Blue Water Patriots: The American Revolution Afloat Review

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(More customer reviews)"Blue water Patriots', an aggravating book fit only to be used as a fly-swatter, repeatedly insults American patriots' motives, thoughts, and opinions before and during the ARW without any basis in facts in the form of quotes from letters or speeches of specific persons of that time. This is a "take the names and dates" collection, that's more "BNA Tory" in attitude than Whig, (British or American). The author would have been liberally coated in 78 degree F. tar, and feathers, rather than winning a B. A. for scholarship, had he written this mulch in Boston in 1775.
In the same sentence in which he calls groups of British sailors "jack-tars", (customarily armed for 1774 impressment duties in Boston with wooden cudgels the size and weight of Babe Ruth's baseball bats), he calls the unarmed colonial farmers and sailors confronted by them "thugs". He mentions that colonials were upset about the actions of certain British Navy ships patrolling the waters near isolated communities; but never says why. He never mentions that at least one of the captains whose ships were burned to the waterline by angry Americans made it his barely-legal habit to send bands of his ship's "jack-tars" sweeping into isolated farms, where they took part or all of a year's hard-earned winter food stores, paying with paper script which could only be redeemed in cities hundreds of miles away by sea.
The book is derivative, however it appears to have derived only the attitudes of British Tories during their most foolish period of British rule, not the reasoned opinions of the men of time, British or American.
He writes of the Stamp Act and the Intolerable Acts as if they were good things that the colonials just didn't understand. This book is a sly slam on our cash-poor, hard-working, brave, long-dead ancestors, long after the fact. Don't waste your money, time, or emotional peace-of-mind on wanting to rip it up with your bare hands. SKIP IT!

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John Barry: An American Hero in the Age of Sail Review

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(More customer reviews)I have just finished reading this book, and although I have never written a book review before I feel compelled to write a few lines of praise about "JOHN BARRY: An American Hero in the Age of Sail". The history of the American Navy at sea during the Revolutionary War is a subject I know little about, except for, of course, John Paul Jones. This book is very well researched by Tim McGrath; it may be his first book but I hope it is not his last. The writing is superb and the descriptive naratives of raging storms at sea as well as numerous sea battles engaged in by Barry are [honest to God] suspenseful and literally kept me on the edge of my seat. [Historical biographies do not normally affect me in this fashion.] The fact that the first sea battle, as well as the last, of the Revolutionary War at sea was won by an American Navy vessel captained by John Barry says much about this unknown hero. However, Barry was very well known, in his day, for his sailing and fighting prowess and, in fact, was appointed by President George Washington as the first commissioned officer in the new United States Navy.

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Captains Contentious: The Dysfunctional Sons of the Brine (Studies in Maritime History) Review

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(More customer reviews)CAPTAINS CONTENTIOUS: THE DYSFUNCTIONAL SONS OF THE BRINE comes from a maritime historian who offers a survey and analysis of five captains in the Continental Navy, considering how their personality flaws hindered their careers and enhanced their actions in the Revolutionary War. Perfect for college-level American history libraries, this uses primary and secondary sources alike to present biographical sketches that illustrate the nature and impact of their actions on world history and local events alike.

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John Paul Jones : Sailor, Hero, Father of the American Navy Review

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(More customer reviews)For Evan Thomas to remind readers that John Paul Jones was his own worst enemy, that his vanity, ego and ambition rivaled those of the preening Alexander Hamilton is unnecessary and an understatement. John Paul Jones was, as much as the knowledge pained him, a glory hound. He was also one of the bravest, most skilled and dashing officers in the services of the United States during the Revolutionary War, and Thomas brings the cantankerous, manic-depressive little bulldog to vivid life for today's historians, history buffs and armchair adventurers. The highest highs and lowest lows of Jones's life toss, exalt, thrill, and lurch the reader like an unpredictable sea, and what a wonderful voyage it is!
John Paul Jones is the latest "self-made man" to appear in a biography, following on the heels of Willard Sterne Randall's cumbersome yet well-rendered "Alexander Hamilton: A Life." From humble roots, the son of a Scottish gardener, Jones was determined to rise from under the oppression of the European class system. He gazed out across the magnificent gardens created by his father and saw the ocean, with its seemingly endless horizon -and that is how Jones decided to live the rest of his life: He would expand, grow himself and mold his image anew, as wide as the sea, as broad as the sky.
As much taken with sail and sea as they took him, John Paul Jones was a natural, a gifted sailor who always tried to improve himself, whether his nautical skills, or by reading books to absorb philosophy and seeking the company of men from whom he knew he could learn. Unfortunately, Jones was never able to subdue his passions sufficiently, not sufficiently enough for any self-reflection to temper his sensitivities and thin skin, nor for him to ever cultivate the necessary strengths to achieve his highest ambition: Appointment to the rank of Admiral in the United States Navy. He would have to travel to Russia near the end of his life and enter the service of Catherine the Great to achieve that rank, but as fundamentally flawed and blameful as Jones was, he was not a rank human being. He was steadfast, loyal to his adopted country, America, and never gave in to the easy profit of privateering or ever turned his back on the Stars and Stripes.
He was as big-hearted and melodramatic as he was tragic and romantic, a sometimes womanizer who barely had a head for wine and never drank hard liquor. Like Thomas Jefferson, Jones was a paragon of paradox and yet always was, in the best sense, an American patriot.
It's painful to look on, page after page, reading about Jones's exploits and ideas, tactics and tales, only to see him constantly self-destruct, eventually alienating every single person around him. Nonetheless, Jones knew how to fight in an age where most men achieved rank through connections and lineage, and even though he didn't always win, he won enough: Jones was a tonic for fledgling America, and any other person or power savvy enough to employ his courage.
Sadly, Jones was far from the best judge of character, and often found himself in an impossibly frustrating, nightmarish circumstance because of his own inability to discern veneer from character, though Jones seems to have had plenty of character, and yet constantly coveted superficial laurels of those less worthy. But no matter how badly he may have comported himself, and in spite of how myopic most of his handlers were, blinded to Jones's full potential, "Little Jones" was indeed a mouse that roared.
Whether Jones ever knew it during his life, he certainly reflected the rigid principles of honor to which he held himself and others, and Evan Thomas has written a flowing, absorbing book about John Paul Jones, a man who cherished freedom above all else, and helped bring it to so many others.

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