as the “when” and “how” are concerned, but clear is Schaeffer’s reaction to the often-repeated story that he brought Hitler out of Germany to a safe hideaway. He has had enough of it, and the necessity of repeated denial is the impelling force behind the book.
Having established his post-war position and motives, the author uses the flash-back technique and finally begins his yarn at the beginning—rather excessively so. He describes his early cadet days in the German Navy with so much detail that he thereby necessitates a target adjustment on the reader’s part. Once it is realized, however, that this is really the story of Heinz Schaeffer’s life in the German Navy instead of only the story of U-977, acceptance is easy. After the cadet days comes the first apprenticeship in a submarine and finally full-fledged participation in the U-boat campaign. The culmination, of course, is the author’s own elevation to command of U-977 and the long, pathetically unnecessary trip to South America.
Throughout Schaeffer’s narrative, despite the wealth of information offered, there is a disappointing lack of detail regarding what made the submarine and its crew tick. The emotional states of mind of the Nazi submariners at the hopeless war they were forced to wage are well, if fleetingly, described; the specifics, no. Perhaps the author did not think they were important, but the fact that they are missing detracts seriously from the permanent and professional value of the book.
There were, indeed, passages wherein it seemed that Schaeffer’s loyalty to long- dead Nazism caused him deliberately to write false information or to exaggerate or withhold certain technical details. To the submariner these instances stand out and can only bring the conclusion that Heinz Schaeffer is a man who does not quickly give up the ideals he has been taught.
Nicholas Monsarrat, author of the magnificent The Cruel Sea, wrote the introduction to U-Boat 977, and garners no praise from this reviewer for having done so.
One is immediately struck by the fact that Monsarrat is guilty of the same crime he found in Schaeffer’s book—an emotional belief in one’s own side and a conviction that the enemy’s is despicable. Monsarrat says that submarine warfare is cruel and treacherous. The spectacle of one tiny ship attacking a convoy protected by a total force many times that of the submarine is, to him, revolting.
For that matter, the submariner in his turn feels that anyone who has been on the receiving end of a depth charge will, like Monsarrat toward torpedoes, never feel the same toward one again.
Perhaps it is inevitable that Monsarrat’s approach to U-977 should have been on the emotional level; by the same token, this writer’s cannot but be on the professional plane. Operating a submarine is something like mathematics in that certain facts and necessities are immutable. The laws of the sea are the same, and the tactics we employed in the United States submarine service were much like those described by Heinz Schaeffer. Also, Schaeffer and this reviewer are about the same age, and we obtained command of our boats at approximately the same time. The problems of •training, leadership, and morale which he discusses were remarkably like those I had
experienced.
In the concluding pages of his book, Schaeffer pleads the cause of the defeated warrior. He feels he was not treated with honor after he surrendered, several months late. Apparently, after the war and the killing are over, Schaeffer would have us “forgive and forget.”
He misjudges us. We do, indeed, honor the defeated warrior, and we are, with certain outstanding exceptions, willing to forgive and forget. The very acceptance of Schaeffer’s book and publication of part of it in a national magazine are proof of the fact. But we cannot be expected to praise the derring- do of our enemies, even though we can abstractly admire it, for it cost us too dearly. Neither can we open-mindedly agree with Monsarrat’s violent denunciation.
Schaeffer is an able man and a strong man. He fought on the side of our enemies and would have destroyed us if he could. We, on our side, hate him and respect him at the same time. But most recently he has written a book for which we owe him thanks, one which the 30,000 dead German submariners have long awaited.
For this, when I meet him, I shall express my gratitude and then try to inveigle him into that discussion of those technical and professional matters he left out of his book.
OPERATION OVERLORD. By Albert
Norman. The Military Service Publishing
Co. Harrisburg, Pa. 1952. 230 pages, maps
and illustrations. §3.75.
Reviewed by Vice Admiral Morton L.
Deyo, U. S. Navy (Retired)
{Admiral Deyo commanded the naval bombardment forces at uUlah” beach, at Cherbourg, and in the Southern France invasion.)
