History offers no example where so much was accomplished in so short a time, or where so many events were crowded into the space of four years, in which the Navy was employed subduing a coast over four thousand miles in length, and recapturing a river-coast of more than five thousand miles,” wrote Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter in his 1886 The Naval History of the Civil War.
Porter’s arguments establish the true gage of the war’s naval action. Neil Chatelain points out that the Civil War started at sea, when cadets of the Military College of South Carolina fired on the Sea of the West as the ship entered Charleston harbor to resupply and reinforce Fort Sumter. Thousands of ships took part, fighting battles together with the armies and patrolling the globe. The actions of more than 100,000 sailors on both sides impacted military, naval, economic, and diplomatic aspects, while providing the tools to comprehend the Anaconda Plan of isolating and splitting the Confederacy.
Unlike the army dividing its efforts into the Eastern, Western, and Trans-Mississippi theaters, this book addresses what happened to the naval forces during the Civil War’s in four distinct theaters of conflict. Chatelain succeeds in detailing the fighting in all of these theaters. The offshore blockade was an economic and logistical campaign waged over whether Confederate armies would remain properly supplied. Sailors enacting that blockade simultaneously worked in tandem with armies to assault cities and coastal areas to deny the Confederacy its ports and coastal infrastructure, all while Confederate sailors fought to both break the blockade and keep control of its ports. Meanwhile, fleets on both sides battled for control over the Mississippi River valley, with a split Confederacy at stake. Finally, an economic and diplomatic war was waged across the oceans, where Confederate privateers and commerce raiders prowled for Federal merchants.
In This Great Contest Afloat, award-winning historian and professor Neil P. Chatelain unpacks each of these naval theaters. Using prolific firsthand accounts merged with keen macro analysis, Chatelain takes readers to the decks of blockade-runners, beaches of coastal assaults, riverine ironclads, and targeted merchants, showing the extent and impact of Civil War naval activity.
A strength of this treatment is Chatelain breaks down operations into the navy's four main areas: blockade, littoral/coastline, rivers, and high seas. It highlights the "great contest" by covering the economic, logistical, and diplomatic aspects of the war, including the actions of over 100,000 sailors, and the role of commerce raiders. Furthermore, This Great Contest Afloat is designed for both students, and experienced Civil War buffs, contributing a mixture of narrative and comprehensive examination. Finally, Chatelain offers readers to an opportunity to feel that they have joined blockade-runners, tread the beaches during coastal assaults, journeyed on riverine ironclads, and sailed on embattled merchant vessels, all the while representing the degree and influence of Civil War naval activity.
Chatelain offers readers a well-written yet not overly detailed summary of the naval battles, explores and places the event in proper historical context, and then presents the readers with extras in the form of 3 helpful appendices including Major Civil War Naval Sites. This standardized organization of the series ensures that both those unfamiliar with the historical events and even well-read students of the war will find this book and interesting and informative. Chatelain organizes the story of the in 16 short chapters. Along with the text, the chapters are replete with helpful pictures and 17 excellent maps throughout that engage the reader
As with the majority of titles in the Emerging Civil War Series by Savas Beatie, this slim volume is designed principally as an introduction to a naval battle or campaign. Written by Neil P. Chatelain, a former U.S. Navy Surface Warfare Officer, history professor at Lone Star College-North Harris, in greater Houston, Texas, expert on Confederate naval operations, and award-winning author, has written a readable, is hard to clear, well organized, hard to put down, highly informative, accessible, and a deeply researched narrative. However, this new tome does not have any notes, an index or bibliography, which would have been helpful to readers.
Once again, the Emerging Civil War Series hits it out of the park with this 192-page volume. I highly recommend this book to students who wish to gain a deeper understanding of naval battles.
