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Editorial

Michael Moir

Introduction

Alicia Caporaso

Other Means of Grace: Agency, Dependency, and the Loan Libraries of the American Seamen's Friend Society

Jane McCamant
This paper assesses the success of the loan libraries of the American Seamen’s Friend Society (ASFS). It contains an analysis of 20 reports submitted to the ASFS by shipboard librarians between 1865 and 1867. Analysis of the reports themselves and how they were represented in ASFS publications reveals the paradoxical relationship the ASFS had with stereotypes of seamen. In the ASFS’s images of sailors and in their administration of the loan libraries, those sailors were kept in a position of moral dependency. The paper concludes by suggesting that Herbert Blumer’s model of social problems as constituted by collective action is a fruitful way to consider seamen’s benevolence in general, and a productive framing to move forward with studies of loan libraries in particular.

Silting at the Dock of the Bay: Mud, Mudslinging, and the Fight for the San Francisco Waterfront, 1853–63

Derek Lee Nelson
Between 1853 and 1863, no issue divided San Franciscans as much as the Bulkhead Bill (or Parsons Plan) that called for a seawall to wrap around the entire waterfront. The bill’s most controversial feature would have allowed a few businessmen to monopolize all waterfront transactions for 50 years as compensation for building the expensive bulkhead. By contrast, opponents characterized it as a scheme to fleece the city of revenue. On the surface, the bulkhead fight appears to be an urban question. But under the surface, it was at the core about sedimentation and the changing nature of San Francisco Bay.

“His Name Does Not Appear”: Missing Voices in Ocean Science and the Invisible Technician at Sea

Penelope K. Hardy
This article identifies voices missing from the scientific maritime on two floating laboratories early in the history of oceanography: HMS Challenger in the 1870s and the oceanographic yachts of Prince Albert I of Monaco from the 1880s to 1920s. Using ships’ logs, field journals, personal letters, and newspapers, it elucidates the vital contribution of enlisted sailors, lab technicians, photographers, and illustrators – including women and people of color – to the development of scientific understanding of the oceans. Restoring these actors to their proper place in the record also contributes to an ongoing conversation about the construction of scientific knowledge and authority.

“A Fierce Tempest”: Disaster and Relief at the Luna Settlement, 1559–61

Christina L. Bolte
Disaster relief efforts for early colonial North America demonstrate that remote locations and the delayed response time of communications and relief supplies directly affected the success or failure of early settlement efforts. This is particularly evident for the 1559 to 1561 Tristán de Luna y Arellano colonization attempt on Pensacola Bay. After just over a month, a hurricane struck the settlement in September 1559, destroying seven ships in Luna’s fleet and much of the colony’s food stores. This research presents an analysis of the disaster relief efforts undertaken in the hope of sustaining the colony.

“A Free Republic, Like Our Own”: The US Navy and the African Colonization Movement in Public Discourse, 1819-60

Roger A. Bailey
This article examines how US naval officers’ attitudes about slavery, race, and American empire led many to support for America’s African colonization movement in the antebellum era. It argues that beyond the well-documented support they provided in Africa, many American naval officers joined colonization societies, gave speeches, published in newspapers, and authored books to advocate for colonization in the United States. Drawing on their firsthand experience, they provided credibility to the movement at a time when it was sorely needed in response to attacks from both sides of the political spectrum.

Coasting Through the Age of Steam: Commerce and Community along the Gulf Coast

Kevin Grubbs
This article examines the persistence of the Gulf Coast’s coasting trade during the late nineteenth century, revealing how sail and steam coexisted within a shared maritime world. Coasting schooners linked small ports, islands, and inland markets, sustaining older traditions of labor and community even as industrialization reshaped global trade. By tracing these local networks of work and exchange, the article argues that maritime modernity along the Gulf was uneven and negotiated rather than uniform. The Gulf emerges as a liminal space where sea and shore, sail and steam, and tradition and modernity continuously intersected.

Greek Cotton Merchants in the New Orleans Mosaic

Alexander Billinis
Beneath the headlines of the mid-nineteenth century cotton trade was a well-financed network of Greek commodities merchants operating in New Orleans and New York, part of a network operating in the major ports of Europe, the Mediterranean, and India. This network played a niche role in the Southern cotton trade, and a primary role in Anglo-French efforts to develop alternative supply chains to Southern cotton during the Civil War by shipping cotton from Egypt, India, and the Ottoman Empire. The network also founded the first Orthodox church community in the United States.