This concise book ably traces the years of research and planning which finally resulted in the Overlord Outline Plan approved at the Quebec Conference, August, 1943. Later, top tactical commanders appointed to implement the plan made some changes, chiefly in widening the beachhead and strengthening the forces. But the Overlord Outline was their basic plan in working out the vastly complicated operation known as Neptune, which set in motion the greatest of overseas expeditions and carried it on to D plus 90 when the allied armies were to be along the Seine and regrouping for the drive to the Rhine.
Divergent views of the Allies are fairly presented. A clear view is given of the basic Problems that were finally solved, such as command relations, organization, procurement of sea borne craft, transportation, assembly in the United Kingdom, training, Paging, how to cross the Narrow Sea, how to tear away the hard crust of enemy defenses, best places and times of landing, deception of the enemy, supply over the beaches, the huge build up, special devices to overcome special obstacles, widening the beachhead, and pouring across France to final victory. The urgency of capturing the Cotentin Peninsula for the port of Cherbourg is not overlooked. Full credit is given the British for their predominant part in research and basic planning as well as for their ingenuity in meeting special situations and devising such things as the larger landing craft and the astonishing artificial harbors.
The first three parts deal with planning and preparation. Part 4, called “Reality” describes, very briefly, the execution of the Plan. Dr. Norman is very inaccurate in summarizing our naval performance. For this the Navy Department must bear some blame in failing to make available and to declassify the great number of official reports Uow resting in the files.
Dr. Norman criticizes the naval bombardment for not putting the very numerous and heavy coastal batteries and Strong Points Permanently out of action. This, he says, Was particularly felt at Omaha and Juno (British) beaches. He also, rather contradictorily, speaks of the easy time the troops had at Utah, ascribing it to a “fortunate error” >n landing well south of the designated spot where obstacles and defenses were much less formidable.
This reviewer can speak for Utah, which presumably shares the first criticism. There was little expectation, in the forty minutes allotted, of demolishing the protected batteries which confronted us, especially since the air spotters had had so little training. The hope was to smother the numerous guns and discourage their crews. The reasons are obvious to those who know the problem. As for the smaller guns, strung all along the beach, many could sink a destroyer. Taken as a whole and judging by their early shooting, these batteries would have made a shambles of our assault had they not been silenced, one after another, by a minutely planned and well executed naval bombardment which did sufficient damage to drive the crews from their guns until the troops were safely established ashore. To be sure, some batteries had to be repeatedly silenced and many had to be taken by the troops as they went forward. But the very low casualty rate at Utah is proof enough that the whole purpose of the huge and costly coastal defenses was decisively defeated by the naval bombardment. There were plenty of guns to cover the entire approach area so that a change of landing place would have availed us little had the German guns been able to keep shooting.
The author errs further in stating that enemy gun fire caused serious damage to destroyers, troop ships, and LSTs. Nearly all the damage afloat came from mines, mostly after D-Day.
Let us see what the enemy thought about it. A few weeks after the Normandy landing there appeared in a German Army publication, Militarische Korrespondenz, an article from which the effectiveness of naval gunfire may be judged.
“It would be utterly wrong to underestimate the fire power of warships, even smaller vessels. . . . Strong formations of warships and cruisers were repeatedly used against single coastal batteries, thus bringing an extraordinarily superior fire power to bear upon them. Moreover, they time and again put an umbrella of fire (Feuerglocke) over the defenders at the focal point of fighting, compared with which very heavy waves of air attack have only modest effect. It is no exaggeration to say that the co-operation of the heavy naval guns played a decisive part in enabling the Allies to establish a bridgehead in Normandy.”
Part 4 would be of greater interest if more German sources had been consulted. Nevertheless Operation Overlord, particularly the first three parts, will be of much interest to naval readers and others.
SEA OF GLORY. The Magnificent Story
of the Four Chaplains. By Francis
Beauchesne Thornton. New York: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1953. 243 pages. $3.00.
Reviewed by Chaplain Robert N.
