On July 3, 1775, under the great elm on Cambridge Common, Washington took command of the patriot army. During the siege of Boston, which followed, his headquarters were in that fin...
About a century ago, pirates on the northern coast of Africa were causing a great deal of trouble. They used to dash out in their vessels, and capture and plunder the merchant ship...
In 1775, in Virginia, the patriots forced the royal governor, Lord Dunmore, to take refuge on board a British man-of-war in Norfolk Harbor. In revenge, the town of Norfolk, the lar...
"Ay, tear her tattered ensign down! Long has it waved on high, And many an eye has danced to see That banner in the sky." In 1833, when the old war ship Constitution, unfit for ser...
If what the proverb tells us is true, that it is always darkest before dawn, the patriots of the South in 1780 must indeed have prayed for the light. Affairs had gone rapidly from...
Exactly eight years from the day when "the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world," the Continental Congress informed General Washington that the war was...
It was plain that Washington was troubled. As he paced the piazza of the stately Murray mansion one fine autumn afternoon, he was saying half aloud to himself, "Shall we defend or...
We have certainly read enough about General Washington to know that he often planned to steal a march on the British. Don't you remember how surprised General Howe was one morning...
About the middle of March, 1781, Lord Cornwallis defeated Greene in a stubborn battle at Guilford, North Carolina. Although victorious, the British general was in desperate straits...
If American boys and girls were asked to name the one great man in their country's history whom they would like to have seen and talked with, nine out of every ten would probably s...
At the beginning of the last century, England was fighting for her very life against the mighty Napoleon. We remained neutral; but our ships were doing a fine business in carrying...
A splendid monument overlooks the battlefield of Saratoga. Heroic bronze statues of Schuyler, Gates, and Morgan, three of the four great leaders in this battle, stand each in a nic...
THE HERO OF MOBILE BAY LASHES HIMSELF TO THE MAST AN old friend of ours is David G. Farragut. We met him, you may remember, years ago, on the old Essex, under Captain Porter, when...
Early in 1775 Daniel Boone, the famous hunter and Indian fighter, with thirty other backwoodsmen, set out from the Holston settlements to clear the first trail, or bridle path, to...
Rarely has the benefactor of a people been awarded such measure of gratitude as we gave Lafayette, in 1824. Eager crowds flocked into the cities and the villages to welcome this he...
A NOVEL FIGHT ON LAKE CHAMPLAIN WAS it not a dreadful pity that Benedict Arnold should disgrace himself forever by becoming a traitor to his country? To think of his making himself...
ADMIRAL PORTER RUNS BY THE FORTS IN A NOVEL WAY OF course you know what a tremendous task the North had before it in the Civil War. The war between the North and the South was like...
HIS WORDS, "DO NOT GIVE UP THE SHIP," BECOME THE FAMOUS MOTTO OF THE AMERICAN NAVY THE United States navy had its Hornet as well as its Wasps. And they were well named, for they we...
THE FIRST GREAT FIGHT OF THE AMERICAN NAVY YOU have been told how Captain Paul Jones lost his ship. He was given another in June, 1777. This was the Ranger, a frigate carrying twen...
THE GREATEST SEA FIGHT OF THE CENTURY I HAVE told you what Hobson did and what Wainwright did at Santiago. Now it is time to tell all about what the ships did there; the story of t...
THE DARING ADVENTURES OF THE HERO OF MARBLEHEAD CAPTAIN SAMUEL TUCKER was a Yankee boy who began his career by running away from home and shipping as a cabin-boy on the British slo...
"OLD IRONSIDES" WINS NEW GLORY "OLD IRONSIDES was a noble old ship, and a noble old ship was she." Come, I know you have not heard enough about this grand old ship, so let us go on...
A FAMOUS INCIDENT OF THE WAR OF 1812 WHEN did our country win its greatest fame upon the sea? I think, when you have read the story of the War of 1812, you will say it was in that...
A FIGHT WHICH CHANGED ALL NAVAL WARFARE. THE story I am now going to tell you takes us forward to the beginning of the great Civil War, that terrible conflict which went on during...
THE GREATEST OF AMERICA'S NAVAL HEROES ONCE upon a time there lived in Scotland a poor gardener named John Paul, who had a little son to whom he gave the same name. The rich man's...
HOW GENERAL PREVOST AND THE BRITISH RAN AWAY THE United States is a country rich in lakes. They might be named by the thousands. But out of this host of lakes very few are known in...
LIEUTENANT CUSHING PERFORMS THE MOST GALLANT DEED OF THE CIVIL WAR NOW I am going to tell you about one of the most gallant deeds done in the navy during the whole Civil War. The m...
AN HEROIC DEED WITHOUT BLOODSHED THERE are victories of peace as well as of war. Of course, you do not need to be told that. Everybody knows it. And it often takes as much courage...
OUR NAVY UPHOLDS THE RIGHTS OF AN AMERICAN IN A FOREIGN LAND NOW I have a story to tell you about how this country looks after its citizens abroad. It is not a long story, but it i...
THE LIVELY LITTLE "WASP" AND HOW SHE STUNG THE "FROLIC" NO doubt most of my readers know very well what a wasp is and how nicely it can take care of itself. When I was a boy I foun...