Alfred Thayer Mahan: 46 books

The contents of this volume were first contributed as a chapter, under the title of "Major Operations, 1762-1783," to the "History of the Royal Navy," in seven volumes, published by Messrs. Sampson Low, Marston, and Company, under the general editorship of the late Sir William Laird Clowes. For permission...

This authoritative 1905 history, based on Mahan’s lectures as president of the Naval War College, develop his still-influential ideas about the role navies play among modern nations. Volume One begins with the antecedents of the war, such as the conditions in the colonies—and ends in the thick of the war, describing ocean warfare in the fall of 1812.

This 1903 collection highlights Admiral Mahan’s still-influential ideas on the role navies play among modern nations. Includes “The Principles of Naval Administration,” “Principles Involved in the War Between Japan and Russia,” “The Strength of Nelson,” “The Value of the Pacific Cruise of the United States Fleet, 1908,” and “The Monroe Doctrine.”

The life of Admiral Mahan spanned the age of sail; the Civil War, the War in the Pacific, and the Spanish-American War; the rise of steam power, and the international political dramas that would explode into the First World War. He tells his story in this 1907 memoir.

Courage, loyalty, and service to the state are among the virtues extolled here by Mahan, the father of modern sea power theory. This authoritative 1905 history is based on his lectures as president of the Naval War College. Volume Two takes the story from the winter of 1812/3 and Bainbridge’s Squadron to the peace negotiations which ended the war in February of 1815. 

While westward land expansion captured the attention of America’s leaders, Mahan used history to prove that he who controls the seas controls the globe. In this 1913 classic of military historical analysis, dissecting battles at Boston, Charleston, New York, Philadelphia, and elsewhere, he argues that the Revolutionary War was really won on the water.

This short biography of the Civil War admiral – and hero of Mobile Bay – was published in 1892. Written by one of America's greatest naval historians, himself a Civil War veteran, this work is a must read for anyone interested in Farragut himself or in the development of Mahan's influential and pugnacious ideas about sea power.

Although the distinguished seamen, whose lives and professional characteristics it is the object of this work to present in brief summary, belonged to a service now foreign to that of the United States, they have numerous and varied points of contact with America; most of them very close, and in some...

When I was a boy, some years before I obtained my appointment in the navy, I spent many of those happy hours that only childhood knows poring over the back numbers of a British service periodical, which began its career in 1828, with the title Colburn's United Service Magazine; under which name, save...

The naval operations described in the following pages extended, on the seaboard, over the Gulf of Mexico from Key West to the mouth of the Rio Grande; and inland over the course of the Mississippi, and its affluents, from Cairo, at the southern extremity of the State of Illinois, to the mouths of the...

When first asked to undertake that duty, the question naturally arose how to impart to the subject of Naval History an aspect which, in this very utilitarian age, should not be open to the ready reproach of having merely archæological interest, and possessing no practical value for men called upon to...

THE UNITED STATES LOOKING OUTWARD. August, 1890. Indications are not wanting of an approaching change in the thoughts and policy of Americans as to their relations with the world outside their own borders. For the past quarter of a century, the predominant idea, which has asserted itself successfully...

NELSON TEMPORARILY COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF IN THE MEDITERRANEAN.—RELIEVED BY LORD KEITH.—APPLIES TO RETURN TO ENGLAND ON ACCOUNT OF ILL HEALTH. AUGUST, August 1799—JUNE, 1800. AGE, 41. Upon Keith's departure, the command in the Mediterranean devolved upon Nelson, who for some time remained in doubt...

The Life of Nelson has been written so often, that an explanation—almost an apology—seems due for any renewal of the attempt; but, not to mention the attractiveness of the theme in itself, it is essential to the completeness and rounding off of the author's discussion of the Influence of Sea Power,...