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Union navy in the civil war1/2/2024 Initiative, innovation, and grit separated successful naval commanders like David Farragut and David Porter from promising lights like Samuel Du Pont and John Dahlgren. The difficulty of the blockade and the physical demands of the ship usually remedied appointment errors. He is persuasive in arguing that, unlike the army, the navy could not afford to carry deadwood among its commanders. Taaffe unwinds the Union command structure with comfort and clarity. Taaffe ably explains this difficult process and details how Assistant Secretary of the Navy Gustavus Fox helped by establishing a gossip network known as his “confidential correspondence.”Ĭommanding Lincoln’s Navy is well written. Welles receives deserved credit for maneuvering through the navy’s rigid hierarchy and securing loyal officers competent to command in combat. Instead, the early obstacles proved to be the navy’s antiquated system of promoting officers based on seniority and the exodus of southern officers. To its advantage, the Union navy did not confront a rival Confederate navy, at least at the beginning. In short, those commanders who fought aggressively and without complaint earned the patience of the navy. Taaffe concludes that the navy had slightly better luck in appointing commanders in its vital areas of operation than the army. Although almost every eventual commander had a powerful patron, how well the officer performed dictated his success or failure. The heart of this structure was Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles’s relationship with his nineteen squadron commanders. Stephen Taaffe’s Commanding Lincoln’s Navy yields the first analysis of the navy’s command structure. Since the Civil War, naval historians have struggled to grasp the magnitude of the navy’s contribution to Union victory.
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