Sea Power - June 2015

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE On Feb. 9, 1888, the New York branch of the U.S. Naval Institute met at the Seawanhaka Corinthian Yacht Club in Manhattan to hold a debate on a topic of “popular interest and national importance” — the establishment of a naval reserve.

Despite a consensus that the Navy needed an ability to augment its manning during times of national emergency, contentions existed regarding the organization and mission of a manpower reserve pool.

In light of the fact that the nation had relied on Merchant Mariners in the past for reserve manpower, CAPT Augustus P. Cooke argued for strong subsidies to rebuild the Merchant Marine, which had been depleted during and following the Civil War.

With a larger pool of Merchant Mariners to draw on,
Cooke envisioned “an efficient naval reserve organized
by the general government.”
In contrast, Jacob W. Miller, an Annapolis graduate who
rose within the commercial sector, represented a con-
stituency of yachtsmen and extolled their potential worth
to the Navy if organized into state-affiliated naval militias.

Miller warned, “In forming a National Naval Reserve,
the traditions hostile to centralizing armed forces may
feel outrages and the scheme may become unpopular.”
He envisioned the naval militias performing coastal
defense missions.

Lacking support from the agrarian midsection of the country, federal legislation to subsidize the Merchant Marine and create a federal naval reserve stalled. In the meantime, Miller in New York and John C. Soley — who would serve in the Navy during the Civil War, Spanish-American War and World War I — in Massachusetts lobbied their respective legislatures and received authorization to create naval militia units.

With federal naval reserve initiatives stymied in Congress, Secretary of the Navy Benjamin Tracy seemed content with the state militia initiatives despite concerns from within the ranks that naval militia proponents were simply organizing units to elevate their social status within their respective communities.

One cynic noted, “Whereas the
Navy desired a reserve pool of sea-
faring men, what it got was lands-
men with aquatic tastes.”
Several states along the coasts
and Great Lakes established mili-
tias. The Navy provided coastal ves-
sels such as Civil War-vintage mon-
itors, tugboats and small craft for
the militiamen to train on.

When the nation declared war against Spain in 1898, concerns that the Spanish Navy would suddenly appear off the Atlantic seaboard and bombard eastern cities was alleviated by naval militiamen who served as coast watchers, and manned monitors and other armed small craft.

The Navy established a federal Naval Reserve on March 3, 1915, with an aim of creating a manpower augmentation pool for its growing fleet of battleships. However, when the United States entered World War I on April 6, 1917, the threat did not come from the German High Seas Fleet but instead from U-boats.

Thus naval militiamen, who were federalized as National Naval Volunteers, joined with civilians entering the Naval Reserve to crew sub-chasers, converted yachts and other small vessels operating off the North American and European littorals against the undersea menace.

While much of the regular Navy’s officers and enlisted served with a battle fleet that remained operationally dormant, the activated littoral citizen-sailors fought at sea.

After the war, Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels would write: “Never again will men dare ridicule the Volunteer, the Reservist, the man who in a national crisis lays aside civilian duty to become a soldier or sailor. They fought well. They died well. They have left in deeds and words a record that will be an inspiration to unborn generations.” ■

Source: David F. Winkler’s Ready Then, Ready Now, Ready Always: More Than a Century of Service by Citizen Sailors

(2014).

Dr. David Winkler is a historian with the Naval Historical Foundation.

Contentious Debate Preceded
Establishment of Naval Reserve
By DAVID F. WINKLER
WWW.SEAPOWERMAGAZINE.ORG 60 SEAPOWER / JUNE 2015

USS Ticonderoga Executive Officer LT Frank L. Muller, left, and LTJG Junius H. Fulcher, U.S. Naval Reserve Force Sailors, were taken prisoner by the German Navy submarine U-152 in October 1918 after it sank the ship