Current Reading: February 2023

Thought I'd start the list ...
I'm reading The Quiet Warrior, by Thomas Buell, about Admiral Raymond Spruance. The book begins with his childhood and USNA acceptance, describes his class of 1907, and then heads off in time sequence towards WWI, the interwar years, and WWII. The book covers a fair amount of personal information as well as career descriptions, and so it is rather an easy read if a bit over-detailed at points. As long as that keeps up into WWII, I'll probably be glad I read this book. I've been reading naval history for a few years and yet somehow was unfamiliar with him/his role, so that's why I'm trying to educate myself.

Finished German Jet Engine and Gas Turbine Development, a great overview of a technical subject, that has the only flaw of being an out-of-print collectible with a rather high price; at least it's readily available via inter-library loan.

Finished the second volume of The History of the Panzerwaffe. Let's just say that the author does better with nuts and bolts than he does with narrative history.

>1 PocheFamily: Spruance was in the Great Admirals: Command at Sea book I just finished, but those were 30 page bio/action summaries, so not very detailed at all.

>4 Karlstar: Well, I'm enjoying it - but I'm just beginning WWII - this afternoon Halsey/Spruance/Nimitz raided the Marshall Islands (Feb '42). That the author admires Spruance greatly can't be understated.

I see the description of the Great Admirals: Command at Sea mentions the essays explore "the combination of personal attributes and professional experience that shaped the admiral's leadership". This is certainly a theme in this book, too. Let me know if you'd recommend the Great Admirals or if it induced you to pick something else up.

Completed The Battle of Glorieta: Union Victory in the West by Don E. Alberts. Very good book, well written without stylizing or atmosphere but in a good narrative style. The book briefly covers the Confederate invasion of New Mexico in 1862 and the Battle of Valverde, then the majority of the book is about the Battle of Glorieta. There is some also coverage of the post battle campaign. The author participated in archeological studies of the battlefield and in the end notes are some interesting observations about artifacts and topography.

Finished up The Panzer Killers, which is a pretty good campaign history of the U.S. 3rd Armored Division in ETO. As a biography of Maurice Rose, maybe not so much. He doesn't appear to have shared much of himself with anyone outside his family, to the point that we can only speculate about his real motivations. Bolger sees a man who, due to his Jewish heritage, was very motivated to get to grips with Nazi Germany. I could also see a true outsider who had to work twice as hard as the normal run of men in his generation to be merely seen as being as good.

Finished an interesting Naval Aviation in the First World War: Its Impact and Influence by R. D. Layman. While a more serious look, the book is still very readable and interesting.

Finished The Quiet Warrior, finally! Really enjoyed it. Felt it was obvious when the author no longer had Capt Carl Moore's accounts/guidance available when describing the planning and battles (Moore, Chief of Staff to Adm Spruance from the beginning of what would become the US 5th fleet until he was transferred away just before Iwo Jima). I appreciate the book's value on character=leadership and in providing a perspective on the view from the Admiral's chair.

And, now back to submarines ... both Sub Tales: Stories that Seldom Surface and Stealth Boat: Fighting the Cold War in a Fast Attack Submarine are in the queue. I'm crawling through U-Boats in the Bay of Biscay: An Essay in Operations Analysis, don't know if I will attempt to read the whole thing or not. Sometimes the challenge of reading something over one's head is worthwhile, but not late in the evening!

Completed Warfare and Weaponry in Dynastic Egypt by Rebecca Angharad Dean. It is an attempt to use the evident available in hieroglyphics and other sources, plus work done by previous authorities, to examine what we know about warfare and weaponry during that period. And there is a very interesting chapter on experimental archeology. There is a lot of supposition which is quite reasonable since evidence at times is scanty or is subject to interpretation. Still I learned a lot from the book.

However, I would feel remiss if I didn't mention that the book could have been better had the author not been pursuing a feminist agenda which she freely acknowledges. In her chapter on experimental archeology, where replica weapons, armor and shield are tested, she repeated emphasized how a female could have used those items and in fact it was one of the goals of the experiments, to demonstrate this. I think this is somewhat ironic, since first of all she acknowledges that there is no evidence whatsoever that females were ever part of the Egyptian army at any time. Also, what's the point of making the distinction? Anyway, that's my take on it.

>5 PocheFamily: I'd recommend The Great Admirals: Command at Sea if you are not familiar with most of the admirals ( I was about 50%) or the technological changes, as Sweetman does a good job summarizing them. I have to emphasize 'summarizing' as every bio and the technology 'surveys' are all 20 pages or so.

>10 jztemple:

Size-wise, modern women are probably a better match for ancient Egyptian men than what modern men are.

Finished The Ethiopian-Adal War yesterday. It's obviously the work of an amateur, but it reads pretty well, and English-language competition is, let's say, limited.

>12 AndreasJ: That reminded me of a coworker who was light infantry in this U.S. recreation of the 29th Foot in its Revolutionary War incarnation, along with her sister. They were like 5'4" so they would always get the job of sniping from trees or roofs when boosted up there by the strapping young lads they were platooned with. The point being that their height was typical for a light infantryman of the period.

At the time (this was the 2ks), my understanding was that it didn't hurt to have some Loyalist antecedents when joining, but most of the members were from Vermont and New Hampshire, and were perfectly willing to play the part of "heavies" at Boston Massacre recreations!

Knocked off The First Victory, a good modern examination of Britain's victory over Italy in East Africa in World War II.

I’ve started Lamson of the Gettysburg. It’s the correspondence of USN Lt. Roswell Lamson who served the Union during the American Civil War. His descriptions of life on board ship and the thought processes of the various combatants on both sides is pretty interesting.

Finished up Warship 2021, a typically good edition of the long-running series.

>16 varielle: Intrigued by your review I read some descriptions of the book and does it sound interesting! I visited the CSS Hunley today and it left me wondering what more was to the story of the navies of the US Civil War. So I really appreciate the timeliness of your review too!