Stretch, U. S. Navy
(iChaplain Stretch entered the Navy after six years of parish work and theological teaching and spent his first four years with the Marine Corps. He has been junior Protestant Chaplain at the Naval Academy since A ugust, 1949.)
In some twenty-six pages of terse, vivid prologue and epilogue, this little book describes the last cruise of the 5000-ton converted freighter Dorchester, from a Massachusetts port on a December dawn in 1942 to her death in the icy waters off Greenland. Four Army chaplains, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish, minister to the troops close- packed aboard and stand with linked arms as the doomed transport plunges beneath the waves.
The body of the book tells the life stories of these four young men who have become a shining symbol of the best in spiritual ministry to our armed forces. They are typically modern Americans in the very variety of their religious, racial, and cultural backgrounds.
George Fox, son of a strict, old-school Sicilian and a devout German Protestant mother, runs away from his home in Altoona, Pennsylvania, to enlist at the age of seventeen in the World War I army. Later, as a Methodist minister in Vermont, he is the tireless pastor of a rugged, independent people.
Quite different is the home of the Brooklyn rabbi in which Alexander David Goode begins his life. Growing up in the Georgetown section of the nation’s capital, he becomes a fine scholar and a Doctor of Philosophy, a writer of learned papers and the socially- minded rabbi of a York, Pennsylvania, congregation.
Clark Poling is the son of one of America’s best-known Protestant leaders. His boyhood is spent in a spacious parsonage overlooking the Charles River at Auburndale, Massachusetts, and at Oakwood, famous Quaker school in Poughkeepsie. He lives for a time in New York City, summers in New Hampshire, attends Hope College in Michigan, Rutgers, and the Yale Divinity School. As pastor of the First Reformed Church of Schenectady, he and his parishioners Dr. and Mrs. Ernest Ligon put into successful practice the religious education described in Ligon’s book, Their Future Is Now. He leaves behind him many poems of sensitive beauty.
The senior Washingtons courted in Ireland and brought much of its charm to the home in Newark where John Patrick was the eldest of their seven children. Popular but unassuming, John turns to the priesthood as naturally as he absorbs the devotional life of his home and parish church. We follow him through Darlington Seminary, ordination, and several years in New Jersey parishes before he volunteers as a chaplain.
The author is a Roman Catholic priest, but no one could be more understanding and sympathetic toward the worship of a little Methodist church in Vermont, the regular cycle of family devotions in a Jewish home, or the liberal, hospitable world of a modern Protestant leader. He takes us into widely differing homes and churches, from Washington to New England, and makes us feel a part of the lighting of the Sabbath candles, the joyful hymns of the Methodist circuit, the intimate holiness of a boy’s First Communion, the unforgettable Sabbath following his thirteenth birthday when Alex Goode entered into the manhood of Israel, the endless round of a busy parish church. This is the almost unique contribution of Sea Of Glory; except in some picture books and magazine articles, never has this reviewer found the varying faiths of our land more perfectly represented. It should give every reader a deeper appreciation of the many- colored strands of our people which are brought to an unforgettable focus on the icy deck of a shattered, dying ship in the North Atlantic.
Fr. Thornton was himself a chaplain during the last war. He is now literary critic for The Catholic Digest and has published two books of poems as well as Reading and Personality, King Doctor of the Ulithi, and Alexander Pope.
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF DAVID, EARL BEATTY. By Rear-Admiral W. S. Chalmers. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1951. 488 pages. 25 shillings.
Reviewed by Professor Arthur J. Marder
(■Professor of History at the University of Hawaii, Dr. Marder is the author of The Anatomy of British Sea Power and is currently editing the correspondence of A d- ntiral Sir John Fisher.)
This important work is the official biography of “the man who was not only Britain’s greatest fighting admiral in the World War of 1914-18, but also the most effective First Sea Lord who ever stood up before the Cabinet as the champion of British sea- power.” Admiral Chalmers’ book completely supersedes the sketchy biography done by Geoffrey Rawson many years ago. It is based on Beatty’s papers, journals, and, especially, the innumerable letters to his wife.
