I recently finished reading Raiders and Blockaders : The American Civil War Afloat by Still, Taylor and Delaney. It is a selection of 19 articles, some of them from the Naval History journal and Civil War Times Illustrated. All of them are written by the three authors of the book. The articles are entertaining and provide people unfamiliar with the naval war a good starting point for further reading. I especially recommend the "Technology Afloat" article by William Still.

Unfortunately, I have to criticize one article "The Yankee Blue Jacket," which was also written William Still. In the very first sentence, he states, "On August 26, 1863, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln gave a speech in his hometown, Springfield, Illinois." This is only the second, maybe third, time I've come across a statement by an historian indicating President Lincoln visited the western part of the United States during the war.  That never happened. Once Lincoln arrived in the eastern U.S., he never went west again until his body was carried home to Springfield. I believe the furthest "West" he ever made it during the war was to visit the Army of the Potomac sometime after the battle at Antietam, Maryland.
 

I decided only to mention the Microsoft Windows 10 news staff when they make a really big and stupid mistake. However, I saw one today which riled me. They had a listing of the 25 Top Patriotic Movies. One was Flags of Our Fathers and is based on the book of the same name. The link goes to the book's Wikipedia page  The book was written by James Bradley, the son of John Bradley, the Navy Medic credited for  helping to raise the U.S. flag on Iwo Jima during that battle in World  War II.

I read the book years ago and found it interesting John Bradley never wanted to talk of his participation in the flag raising. He would even leave town on the anniversary of the flag raising to avoid reporters. This made me wonder why he would do so. On one hand, I could understand his feelings about those who died, but on the other hand, I wondered why he didn't try and honor them. Turns out there was a very good reason for his avoiding publicity. He knew he wasn't one of the six men who raised the flag.

You have to honor his memory for not taking credit for something he didn't so. So many of our politicial leaders could learn from his example.  More than likely, he denied doing so but was pressured by the military (Marines? Navy?) to go along with it. Remember, it was a Pulitizer Prize-winning photo of a great historic event and both services profited by it. But you also have to wonder to what level of command his denial reached.

Over the years, the Marine Corps discovered, due to the investigations of others, that three of the men were misidentified. In fact, one man's mother helped identify her son when she saw the photo, saying she would recognize his "ass" anywhere.  Suffice it to say the Marine Corps didn't just use that reason to change the identity of one of the men.  Very complex investigations and tracing the whereabouts of the individuals involved lead to the listing of the six correct names.

You'll find their names in the introduction of the Wikiepdia page above.

But what got me to write this post is the jerks at Microsoft referred to the men who raised the flag as "soldiers."  Excuse me, but they were MARINES!  If word of this gets out, whoever wrote that part of the news had better lay low for awhile. As some former Marines might take exception, and vent their dismay in other ways than just writing a post like this. 

Note: The following mistake was not made by an historian. Thank God.

I read across a wide range of book genres. Sometimes I like to read an easy book while I'm reading a difficult one. You know, sort of like vegging out by watching TV, except you still get to use your brain.  One easy mystery series I enjoy is based on the TV series Murder She Wrote.

I was reading one---Murder in Moscow---recently and came cross this interesting sentence, which told me someone didn't do their homework for the book. And you have to wonder what the publisher's editors were smoking the day they reviewed the book.

The first part of the sentence---on page 42---was "Jefferson Davis, Secretary of War in Lincoln's first cabinet, ...."

I had to laugh at that one. But I'm also very understanding. After all, a lot of history happened before MTV, so it's not really all that important.

It has been awhile since I have ranted over historical mistakes in a book, but I found more in another I read recently.

Lucky 666 The Impossible Mission

"Lucky 666" was a B-17, a heavy bomber. For it's last mission two members of the plane's crew were awarded the Medal of Honor, while all the rest received the Distinguished Service Cross. As a result, they became the most decorated crew in the history of America's Air Forces. Unfortunately, the authors made so many historical errors in parts of the book which didn't deal with the crew, that you have to wonder if they also didn't make errors about the story of "Lucky 666" itself.

I list those errors in my review on the books page above.

In The Immortal Irishman, the author states Confederate General R.E. Lee's orders to his corp commanders, discovered before the 1862 Battle of Antietam by Union soliders, was wrapped in "cigar leaves."   What!    How did he get that wrong?  The "missing orders"  were wrapped around some cigars. Not the other way around.

This "missing copy," and which Confederate general's it was, is still argued about today by Civil War historians.  Southern Mythologists like to blame James Longstreert, but most historians refute this.