Articles Archive

Created solely from the artist’s imagination, this chromolithograph was issued to meet the Ameri- can public’s demand for revenge against Spain for the destruction of the USS Maine.

The USS Maine

By VanLoan Naisawald

Darkness had settled over the harbor, the lights along the shoreline casting a faint glow on the murky harbor water. Read more

A painting by Jean Watteau (1684-1721) shows French infantry on the march, complete with donkeys and camp followers.

The Duke of Marlborough Unleashed at the Battle of Ramillies

By Vince Hawkins

The War of Spanish Succession, fought between 1701 and 1711, witnessed the emergence of some of Europe’s greatest military commanders. Read more

Q-Ships in World War II

By William H. Langenberg

As an effective naval weapon, submarines were in their infancy when World War I began in August 1914. Read more

Thick sulphurous smoke pours from the flaming wreckage of a B-17 bomber in a French field.

The Hidden Freedom Trail

by Adam Lynch

A few moments after his stricken Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber tore apart, co-pilot Ralph Patton hurriedly put his bail-out plan into action. Read more

General Douglas MacArthur’s Crisis at Biak

By Marc D. Bernstein

In April 1944, General Douglas MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific forces took a giant 600-mile leap along the north coast of New Guinea with their landing at Hollandia. Read more

Embattled Tobruk lies under a pall of smoke during Rommel’s push to capture the vital North African port city in the spring of 1941.

The Siege of Tobruk: WWII’s Debacle in the Desert

by Michael D. Hull

Sidi Barrani, Bardia, Sollum, Sidi Rezegh, Mersa Matruh, Bir Hacheim, El Agheila, Beda Fomm, Sidi Omar, Benghazi … The names of many remote villages in North Africa were written into history in 1941-1942 as British and Axis armies battled back and forth across the scrubby desert wastelands of northern Egypt and Libya. Read more

Civil War Weapons: The Telegraph?

By Jim Haviland

Early in the American Civil War, during the first months of 1862, Union General Henry Halleck, commanding from his headquarters in St. Read more

Napoleon Bonaparte, commanding the French Army of Italy, issues orders during an assault over a bridge at Lodi. At one point in the struggle, Bonaparte led a charge himself. The victory here gave much confidence to both commander and army.

Napoleon’s Italian Campaign: A Year Against the Odds

By Jeremy Green

The newly appointed 26-year-old commander-in-chief of the French Army of Italy arrived at Nice headquarters on March 27, 1796. Read more

Students at the U.S. Maritime Service Training Station on Long Island, N.Y., practice putting on Morner lifesaving suits, which could keep them warm and buoyant in cold water.

Saving Men from Poseidon

By Kevin M. Hymel

The harsh elements of the world’s oceans and seas were undoubtedly just as dangerous to U.S. sailors as the German or Japanese navies. Read more

General Douglas MacArthur’s Navy

By Glenn Barnett

In November 1941, the U.S. Asiatic Fleet weighed anchor in Shanghai, China, for the last time. Alarmed by the growing hostility and aggressiveness of the Japanese, Admiral Thomas Hart ordered the outnumbered and outgunned American vessels moved to the relative safety of Manila Bay in the Philippines. Read more

Belisarius is shown triumphant over the Ostrogoths and heading for Rome.

Military Myths and Legends: Belisarius

By James Allan Evans

It was a sorry tale. A brilliant general, military hero, and faithful servant of the state, blind and reduced to penury in his old age, sitting on the main street of Constantinople begging for his living. Read more

Alex Kershaw’s ‘Patton’s Prayer’

By Christopher Miskimon

The U.S. Army’s summer campaign of 1944 proved hard-fought, but successful. The Normandy landing succeeded in establishing a lodgment in mainland Europe. Read more

The Northrop P-61 Black Widow was the first aircraft designed with an integral nose-mounted radar that made it an excellent night fighter.

Paul Hendrickson’s ‘Fighting the Night’

By Christopher Miskimon

On September 20, 1944, 1st Lt. Joe Paul Hendrickson said goodbye to his wife and two small children. Read more

Following a successful raid against targets in the Marianas, a Grumman F6F Hellcat fighter sets down on the USS Hornet. A tough, powerful fighter, the Hellcat ultimately dominated the skies over the Pacific.

Cdr. Hamilton McWhorter III’s ‘The First Hellcat Ace’

By Christopher Miskimon

Georgia-born Hamilton McWhorter III wanted to be a fighter pilot. When the Pearl Harbor attack happened on December 7, 1941, he was a naval aviation cadet still in training. Read more

An American soldier takes aim with a captured Japanese 6.5mm light machine gun. The weapon was taken during the savage fighting for Guadalcanal.

William Swanson’s ‘The View from my Foxhole’

By Christopher Miskimon

William Swanson described himself as an ordinary rifleman, but there was nothing ordinary about his experiences as a United States Marine in World War II. Read more

British paratroopers of the 1st Airborne Division, who were tasked with the highway bridge over the Nederrijn at Arnhem, land in an open field at the outset of Operation Market Garden.

Mike Gallagher’s ‘With Recce at Arnhem’

By Christopher Miskimon

Trapped in a reserved occupation which prevented him from enlisting, Des Evans abandoned his job and ran off to join the army. Read more

During one of many close quarters engagements in the dense jungle of Peleliu, Marines hurl molotov cocktails towards enemy positions along a bitterly contested elevation nicknamed “Suicide Ridge.”

Andrew Biggio’s ‘The Rifle 2’

By Christopher Miskimon

Emilio Magliacane, a second-generation Italian from Boston, joined the Marine Corps in 1942. After training he went to the Pacific, assigned to Company A, 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st marine Division. Read more

Determined to win back eastern Tennessee from the advancing Federals, Confederates hurled themselves at the Northerners in the forested and broken fields near Chickamauga Creek in northwestern Georgia.

On They Came Like an Angry Flood: The Battle of Chickamauga

By Arnold Blumberg

It had been a little over six months since Major General William S. Rosecrans and his Army of the Cumberland had checked the Confederates at the Battle of Stones River (December 31,1862–January 2,1863). Read more

The Many Faces of Adolf Hitler

By Kevin M. Hymel

As the Allied armies in the West closed in on Germany in late September 1944, one question began to dog many of democracy’s leaders. Read more

Angus Konstam’s ‘The Convoy HG-76’

By Christopher Miskimon

Convoy HG-76 departed Gibraltar for Liverpool in December 1941. The 32 ships had to make a2,000-mile voyage, braving the dangers of German U-Boats and maritime strike aircraft. Read more

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