The most noteworthy thing about Beatty’s early service career was his remarkably swift rise. In 1910, when he was not quite thirty-nine, he was appointed a rear- admiral, the youngest British flag officer since Nelson. In 1913 he was appointed to command the newly formed Battle Cruiser Squadron—the most coveted appointment open to a rear-admiral. Again he had been appointed “over the heads of all.” Beatty’s rapid promotions did not endear him to the service at large. His energy and physical courage were acknowledged, but he was generally passed off as a mere dashing officer in the Prince Rupert tradition. Prior to the war few suspected that he had larger talents. But Beatty was a good deal more than an impetuous man of action. He was a natural born leader at sea, and, while no theorist, he had a solid grasp of strategy and tactics. Moreover, he had the tremendous asset of receptiveness to advice and criticism, and the intelligence to surround himself with first-rate men. Above all, he had a passion for victory and was distinctly offensive- minded. Like Nelson, he felt that no captain could go wrong if he sought out and engaged the enemy. The Archbishop of Canterbury, at Beatty’s funeral services in St. Paul’s in March, 1936, spoke the mind of the Royal Navy when he described the admiral as “the very embodiment of the fighting spirit of the Navy. In him something of the spirit of Nelson seemed to have come back.”
Chalmers devotes exactly half of his story to Beatty’s record in World War I. With reference to the Battle of Heligoland Bight: “There is no doubt that Beatty, by his prompt action, had turned into a victory what would otherwise almost certainly have been a disaster.” Dogger Bank was another Beatty victory; but, says Chalmers, the German squadron would have been annihilated but for the misinterpretation by Beatty’s second-in-command of a vital signal. Sixty-three pages are devoted to the controversial Battle of Jutland. The author treats Jellicoe with sympathy and understanding, but is mainly concerned with explaining and justifying Beatty’s tactics. Thus, he states that, despite the loss of two of his battle cruisers in the preliminary battle cruiser action, Beatty achieved his object—namely, locating the German battle fleet, keeping touch with it, and preventing Hipper from locating the British battle fleet.
In November, 1916, Beatty succeeded Jellicoe as Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Fleet, the latter becoming First Sea Lord. The Commander-in-Chief’s big problem in 1917-18 was the defeat of the submarine, and there is no doubt that the intensification of the counter-measures against the U-boats was in goodly measure due to his initiative. In particular, “His continuous pressure on Ministers was undoubtedly one of the main factors in overcoming the strong opposition to the introduction of convoy which existed in some highly influential quarters at the time.” After the war he served as First Sea Lord for seven and a half years (a record). His most serious problem was how to maintain the strength and efficiency of the navy in the face of the demand for retrenchment in those days of financial stress. On the whole he was successful in his tussles with the Cabinet.
The present reviewer has only two faults to find with the book. For one thing, it is uncritical. The author tells us that he “can find few faults either in Beatty’s conduct or in his outlook on policy, strategy, and tactics.” This approach leaves questions unanswered or disposed of with dispatch. One example must suffice. Concerning the Dogger Bank action, the crucial signal to the battle cruisers to turn together 90° to port, in order to avoid what seemed to be a submarine, is disposed of in a couple of sentences. Yet the delay that resulted was enough to destroy any chance of overtaking the German squadron. Was the order to turn necessary?
In the second place, Chalmers leans over backward to avoid controversy. Thus, he writes of the relations between Jellicoe and Beatty: “Like all great men, they had their differences, but no one could question Beatty’s loyalty to his chief while he served under his command, and afterwards.” This glosses over Beatty’s increasingly critical attitude toward Jellicoe during 1917 on account of the First Sea Lord’s alleged fumbling anti-U-boat policy and lack of the offensive spirit generally.
These strictures do not detract seriously from the over-all excellence of the book. Eminently readable and full of rich material and fresh insights, the volume is well worth space in any naval library.
BEYOND HORIZONS: VOYAGES OF ADVENTURE AND DISCOVERY. By Carleton Mitchell. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1953. 312 pages, drawings by W. N. Wilson. $3.95.
