The Officers Of The Css Shenandoah

Author : Angus Curry
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780813029436
Total Pages : 428 pages
Book Rating : 4.30/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Officers of the CSS Shenandoah written by Angus Curry and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Confederate Steam Ship Shenandoah is renowned as the last vessel to surrender after the Civil War, and the young officers on board--who didn't learn of the war's end for three months--consequently suffered extraordinary physical and emotional stress. This first-hand account of the crew's hazardous last year, told through shipboard diaries and postwar journals, reveals the heavy personal toll they paid during the cruiser's transition from commissioned commerce raider to hunted fugitive. Many of the Shenandoah's officers had resigned commissions in the United States Navy to fight for the South. Curry examines how their social and professional backgrounds shaped them as leaders and how their expectations clashed with the realities of military rule, chronic personnel shortages, and harsh conditions at sea. He explores the ethical problems faced by Confederate naval personnel who participated in attacks on civilian maritime commerce, and he describes the kinds of rationale employed by the Southern officers to justify their duties. He also reveals the tension that developed between the cruiser's commander, Lieutenant James I. Waddell, and his subordinates. In frequent public and private outbursts, the officers expressed dissent about the manner in which Waddell operated. After learning of the Confederacy's defeat and being forced into exile, they argued over the appropriateness of their actions, and for years after the war were plagued by accusations of "mutiny" and "piracy." Curry also follows the process by which the former naval officers concealed controversial aspects of the last voyage of the CSS Shenandoah in their public recollections, showing how postwar experiences shaped and reconstructed their memories of sea duty.

Author : Dwight Hughes
Publisher : Naval Institute Press
ISBN 13 : 1612518427
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.28/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Confederate Biography written by Dwight Hughes and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2015-12-15 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From October 1864 to November 1865, the officers of the CSS Shenandoah carried the Confederacy and the conflict of the Civil War around the globe through extreme weather, alien surroundings, and the people they encountered. Her officers were the descendants of Deep South plantation aristocracy and Old Dominion first families: a nephew of Robert E. Lee, a grandnephew of founder George Mason, and descendants of one of George Washington's generals and of an aid to Washington. One was even an uncle of a young Theodore Roosevelt and another was son-in-law to Raphael Semmes. Shenandoah's mission-commerce raiding (guerre de course)-was a central component of U.S. naval and maritime heritage, a profitable business, and a watery form of guerrilla warfare. These Americans stood in defense of their country as they understood it, pursuing a difficult and dangerous mission in which they succeeded spectacularly after it no longer mattered. This is a biography of a ship and a cruise, and a microcosm of the Confederate-American experience.

Author : William C. Whittle
Publisher : University Alabama Press
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 280 pages
Book Rating : 4.22/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Voyage of the CSS Shenandoah written by William C. Whittle and published by University Alabama Press. This book was released on 2005-05-08 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The Confederate cruiser Shenandoah was the last of a group of commerce raiders deployed to prey on Union merchant ships. Ordered to the Pacific Ocean to "greatly damage and disperse" the Yankee whaling fleet in those waters, the Shenandoah's successful pursuit of her quarry compares favorably with the exploits of the more celebrated Alabama and Florida but has never been as well known because it coincided with the war's end. It was, however, one of the best documented naval expeditions - from England to the Indian Ocean, Australia and the South Pacific, the Bering Sea, San Francisco, and finally to port in Liverpool - during the Civil War."--BOOK JACKET.

Author : Tom Chaffin
Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 0809095114
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.17/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sea of Gray written by Tom Chaffin and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2006 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of the 58,000-mile, around-the-world cruise of the Confederacy's last ship afloat. Launched secretly from England in October, 1864, the CSS Shenandoah became the Confederacy's second most successful merchant raider, but--after rounding Africa's Cape of Good Hope, stopping long enough in Australia to cause a diplomatic crisis, and navigating the ice floes of Siberia's Sea of Okhotsk, the Bering Sea, and the Arctic Ocean--Captain Waddell learned that he had been fighting without cause or state, since the Civil War had ended four months earlier. In the eyes of the Union, he had gone from being an enemy combatant to a pirate, a hangable offense. Hunted by Union and British men-of-war, his polyglot crew rife with hints of mutiny, and with dwindling supplies, Waddell elected to camouflage the ship, circumnavigate the globe, and attempt to surrender on English soil.--From publisher description.

Author : William C. Whittle
Publisher : University of Alabama Press
ISBN 13 : 0817357874
Total Pages : 270 pages
Book Rating : 4.70/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Voyage of the CSS Shenandoah written by William C. Whittle and published by University of Alabama Press. This book was released on 2014-06-15 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Confederate cruiser Shenandoah was the last of a group of commerce raiders deployed to prey on Union merchant ships. Ordered to the Pacific Ocean, the Shenandoah's successes compared favorably with the exploits of the more celebrated Alabama and Florida but have never been as well known because the Shenandoah's story coincided with the war's end. The expedition, however, from England to the Indian Ocean, Australia and the South Pacific, the Bering Sea, San Francisco, and finally to port in Liverpool, was one of the best documented during the Civil War. Among the most significant accounts of the expedition is the journal of Lieutenant William Whittle Jr., which is presented here with annotations from other journals, the official records and logs, and newspaper accounts or the Shenandoah's activities. These fascinating primary sources bring to life the history of this remarkable voyage. Book jacket.

