Reviews

John Barry: An American Hero in the Age of Sail by Tim McGrath

apryde6226's review

4.0

I found this book by accident and was fascinated by it. Here's a hero of our country's revolution, who I would be that 10 out of 10 general college student have never heard of. After going to sea as a boy, he worked his was from ship's boy to captain. He became a captain of his own "brig" in his twenties. He was one of the reasons that the colonies were able to convert merchant ships into war ships and he was one of the guys who went toe to toe with the premier navy of the time and won.

I really recommend this book.

jstamper2022's review

4.0

Apparently 500 pages instead of 700. The last 200 are notes and sources. Anyway, detailed account as best historians can determine, of the life of the father of the United States Navy. Details get a bit pedantic at times but it's a history book, it happens. Otherwise an easy read filled with details not just of Barry but of what was happening in America and other parts of the world around the Revolutionary War, and includes a brief look at trade with China in the late 18th/early 19th Century.