Reviewed by Commander Alexander C.
Brown, U. S. Naval Reserve
(Commander Brown, an associate editor of the maritime history quarterly, The American Neptune, is the author of three books and numerous articles in the field of maritime and naval history.)
One thing about people who are devoted to the sea and sailing is that when they are not actually engaged in pursuing their favorite pastime, they may at least be reading about it. One such yachtsman-reader is Carleton Mitchell whose previous books, Islands to Windward and Yachtsman’s Camera, recounted delightfully not only his adventures during West Indies cruises in his yawl Carib, but also let the reader in on his trade secrets of successful picture taking.
Mr. Mitchell is presently an editor of Yachting magazine, but had considerable photographic experience as a reserve officer in World War II, being named officer-incharge of the Combat Photography Section in August, 1942. He returned to inactive duty in December, 1945, with the rank of lieutenant commander. Through the years he has apparently been an omniverous reader of ancient sea-journals that cover voyages of adventure and discovery of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Many of these are not easily come by today and his commendable desire to share his pleasure in some of these accounts inspired the compilation of this very satisfactory book.
Beyond Horizons is, therefore, both by and about selected pioneer sailors who set out for distant shores at a period before reliable means of navigation had been perfected and longitude was obtained by dead reckoning. Vast segments of the oceans, particularly the South Pacific, were still to be explored and charted. More deadly even than unsuspected reef and shoal, however, was the apathy and resignation with which naval commanders accepted the inevitable visitation of the dred scourge of scurvy. Large crews were purposely jammed into tiny quarters at the outset of lengthy voyages since it was realized that over half of them would probably not survive to see the cruise completed. Yet effective means of preventing the disease had been demonstrated as far back as Captain John Smith’s day. Not until 1844 was the requirement of daily rations of lime juice applied in the British merchant service, thus, of course, originating the term “Limey.”
Mr. Mitchell’s arrangement for this book takes the following pattern. Selecting an old account that met his fancy, he carefully edits the text to eliminate repetition and confusion in archaic terms and phraseology, yet still contriving to retain the flavor of the original narrative. At the beginning and at the end of each (and in the middle too as his fancy dictates), he contributes his own brilliant commentary pointing up the story and interpreting the events for the benefit of land-lubber readers. This is quite well done, but it is sometimes difficult to determine what parts are quoted from the original reports and what Mr Mitchell has written.
In all there are eight contemporary accounts that are given this presentation. But before he squares away on the narratives, Mr. Mitchell warns his readers that ships were by no means as pretty as they looked in the old paintings. Masefield wrote: “There has been, perhaps, no such beautiful thing °n earth, the work of man’s hands, as an old ‘74’ under sail.” But he also added: “And Perhaps no place has contained more vice, wickedness and misery, within such a narrow compass, than a ship of the line during the eighteenth century.”
The first narrative selected by Mr. Mitchell ls an account of the 1740 round-the-world voyage of H.M.S. Centurion, flagship of a squadron commanded by Lord George Anson, as told by Richard Walter, the ship’s chaplain. The squadron’s mission was to attack Spanish possessions and commerce !n the Pacific, but of 977 men who sailed from England only 351 survived illness and hazards of the sea. Some of the vessels never returned either—rotten and worm eaten, they literally sank right out from under their scurvy-ridden crews.
Yet Anson’s men had the courage to engage in a furious battle with a larger, more heavily gunned Manila treasure galleon carrying gold from the Orient intended for Spain, which the Englishmen contrived to divert to Britain.
Happier was the account of George Robertson of H.M. frigate Dolphin, in which Captain Wallis discovered Tahiti. After the inhabitants were initially intimidated by the Englishmen’s guns, the visitors were well received and a lively trade sprang up by which fresh stores were secured in exchange for nails and beads. The crew, however, soon discovered another commodity that might be obtained by barter from the South Sea island maidens. And it was not long before nails were at a premium on board, the sailors even surreptitiously pulling them out of the ship itself. “Two-thirds of the men,” Robertson dryly observed, “were obliged to he on the deck for want of nails to hang their hammocksl” .
