War, Technology, and Experience aboard the U.S.S. (review)

War, Technology, and Experience aboard the U.S.S. Monitor. By David A. Mindell. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000. Pp. x, 187. $35.00 cloth; $14.95 paper.)

"What becomes of people when the face of battle becomes that of a machine?" (8). This is the central question that David A. Mindell addresses in this unusual history of the Monitor. Rather than merely refighting the famous March 1862 battle at Hampton Roads, he examines the impact service aboard the ironclad had on its crew. This sheds new light not only on the Civil War but also on military history in general, as war, technology, and society increasingly intersect.

According to the author, the Monitor represented a revolution in naval design yet created numerous ironies as life itself became reliant upon machines. By placing most of the crew below the waterline and encasing them in iron, the vessel offered sailors maximum protection. This arrangement, however, rendered them dependent upon ventilators for air and made escape difficult if the vessel floundered, something that ultimately occurred. The living areas were well furnished, but the vessel leaked profusely and became brutally hot in the summer, with internal temperatures reaching 150 degrees. Not surprisingly, the crew referred to the ship as an "iron coffin."

Mindell asserts that one of the vessel's most troubling aspects concerned the sailors' perception of themselves. Some crew members questioned their images as warriors and heroes in an artificial environment where "there isn't enough danger to give us glory" and technology seemingly dominated (2). This persisted throughout the vessel's life and beyond, especially as the press hailed the Monitor as having made European fleets obsolete. Had the crew fought valiantly, or had the ship itself? Furthermore, despite this acclaim, doubts remained about its actual effectiveness. The Monitor had failed to sink the Virginia and was never allow to seek and destroy its rival. Instead, the Navy utilized it defensively as a deterrent and as a symbol of Northern power. The Monitor's inglorious end added to the controversy as many wondered if man or machine had failed.

A central figure in much of this was John Ericsson, the Monitor's inventor, of whom Mindell takes a critical and somewhat revisionist view. Rather than seeing him as a "visionary" who "clashe[d] with stodgy, conservative, and entrenched bureaucracies," Mindell portrays the inventor as an aggressive promoter (32-33). Ericsson actively sought support to build his ship, lobbied the Navy to cancel rival ironclad programs, and refused to accept that his designs had major flaws. In this regard, Mindell shows the great distance between theory and the actual experiences of those who served aboard the ship. Moreover, he demonstrates that many naval officers who opposed Ericsson's program were innovators themselves in such technologies as steam power and armaments, a fact that illuminates the inherent tensions that existed between line and staff officers. Line officers viewed their staff counterparts as mere mechanics, not warriors. The book also examines the politics of building the vessel and then getting additional monitors approved. As Mindell points out, however, these unseaworthy vessels were short-lived and had largely disappeared by the twentieth century.

Mindell organizes his material chronologically but explores some topics thematically within this framework. While this is generally effective, it makes the book repetitive in places. He has drawn on a wide variety of primary and secondary sources and makes especially good use of the crew's and Ericsson's writings. Mindell also examines Herman Melville's Civil War poetry, some of the first works to deal with the implications of mechanical warfare, and closes by discussing airplanes and other inventions which perpetuated it. Overall, the work contains thought-provoking insights and will be valuable for those interested in the human dimensions of military history and technology.

 

Michael P. Gabriel
Kutztown University of Pennsylvania

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