Author : Stephen Fox
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0307498824
Total Pages : 336 pages
Book Rating : 4.23/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Wolf of the Deep written by Stephen Fox and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2009-03-25 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The electrifying story of Raphael Semmes and the CSS Alabama, the Confederate raider that destroyed Union ocean shipping and took more prizes than any other raider in naval history. In July, 1862, Semmes received orders to take command of a secret new British-built steam warship, the Alabama. At its helm, he would become the most hated and feared man in ports up and down the Union coast—and a Confederate legend. Now, with unparalleled authority and depth, and with a vivid sense of the excitement and danger of the time, Stephen Fox tells the story of Captain Semmes's remarkable wartime exploits. From vicious naval battles off the coast of France, to plundering the cargo of Union ships in the Caribbean, this is a thrilling tale of an often overlooked chapter of the Civil War.

Author : John Baldwin
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0307236560
Total Pages : 370 pages
Book Rating : 4.62/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Last Flag Down written by John Baldwin and published by Crown. This book was released on 2008-05-06 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the Confederacy felt itself slipping beneath the Union juggernaut in late 1864, the South launched a desperate counteroffensive to shatter the U.S. economy and force a standoff. Its secret weapon? A state-of-the-art raiding ship whose mission was to prowl the world’s oceans and sink the U.S. merchant fleet. The raider’s name was Shenandoah, and her executive officer was Conway Whittle, a twenty-four-year-old warrior who might have stepped from the pages of Arthurian legend. Whittle would share command with a dark and brooding veteran of the seas, Capt. James Waddell, and together with a crew of strays, misfits, and strangers, they would spend nearly a year sailing two-thirds of the way around the globe, destroying dozens of Union ships and taking more than a thousand prisoners, all while continually dodging the enemy.Then, in August of 1865, a British ship revealed the shocking truth to the men of Shenandoah: The war had been over for months, and they were now being hunted as pirates. What ensued was an incredible 15,000-mile journey to the one place the crew hoped to find sanctuary, only to discover that their fate would depend on how they answered a single question. Wondrously evocative and filled with drama and poignancy, Last Flag Down is a riveting story of courage, nobility, and rare comradeship forged in the quest to achieve the impossible.

Author : Paul Williams
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 1476619956
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.58/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Last Confederate Ship at Sea written by Paul Williams and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-27 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The CSS Shenandoah fired the last shot of the Civil War and was the only Confederate warship to circumnavigate the globe. But what was Captain James Waddell’s true relationship with his Yankee prisoner Lillias Nichols and how did it determine the ship’s final destination? Without orders, Waddell undertook a dangerous three month voyage through waters infested with enemy cruisers. He risked mutiny by a horrified crew who, having been declared pirates, could be hanged. This is the true story behind the cruise of the Shenandoah—one of secret love and blackmail—brought to light for the first time in 150 years.

Author : James M. McPherson
Publisher : UNC Press Books
ISBN 13 : 0807837326
Total Pages : 288 pages
Book Rating : 4.20/5 ( download)

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Download or read book War on the Waters written by James M. McPherson and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2012-09-17 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although previously undervalued for their strategic impact because they represented only a small percentage of total forces, the Union and Confederate navies were crucial to the outcome of the Civil War. In War on the Waters, James M. McPherson has crafted an enlightening, at times harrowing, and ultimately thrilling account of the war's naval campaigns and their military leaders. McPherson recounts how the Union navy's blockade of the Confederate coast, leaky as a sieve in the war's early months, became increasingly effective as it choked off vital imports and exports. Meanwhile, the Confederate navy, dwarfed by its giant adversary, demonstrated daring and military innovation. Commerce raiders sank Union ships and drove the American merchant marine from the high seas. Southern ironclads sent several Union warships to the bottom, naval mines sank many more, and the Confederates deployed the world's first submarine to sink an enemy vessel. But in the end, it was the Union navy that won some of the war's most important strategic victories--as an essential partner to the army on the ground at Fort Donelson, Vicksburg, Port Hudson, Mobile Bay, and Fort Fisher, and all by itself at Port Royal, Fort Henry, New Orleans, and Memphis.

Author : James D. Horan
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 0307827941
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.44/5 ( download)

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Download or read book C.S.S. Shenandoah written by James D. Horan and published by Crown. This book was released on 2012-11-07 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The last shot of the Civil War was fired, not on an obscure battlefield, but in the ice-locked Sea of Okhotsk off Siberia seven months after Lee’s surrender. The last armed Confederate cruiser was the C.S.S. Shenandoah, a beautiful but dangerous vessel which scattered and burned the New Bedford whaling fleet in Arctic waters. She was the last cruiser sent to sea by James Dunwoody Bulloch, the captain who built the Confederacy’s navy in the shipyards of Europe. Constructed at a cost of £53,715, the Shenandoah captured thirty-eight ships and burned thirty-two. She inflicted damage to Union commerce which was officially judged at $1,361,983. She took 1,053 prisoners. In fact, she took so many her skipper, Lieutenant-Commanding James Waddell, had to rig a chain of whaleboats that could be towed along by his vessel, to accommodate captured Union seamen and the crews of the whalers he had burned. A few years after the war, Waddell wrote his account of the Shenandoah’s great cruise, and it is published here complete for the first time. He tells of his own career in the United States Navy and in the Confederate Navy, and also of the events leading up to his taking command of the Shenandoah.