Still another narrative describes the 1631 adventures of Captain Thomas James in the 70-ton ship Henrietta Maria in a heartbreaking search for the Northwest Passage from Atlantic to Pacific over the “top” of the North American continent, a search that was to occupy the energies of countless expeditions until finally, only as recently as 1906, Amundsen found the way in the little sloop
Gjoa. The privations of James’ crew, forced to spend the long dark Arctic winter in the ice, are vividly brought out. Curiously though, Mr. Mitchell fails to identify the ship by name, an omission we have fortunately been able to supply here by recourse to Hakluyt’s Voyages.
Other accounts cover the loss of the Sea Venture, shipwrecked on Bermuda during a “horacano” encountered on a voyage to Virginia in 1609. Then there is Captain William Bligh’s own account of the open- boat voyage following the famous Bounty mutiny in 1789, an unparalleled feat of seamanship. Marooning and piracy are included in the other adventures given in this entertaining book. These combined with shipwreck and mutiny make one sometimes wonder why man ever decided to go to sea in the first place.
FUN IN THE WATER. By Commander
Bob Winston, U.S.N.R. with drawings by
Eric Gurney. New York: June, Osborn,
Foster, and Smith. 1952. 62 pages. $1.00.
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander John H. Higgins, U. S.
Naval Reserve
Commander Higgins, Varsity Swimming Coach at the Naval Academy, was director of swimming and water survival for Pre-Flight School, Pensacola, during the War. He has held ten world swimming records and 21 American records, and was National Champion twelve times.
A number of books have been written about water sports. Fun in the Water approaches swimming and water sports in a different manner. Bob Winston, having been the Captain of the swimming team at Indiana in 1929, looked for an outlet for his swimming abilities after competitive days had gone. He found this goal under the cool water ways. Fun in the Water has many descriptive illustrations that make the book doubly interesting and instructive.
You go to many wonderlands through a magic eye, the water face mask. Like Alice in Wonderland you are taken through the mirror-like surface to the marvels below. If you have ever dreamed of lying suspended in space, this book will help you achieve this end if you try it.
Underwater hunting opens up a new frontier for us all. This is a new sport to most of us, but with a mask, some flippers, and a spear or spear gun we can go to the ocean floor for some sport of hunting the fish in its own element.
Amputees or polio victims are able to get around with surprising ability and may take part in the underwater sports.
Neptune’s ten commandments are for us all.
1 - -Always inhale through your mouth.
2— Keep your eyes open when you swim.
3— Don’t get chilled.
4— Don’t overexert yourself.
5— Stay out of dirty water.
6— Never swim alone.
7— Don’t misjudge your own ability.
8— Keep an eye on the weather.
9— Don’t be a sunburned fool.
10— Give the fish a break.
Our late President gave us a fine example of recovery through water therapy. He showed us that swimming can be a way to health while having fun, especially to the handicapped.
THE OCEAN RIVER. By Henry Chapin and F. G. Walton Smith. New York. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1952. 325 pages, including bibliography and index; with maps. $3.50.
Reviewed by Frederick Laidlaw
(Mr. Laidlaw, who has been closely associated with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, contributed the historical chapters to Marine Fouling and Its Prevention, 1952, published by the U. S. Naval Institute.)
In The Ocean River, a phrase used here as a name for the Gulf Stream of the Atlantic Ocean, the authors have brought together a great amount of interesting material from many fields of knowledge; material that varies from facts observed and recorded by scientists in many ages, to the fascinating tales found in superstition and fable.
After comparing the ancient picture of the oceans with a more modern theory of them as being part of a great thermal system which makes life possible, The Ocean River starts with the formation of the earth itself together with its continents and great ocean basins. It discusses the earth’s crust, the formation of the Atlantic Ridge, the probable form of the early continents, one of which may have been the fabled Atlantis, and the development of life from the Paleozoic Age, as shown in marine sediments, through the Age of Reptiles to the modern forms. The book discusses, also, the great air currents that form the other half of the thermal system that determines our weather, which in turn affects the abundance or scarcity of food and the rise and fall of civilizations, even between the great ice ages.