Atkins, John. The Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration on Film and Television, Volume 2, Scott and Amundsen

Ingo Heidbrink

Bamford, Tyler R. and Hulver, Richard A., ed. Best Beloved. The Wartime Letters of Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz to His Wife, Catherine

Marco Mostarda

Barcia, Manuel. Pirate Imperialism: Trade, Abolition, and Global Suppression of Maritime Raiding, 1825–1870

Michael Toth

Barritt, Michael. Nelson’s Pathfinders: A Forgotten Story in the Triumph of British Sea Power

William Glover

Black, Dan. Oceans of Fate: Peace and Peril Aboard the Steamship Empress of Asia

Eric Wiberg

Caiella, James M. American Naval History in 50 Ships

Louis Arthur Norton

Chapman, Craig S. The Resurrected Pirate: The Life, Death, and Subsequent Career of the Notorious George Lowther

Bethany Henderson

Cooper, Iver P. Work at Sea: The Evolution of Shipboard Technology

Louis Arthur Norton

Copestake, Ian D. Madness and the Sea: A Literary History

Louis Arthur Norton

Dolin, Eric Jay. The Wreck of the Mentor: A True Story of Death, Despair, and Deliverance in the Age of Sail

Louis Arthur Norton

Dunn, Steve R. Steam Yachts at War: The Naval Deployment of British & American Armed Yachts 1898–1918

Eric Wiberg

Elleman, Bruce A. The ABCs of Cold War History: Anglo-America, Bloc Sovietique, China, 1919–1994

Stephen P. Hay

Ferguson, Bill. c/o Cunard House, 88 Leadenhall Street, London EC3

Ingo Heidbrink

Gimblett, Richard H. and Karl Gagnon. Guardians of the North: Canadian Warships and Maritime Aircraft, 1910–2025

William Glover

Grant, Rick. Broadside: Halifax’s Wartime Pilot Boat Disaster

H.T. Holman

Hooten, E.R. Franco’s Pirates: Naval Aspects of the Spanish Civil War, 1936–39

Mark Klobas

Jampoler, Andrew C. A. Hard Aground: The Wreck of the USS Tennessee and the Rise of the US Navy

Jim Gallen

Lambert, Andrew. No More Napoleons: How Britain Managed Europe from Waterloo to World War One

Ian Yeates

Luebke, Peter C., ed. The U.S. Navy and Innovation: Twentieth Century Case Studies

Adam Coombs

Macfarlane, Daniel. The Lives of Lake Ontario: An Environmental History

Rebecca Murray

Maclean, Roderick G. Never to Return: Convoys to Russia in the Second World War

Ian Dew

Medina, Ana Maria Rivera, ed. Ports in the Medieval European Atlantic: Shipping, Transport, and Labour

Alicia Caporaso

Morddel, Anne. Napoleon’s American Prisoners

Faye M. Kert

Morriss, Roger, ed. Samuel Bentham, Inspector General of Naval Works, 1796–1807, Letters and Papers

Thomas Malcomson

Morton, Suzanne. Contested Catch: Lobster, Localism, and Canada’s Atlantic Coast

H.T. Holman

Moss, Tara and Rebecca Love. Nantucket: The Ultimate Playground

Jim Gallen

Nelson, Thomas M. and Jerald Podair. Wrecked: The Edmund Fitzgerald and the Sinking of the American Economy

Adam Coombs

Neufeld, Matthew. Early Modern Naval Health Care in England 1650–1750

Rebecca Murray

Pearson, Judith E. and John A. Rodgaard, eds. The Trafalgar Chronicle: Dedicated to Naval History in the Nelson Era: New Series 9

Frederick C. Leiner

Pietrek, Matt and Alexandre Gabriel. The Rum Never Sets: 300 Years of Royal Navy and London Dock Rum

Ingo Heidbrink

Rayner, Jonathan. Screening the Fleet: The Royal Navy on Television 1973–2023

Rebecca Murray

Riess, C. Warren. Studying the Princess Carolina: Anatomy of the Ship That Held Up Wall Street

Bethany Henderson

Rodger, N.A.M. The Price of Victory: A Naval History of Britain, 1815–1945

Martin Hubley

Scher, Rod. Ship of Lost Souls: The Tragic Wreck of the Steamship Valencia

Jacob Bart Hak

Smith, William. Churchill’s Arctic Convoys: Strength Triumphs Over Adversity

Peter K.H. Mispelkamp

Stille, Mark; illustrated by Adam Tooby. Midway-Class Aircraft Carriers 1945–92

Adam Coombs

Stille, Mark E. Pearl Harbor: Japan’s Greatest Disaster

Rebecca Murray

Stone, Richard. Bristol and the Birth of the Atlantic Economy, 1500-1700

William Glover

Wade, Lewis. Privilege, Economy and State in Old Regime France: Marine Insurance, War and the Atlantic Empire under Louis XIV

William Glover

Webb, James Jack. Generals and Admirals of the Third Reich: For Country or Fuehrer, Volume 1: A–G

Peter K.H. Mispelkamp