Forged in War: The Continental Congress and the Origin of Military Supply and Acquisition Policy (review)

During the American War of Independence, Congress established structures and set precedents that developed over time into modern weapons acquisition processes. Lucille Horgan comes to her subject not as a historian of the period but as "a scholar of military management as it relates to weapons acquisition" (p. xiii). Her book seeks the origins of those processes: "In the end, if a full story is desired, it becomes imperative to start at the very beginning, and that is the goal of this book" (p. xii). She has read widely (despite a few lacunae) in the printed primary sources (notably the Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789, Worthington C. Ford et al., eds., 34 vols. [Washington: GPO, 1904-37]) and secondary literature. Her military management perspective, focused on the subject of Revolutionary-era weapons acquisition, provides fruitful insights.

Horgan stresses the continuity of weapons acquisition processes over time. The Continental Congress developed an embryonic military staff and civilian administration dealing with finance and supply. When foreign sources of artillery and naval ships became inaccessible, Congress had to make special arrangements to provide these major weapon systems. Horgan provides details of congressional initiatives in research and development (establishing arsenals at Springfield, Massachusetts, and Carlisle, Pennsylvania), fostering expertise (forming the artillery and engineering organizations within the Continental Army), encouraging innovation (entertaining John Fitch's proposals for a steamboat), and industrial development (contracting with saltpeter and gunpowder mills). The Continental Army used a mixture of civilian and military administration, but the Continental Navy developed a predominantly civilian structure, for weapons acquisition. The Army relied on contracts with detailed specifications for artillery and assured compliance by means of proofing, or testing, the guns. The Navy, by contrast, used similar contractual arrangements with shipbuilders, but naval officials were involved in inspection throughout the construction process.

Horgan projects "that this is the first of an anticipated series of books that will detail the chronological evolution of related topics up to the present" (p. xvii). Readers of military history can look forward with anticipation to her future contributions to the field. Since she argues that during the Revolutionary era, "the recognition that technology was critical to national security first emerged and was dealt with by policy makers" (p. xvi), readers of her future studies may hope to see her focus broaden to place the American experience in the wider transatlantic context of technological, military, and naval development portrayed by scholars such as C. R. Boxer and Frederic Chapin Lane.