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Today on the blog, Brian Lane Herder, author of US Navy Battleships 1886-98, gives an intriguing overview of late-19th century US battleships.Continue Reading

Rigidly organised and harshly disciplined, the Georgian Royal Navy was an efficient fighting force, but life in its service could also be brutal. Do you have what it takes to survive just some of the problems faced by its officers and sailors? Take this quick quiz to find out.Continue Reading

On the night of 11 October 1942 the Japanese had planned an operation to bombard Henderson Field, an important Allied airfield on Guadalcanal...Continue Reading

On 27 September 1941 SS Patrick Henry was launched by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. It was the first of the Liberty Ships, described by Roosevelt as ‘a dreadful looking object’ and dubbed an ‘Ugly Duckling’ by Time magazine...Continue Reading

Early in the morning of 2 August, 1943 Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 was struck by the Amagiri, a Japanese destroyer.  It was cut in two, leaving Seamen Andrew Jackson Kirksey and Harold W. Marney dead and two others badly injured. The eleven survivors clung to the burning wreckage, amongst them future US President John F. Kennedy, who was commanding the PT-109 at the time...Continue Reading