Since 1977 Nathan Miller's concise history of the U.S. Navy has been the standard historical survey read by plebes at the U.S. Naval Academy. Now this highly readable account of the navy, its men and women, ships and aircraft, wars and politics, and the role all played in the creation and protection of the United States has been revised, updated, and made available to the general public in a handy, affordable paperback. Miller, an award-winning biographer and naval historian, has drawn upon a wide variety of stellar published and archival sources to produce a unique primer for those interested in an easy-to-read introduction to American seapower. His concise, fast-moving survey takes the reader from the founding of the raggle-taggle Continental Navy in 1775 through its growth and challenges in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, to lessons learned from Desert Storm as well as current efforts to integrate women into combatant roles, deal with personnel and material downsizing, and deploy the Pentagon's strategic and tactical innovations for the twenty-first century. All new for this third edition are enhanced coverage of the Marine Corps, an index, and maps. As readable as fiction and as up-to-date as today's headlines, this little-known gem prized by Annapolis midshipmen for decades will quickly be recognized by readers of all stripes as simply the best available brief history of the U.S. Navy.

Before there was a U.S. Navy, several Colonial navies were all-volunteer--both the crews and the vessels. From its beginnings through World War II, the Navy has relied on civilian sailors and their fast vessels to fill out its ranks of small combatants. Beginning with the birth of the yacht in the Netherlands in the 17th century , this illustrated history traces the development of yacht racing, the advent of combustion-engine power and the contribution privately owned vessels have made to national defense. Vessels conscripted during the Civil War served both the Union and Confederacy--sometimes changing sides after capture. The first USS Wanderer saw the slave trade from both sides of the law. Aboard the USS Sylph, Oscar-winning actor Ernest Borgnine fought the Third Reich's U-boats under sail. USS Sea Cloud made history as the first racially integrated ship in the Navy, three years before President Truman desegregated the military.

Excerpt from Standard Nomenclature and List of Vessels, U. S. Navy: July 1, 1920 The following is a classified list of all naval vessels in service, under construction, or authorized, exclu sive of district craft and aircraft. The names are entered under each type in the order of identification numbers, as assigned, the duty or station and the home yard of each, as of July 1, 1920 being included. For latest information con eerning duty or station and home yards, see Monthly Navy Ifirectory. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Traces the usage of- and meaning given to- the terms "roles and missions" relating to the armed forces and particularly to the United States Air Force, from 1907 to the present.