Yankee from Sweden: The Dream and the Reality in the Days of John Ericsson (review)

330civil war history as "the courage of treatment which so delights us, and which large perception only can inspire" and conclude appropriately with the observation that" . . . the solid sense of the book is a sober certainty. It has the best merits, namely, of fortifying and encouraging." Arnold Gates Garden City, New York Yankee from Sweden: The Dream and the Reality in the Days of John Ericsson. By Ruth White. (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1960. Pp. xix, 299. $4.50.) the unpredictable and complex inventor of the 19th century, SwedishAmerican John Ericsson, who transformed the war at sea by designing and building the Monitor, has long been neglected by biographers. The 1907 account by William Conant Church, the designated heir of the Ericsson Papers (who suppressed materials which did not please him), is a colorless, distorted image by a devoted admirer. Ruth White, who, with her late husband, wrote Tin Can on a Shingle, is the second to attempt a full-dress biography of this engineering genius. John Ericsson's life spanned almost the entire 19th century. The author brings out in fresh detail many of his lesser known but equally pregnant creations and his rugged persistence. After describing his early life in Sweden, she traces his activities in London where he produced the first practical steam tire engine and the first locomotive to run a mile in fiftythree seconds. Emigrating to the United States, Ericsson turned out the first screw-driven warship, the Princeton, designed the engines and propellors for tow boats and canal boats, built the Ericsson, the Monitor, the Dictator, and the Destroyer, tinkered with numerous other inventions, and dreamed of harnessing the sun's energy. Ruth White's close-up of her subject is interrupted by wide angle shots of the social and political scenes. At best, Yankee from Sweden is a descriptive biography. The author has dutifully inspected the Ericsson manuscript materials in the Library of Congress, the American Swedish Foundation, the New York Public Library, and the New York Historical Society, the William Church Papers in the Library of Congress and the familiar secondary sources. It is regrettable that Mrs. White did not sample the rich manuscript collections of naval officers who were connected with Ericsson's inventions, such as the John Rodgers Papers in the Library of Congress or the Samuel Francis DuPont correspondence in the Longwood Foundation or, more significantly, certain of the record groups in the National Archives which detail the dayto -day building of the Monitor and other ships. Such neglect hampers her account of the complicated problems that Ericsson faced in constructing these vessels. This and herfailure to analyze critically is partially compensated for by the impact of her sympathetic, vivid pace, except when slowed by too frequent and too lengthy quotations. Yankee from Sweden is also handicapped by sweeping generalizations as "Without Ericsson's invention [of Book Reviews331 the surface condenser] , it is fair to say that sailing ships would have retained their supremacy until the introduction of the diesel engine. . . ." The first iron-hulled warship in the United States was the Michigan and not, as Mrs. White maintains, the Princeton. The author's affectionate lens captures a portrait of the "Big Swede" which is a trifle blurred but usually entertaining. James M. Merrill Whittier College Jefferson Davis: Confederate President. By Hudson Strode. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1959. Pp. xvii, 556. $6.75.) the ftrst volume of professor Hudson strode's projected three-volume study of Jefferson Davis was praised by the Madison Avenue pundits, and now the second volume of this work receives the same treatment. This second book is supposed to cover the life of the President of the Confederacy from his inauguration to January 1, 1864. I dissented in a published review to the praises given the first volume, and I herewith give my reasons for dissenting from the praise given the second volume. Mr. Strode's book possesses virtues. It is sympathetic with a defeated man who has been unfairly treated by the biographers. To speak favorably of Davis outside the precincts of the United Daughters of the Confederacy is a contribution to the interpretation of an important period of American...