Treasures of the Collection: Official War Records, Part 2

This is Part II of the Treasures of the Collection Feature: Official War Records.   Part 1 is also available to read. 


Photograph of a US Passport from the time period of the Barbary Wars

Official War Records-Part II  (pre-Civil War Navy)
The old saying goes, “history is written by the victors” But sometimes, whether a history is written at all depends upon the branch of service of the person ordering the history to be written.  Hewes library contains three examples of official military histories that were written because of the military service related positions held by presidents of the United States.



Title Page of Book

In the 1934 Congress passed an authorization for the expenditure of $10,000 to begin printing historical and naval documents.  The first set of naval documents printed under this law was a set entitled “Naval documents related to the Quasi-War between the United States and France”.  Consisting of 7 volumes the collection of documents was assembled by Dudley Knox, the officer in charge of the Office of Naval Records and Library in the Department of the Navy.  President Franklin D. Roosevelt who had served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy from 1913 – 1920 wrote the preface to the set, which indicates that his interest in naval matters was responsible for the publication of this work.



Title Page of Book

The Quasi-War with France was one of the first engagements with a foreign power undertaken by the United States after the establishment of the country.  Running from 1798-1800, the war occurred because of the signing of a favorable trade treaty with Britain in 1794.  This angered France which believed that the United States was giving more favorable treatment to the British than to them.  In retaliation, the French began seizing U.S. trading ships bound for Britain. The XYZ affair, in which American diplomats were refused access to the French Prime Minister Talleyrand without payment of a bribe, caused the U.S. to sever relations with France in 1798 and U.S. ships began to seize French ships.  The Quasi-War was ended in September 1800 by the signing of the Treaty of Mortefontaine.



Sample document written by the Commander of the USS Constellation

Publication of early naval documents continued under the Roosevelt administration in 1939 with the publication of the 6 volume set Naval Documents related to the United States Wars with the Barbary Powers.  The wars with the Barbary Powers referred to were a series of conflicts that took place between North African pirates and the U.S. Navy between 1801 -1805 and 1814-1815.  Shortly after the publication of this set, the U.S. Navy was attacked at Pearl Harbor and World War II began, stopping all publications of an historical nature. 



Title page of Book

Publication of historical naval documents languished until the 1960’s when, apparently not to be outdone by President Roosevelt, President John F. Kennedy a former officer in the U.S. Navy during World War II wrote the preface for the 11 volume set “Naval Documents of the American Revolution”.  Now there was no official American navy until after the war was over and United States came into being, but there were engagements between ships of the British navy and the American rebels throughout the revolution.

Both sets contain many documents and illustrations relating to our early navy.  The sets can be found in the Hewes Library government documents collection, the Quasi-war with France at N.16.2:Q2, the Barbary Wars set at N16.2:B23 and the Naval documents of the American Revolution at D 207.12.  These titles cannot be found in the online catalog, but in the card catalog in the government documents section.



Drawing of Naval Cannon and Carriage, plus bar and round shot

The next section of this article will discuss histories of more recent conflicts.  Check back soon!