The Monitor Chronicles : One Sailor's Account : Today's Campaign to Recover the Civil War Wreck

by Mariners' Museum (Compiler), William C. Davis (Foreword), William Marvel (Editor)

An account of ongoing efforts to recover the nineteenth-century wreck of the USS Monitor features more than one hundred photographs, paintings, and technical plans, as well as never before published letters from a common Civil War sailor who served aboard the famous battleship.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, War, Civil War

272 pages, Hardcover

First published June 26, 2000

Reviews

[Virgil · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Monitor Chronicles tells the operational history of the revolutionary ironclad from the preserved letters of a crew member, George Geer, to his wife. It's a fascinating glimpse into the operation of an entirely new type of warship, and the challenges its crew faced in adapting to the new technology.

The structure of the book is a good balance between the letters (happily included in full and in chronological order) and commentary explaining the context behind them. Most of the letters are full of minutiae that some may find boring, but they accurately convey the interminable waiting and inaction that is the reality of much of warfare.

Geer's often conflicted opinions towards the war and the destruction he witnessed firsthand do much to dispel the myth of either side being absolutely pro-Union or pro-secession (the Monitor actually acquired a captain from South Carolina towards the end of its career.) The short section on recent recovery efforts at the wreck site is a nice coda. And yes, they got the turret.