Laughton saw Mahan as a theorist while Mahan called Laughton "the historian". Mahan was later described as a "disciple" of Laughton, but the two were at pains to distinguish between each other's line of work. Mahan struck up a friendship with pioneering British naval historian Sir John Knox Laughton, the pair maintaining the relationship through correspondence and visits when Mahan was in London. Mahan was criticized for so strongly condemning Nelson's love affair with Lady Emma Hamilton, but it remained the standard biography until the appearance of Carola Oman's Nelson, 50 years later. Mahan sought to resurrect Horatio Nelson as a national hero in Britain and used his biography as a platform for expressing his views on naval strategy and tactics. Mahan stressed the importance of the individual in shaping history and extolled the traditional values of loyalty, courage, and service to the state. Mahan's lectures, based on secondary sources and the military theories of Antoine-Henri Jomini, became his sea-power studies: The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783 (1890) The Influence of Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire, 1793–1812 (2 vols., 1892) Sea Power in Relation to the War of 1812 (2 vols., 1905), and The Life of Nelson: The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain (2 vols., 1897). There, in 1888, he met and befriended future president Theodore Roosevelt, then a visiting lecturer. Though he was prepared to become a professor in 1886, Luce was given command of the North Atlantic Squadron, and Mahan became President of the Naval War College by default (J– January 12, 1889, J– May 10, 1893). During his first year on the faculty, he remained at his home in New York City researching and writing his lectures. Luce pointed Mahan in the direction of writing his future studies on the influence of sea power. Before entering on his duties, College President Rear Admiral Stephen B. In 1885, he was appointed as a lecturer in naval history and tactics at the Naval War College. He had an affection for old square-rigged vessels rather than the smoky, noisy steamships of his own day and he tried to avoid active sea duty. While in actual command of a ship, his skills were not exemplary and a number of vessels under his command were involved in collisions with both moving and stationary objects. interests during the final stages of the War of the Pacific. As commander of the USS Wachusett he was stationed at Callao, Peru, protecting U.S. In 1865, he was promoted to lieutenant commander, and then to commander (1872), and captain (1885). Commissioned as a lieutenant in 1861, Mahan served as an officer on USS Worcester and James Adger and as an instructor at the Naval Academy. He then joined the steam-corvette Pocahontas of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron and participated in the Battle of Port Royal in South Carolina early in the American Civil War. Early career Īfter graduation he was assigned to the frigate Congress from 9 June 1859 until 1861. Naval Academy, where he graduated second in his class in 1859. Against the better judgment of his father, Mahan then entered the U.S. He then studied at Columbia for two years, where he was a member of the Philolexian Society debating club. Mahan attended Saint James School, an Episcopal college preparatory academy in western Maryland. Mahan's middle name honors "the father of West Point", Sylvanus Thayer. Mahan was born on September 27, 1840, at West Point, New York, to Dennis Hart Mahan, a professor at the United States Military Academy and the foremost American expert on fortifications, and Mary Helena Okill Mahan (1815–1893), daughter of John Okill and Mary Jay, daughter of Sir James Jay. Alfred Thayer Mahan ( / m ə ˈ h æ n/ Septem– December 1, 1914) was a United States naval officer and historian, whom John Keegan called "the most important American strategist of the nineteenth century." His book The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660–1783 (1890) won immediate recognition, especially in Europe, and with its successor, The Influence of Sea Power Upon the French Revolution and Empire, 1793–1812 (1892), made him world-famous and perhaps the most influential American author of the nineteenth century.
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