Although the ancient Phoenicians undoubtedly mapped the currents of the Mediterranean and knew something of navigation, all such information was a closely guarded trade secret until the great voyages, starting in the time of Columbus, opened up the new lands to the West. As the authors point out, it was these voyages and the various wars, industries, and civilizations that eventually resulted from them, that led to our modern aids to navigation, to maps that marked currents as well as shore lines, and finally to a carefully planned examination of the Gulf Stream itself.
In illustration of this, they have sketched the philosophical attitudes and historical background that led to the voyages and touched lightly in the same way on many subjects: on the cruelty in the looting of Mexico and Peru; on slavery and the slave trade; on buccaneers and pirates; on the voyages of Hawkins, Drake, and Raleigh; on the importance of the New England trade in sugar and molasses; and on the shifting control of the “codfish frontier”; to name some of them. And, finally, they recapitulate briefly the histories of Spain, Portugal, France, Holland, and England, “all countries with open access to the lifegiving influence of the Ocean River.” •
The very multiplicity of all this information, differing so much in kind and drawn from such widely separated fields, makes it certain that every reader will find something of absorbing interest. But, perhaps unavoidably, it also makes the material seem diffuse and lacking in coherence. Many of the philosophical comments and historical vignettes seem only tenuously connected with the Gulf Stream itself; and many of the stories interspersed throughout the book, interesting as they are, seem chosen for their literary value rather than to illuminate the subject or to clarify understanding.
The illustrations also carry out this great diversity of subject matter. Included among the useful maps and charts, are illustrations from an early book on cod fishing, a map of the early buccaneer hunting grounds, and a device for telling time from the pole star. Like the discussion of Columbus’s personal problems, these things, interesting though they are, are interesting for themselves rather than for their vague and undeveloped connection with the Gulf Stream.
However, if The Ocean River is a collection of information from many sources rather than a book specifically discussing the Gulf Stream itself, this makes it all the more useful as a popular introduction to the subject. In addition, as far as this reviewer is aware, it is one of the first to introduce the general reader to some of the aims and problems of oceanography as a science. As its authors frankly say, no single book such as this can hope to do more than outline the general picture which, it is to be hoped, later books will examine in more detail.
David i. walsh, citizen-patriot.
By Dorothy G. Wayman. Milwaukee:
Bruce Publishing Company, 1952. viii,
366 pp. $5.00.
Reviewed by Dr. Frank Freidel
(A member of the Department of History, University of Illinois, Dr. Freidel is the author of Franklin D. Roosevelt: The Apprenticeship, the first of a six volume study of its subject.)
During the ten crucial years between 1936 and 1946, David I. Walsh of Massachusetts was Chairman of the Senate Naval Affairs Committee. His somewhat contradictory attitudes and policies during these years were of importance to the Navy, and merit study. Unfortunately, this adulatory biography comes closer to being a chronicle based on the Senator’s speech files and scrap books.
Walsh’s career was the success story of a devout, industrious Irish politician, who in 1918 became the first Democrat elected to the Senate from Massachusetts since the Republican party had come into existence. Promptly he followed the lead of Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, and voted with the Republicans on many issues. He opposed United States entrance into the League of Nations and favored continuance of a large Navy. In the 1930’s, at times he went even beyond President Roosevelt in his advocacy of a building program, but reiterated his determination that the Navy should be used only for defensive purposes. He most emphatically opposed turning naval vessels over to Great Britain after the fall of France, and caused Roosevelt and the Navy Department much trouble over the destroyers- for-bases deal. Similarly, he threw his weight against Lend-Lease. After Pearl Harbor, he called for all-out prosecution of the war: nevertheless when German submarines were harassing shipping along the Atlantic coast, he demanded that some of the fleet be brought home to defend the shoreline. Undeniably he was a warm friend of the Navy, but he never demonstrated a grasp of naval policy and strategy comparable to that of the distinguished Chairman of the House Naval Affairs Committee, Carl Vinson.
★