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Admiral Coontz |
Admiral Coontz's long career, from Midshipman at the Naval Academy to Chief of Naval Operations and Commander-in‑Chief of the United States Fleet, spans the period from the wooden sailing ship to the early days of naval aviation, the promise of which he was quick to recognize well before it became obvious to all. In this memoir we get not so much a detailed autobiography as an autobiographical memoir: many amusing anecdotes — mostly naval of course — but he also recounts more serious events and concerns, and here and there provides us a window into American naval policy. His book seems particularly valuable for giving us a good feel for the daily life of the Navy the way it was in his time.
The printed book is inscribed,
This book is dedicated to the officers and men of the United States Navy. |
My copy of the book is inscribed:
To my best friend in my early
Sadie Carter Babbitt with all good wishes R. E. Coontz.
1930.
Notwithstanding, she is not mentioned in the book. |
Early Days in Missouri |
13 | |
Boyhood Experiences |
34 | |
Choice of a Career |
50 | |
My First Cruise |
63 | |
Graduation from Annapolis |
79 | |
A Scarcity of Commissions |
95 | |
Ensign Coontz |
107 | |
Five Years on the "Pinta" |
117 | |
A Difficult Undertaking |
135 | |
A Winter in the North |
146 | |
My Marriage in Alaska |
156 | |
Assignment to the "Michigan" |
170 | |
Lieutenant — Junior Grade |
181 | |
"Sealed Orders" |
194 | |
The Surrender of Manila |
204 | |
Aboard the "Enterprise" |
221 | |
A Record Voyage |
229 | |
Back to the "Philadelphia" |
244 | |
The Trip to Honolulu |
260 | |
Executive Officer of the "Nebraska" |
271 | |
Honolulu to Samoa |
281 | |
Promotion to Commander |
296 | |
A Foreign Cruise |
310 | |
In Authority at Guam |
327 | |
Conditions and Customs in Guam |
340 | |
From Guam to Battleship |
355 | |
Bremerton Yard: Preparation for War |
367 | |
381 | ||
Demobilization |
389 | |
Chief of Naval Operations |
399 | |
Limitation of Naval Armaments Conference |
411 | |
Control of the Oil Situation |
422 | |
Commander-in‑Chief of the United States Fleet |
431 | |
Winter Maneuvers at San Pedro |
441 | |
The Cruise to Australia and New Zealand |
451 | |
Our Visit to New Zealand; the Fleet Leaves for Home |
460 | |
I Haul Down My Flag as Commander-in‑Chief |
469 | |
478 | ||
481 | ||
483 | ||
479 |
Admiral Coontz |
Frontispiece |
facing page |
|
R. E. Coontz |
64 |
Cadets Kittrell and Coontz, Second Class Dance |
64 |
U. S. S. "Mohican" |
80 |
U. S. S. "Enterprise" |
80 |
Sitka Harbor, Alaska |
112 |
Sitka |
112 |
Totem Poles |
128 |
Sitka Indians Before a "Potlatch" |
128 |
Battle Practice |
256 |
U. S. S. "Nebraska" |
256 |
U. S. S. Wyoming, Flagship of Admiral Coontz |
272 |
U. S. S. "Iowa", Flagship of Sampson and Evans |
272 |
The Governor's Palace at Guam |
336 |
The Governor on a Trip of Inspection |
336 |
Fleet Parade Passing Government House, Melbourne |
352 |
U. S. S. "Maryland" Illuminated |
352 |
Admiral Coontz and Staff, Office of Operations, Washington |
400 |
Secretary Daniels and Assistants |
416 |
The Commander-in‑Chief, United States Fleet, and Staff |
416 |
President Harding, General Pershing, Vice President Coolidge, and Admiral Coontz Marching Behind Caisson of Unknown Soldier |
448 |
The Czar's Ring |
464 |
The edition transcribed here appears to be the first and only one. It was © 1930 Dorrance and Company, Inc. but is now in the public domain because the copyright was not renewed in 1957 or 1958 as then required by law: details here on the copyright law involved.
For citation and indexing purposes, the pagination is shown in the right margin of the text at the page turns (like at the end of this line); p57 these are also local anchors. Sticklers for total accuracy will of course find the anchor at its exact place in the sourcecode.
In addition, I've inserted a number of other local anchors: whatever links might be required to accommodate the author's own cross-references, as well as a few others for my own purposes. If in turn you have a website and would like to target a link to some specific passage of the text, please let me know: I'll be glad to insert a local anchor there as well.
As almost always, I retyped the text by hand rather than scanning it — not only to minimize errors prior to proofreading, but as an opportunity for me to become intimately familiar with the work, an exercise which I heartily recommend: Qui scribit, bis legit. (Well-meaning attempts to get me to scan text, if successful, would merely turn me into some kind of machine: gambit declined.)
My transcription has been minutely proofread. In the table of contents below, the sections are shown on blue backgrounds, indicating that I believe the text of them to be completely errorfree; a red background would mean that the page had not been proofread. As elsewhere onsite, the header bar at the top of each chapter's webpage will remind you with the same color scheme.
The printed book was remarkably well proofread. The inevitable typographical errors were very few, and all trivial: I marked them with a dotted underscore like this: as elsewhere on my site, glide your cursor over the underscored words to read what was actually printed. Similarly, glide your cursor over bullets before measurements: they provide conversions to metric, e.g., •10 miles.
A number of odd spellings, curious turns of phrase, etc. have been marked <!‑‑ sic in the sourcecode, just to confirm that they were checked. They are also few.
Any overlooked mistakes, please drop me a line, of course: especially if you have a copy of the printed book in front of you.
The icon I use to indicate this subsite is a colorized version of the book's frontispiece, above.
Images with borders lead to more information.
The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.) |
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A page or image on this site is in the public domain ONLY if its URL has a total of one *asterisk. If the URL has two **asterisks, the item is copyright someone else, and used by permission or fair use. If the URL has none the item is © Bill Thayer. See my copyright page for details and contact information. |
Site updated: 31 Dec 16