By piecing together diaries, letters, scrapbooks, and rare privately printed memoirs, the author has created a story which tells how America's ragtag navy-composed mainly of converted yachts, steamers and tugboats-was able to fight and win against the more powerful Spanish gunboats. The naval battles fought in places like Santiago, Cardenas, Cienfuegos, Manzanillo, Port Nipe, Guantanamo, San Juan, Guanica, and Ponce come alive in this book. The stories of the brave little ships that fought these battles-with names like the Gloucester and the Yosemite-at times against overwhelming odds, demonstrates the excellent training of the men who manned their guns under leadership of daring officers. This book fills in many of the missing pieces in the history of the Spanish-American War.

Auteur

A. B. FEUER is a military historian and freelance newspaper and magazine journalist. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1943-1946 and is a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Society of Professional Journalists, and the Society for Military History. His previous works include Commando: The M/Z Unit's Secret War Against Japan (Praeger, 1996), The Spanish-American War at Sea (Praeger, 1995), and The Santiago Campaign of 1898 (Praeger, 1993).