Royce Shingleton | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 1935 (age 88–89) |
| Education | East Carolina University (B.S.) Appalachian State University (M.A.) Florida State University (Ph.D.) |
Royce Shingleton is a retired American professor and author. He won several awards and is listed in - among others - Directory of American Scholars and Contemporary Authors. His scholarly endeavors have left an indelible mark on historical research. [1]
Shingleton was born in 1935 in the small eastern North Carolina town of Stantonsburg, to Wiley Thomas "Babe" and Lossie Vick Shingleton, the second son and fourth child of six. [2] His father, a veteran of World War I, [3] was a merchant and farmer.
Productive farmland surrounded Stantonsburg with historic Contentnea Creek (a tributary of the Neuse River that flows to the port of New Bern) forming the western boundary. In the town's business district, his father was a partner in Shingleton Brothers Hardware and Appliance (1914-1959), and the brothers also acquired some of the farmland there on Contentnea Creek.
Shingleton married Frances Ruth Bennett of Asheboro, North Carolina. [4]
Shingleton graduated from Stantonsburg (NC) High School, where he was class president, in 1954 and then from East Carolina University, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in social studies, in 1958. [5]
He went on to complete a Master of Arts degree in social studies at Appalachian State University. [6]
In 1971, he received a PhD in history from Florida State University. [7] His dissertation is entitled "Rural Life in the Old South: The British Travelers' Image, 1820-1860" [8] (Photocopy Ann Arbor, MI, University Microfilms, 1971, 338 pp.), completed under the supervision of Dr. William Warren Rogers, and is available for reference in special collections at certain libraries.
Among Shingleton's publications are three American Civil War era biographies. He received a Darton College Foundation Grant to commission the eight original maps for John Taylor Wood: Sea Ghost of the Confederacy, and its second printing (in both hardcover and paperback) was a National Historical Society Book Club edition. Working from Wood's family documents, his military career has been reconstructed. Moving boarding cutters overland by day, Wood emerged from unexpected places at night along the eastern seaboard to capture Union vessels in hand to hand combat. At the end of the war, Wood escaped along the eastern Florida coast to Cuba in one the of the most famous escape stories in American history. [9]
For his second book, Richard Peters: Champion of the New South, he received an Atlanta Foundation Grant. Richard Peters (Atlanta), was known for fulfilling the tenants of the New South. Before there was a New South, there was Richard Peters, who arrived in the rough-hewn crossroads town of Marthasville, Georgia in 1845 as superintendent of the Georgia Railroad. He was instrumental in changing the town name to Atlanta, maneuvered the transfer of the state capital to Atlanta, and donated the land on which the Georgia capitol sits. This biography sheds new light on an extraordinary individual whose contributions continue to enrich the South and the nation. [10]
High Seas Confederate: The Life and Times of John Newland Maffitt (Studies in Maritime History), also had a second printing with a redesigned dust jacket, and won the Clarendon Award. Shingleton traces Maffitt's climb in rank and reputation among the Confederate officers in the first modern biography of the swashbuckling captain. Maffitt's courage, quick thinking, seamanship, and navigational skills made him effective in extraordinary runs through the Union blockade into southern ports. As commander of the C.S.S. Florida, he captured twenty-three merchant vessels in this adventure of life on the high seas during the Civil War. [11]
Shingleton also contributed two chapters (chapter six - "The Officers" - and chapter seven - "Seamen, Landsmen, Firemen and Coal Heavers") to William Still's Confederate Navy: The Ships, Men and Organization 1861-1865. This comprehensive guide to the Confederate Navy covers its ships and men, its organization and facilities, its strategy and tactics, and its operations, including those on the Western rivers. [12]
"Both a colonel in the Confederate army and a captain in the Confederate navy, [John Taylor] Wood has previously received only part of the historical attention he deserves. Now the dauntless and resourceful 'sea ghost of the Confederacy' lives anew as a flesh-and-blood hero--thanks to the stylistic and scholarly skill of Royce Gordon Shingleton." [13]
"The author has presented an extensively documented biography of a relatively unknown Confederate naval officer whose wartime career reads like that of C. S. Forester's fictional Horatio Hornblower. John Taylor Wood's whaleboat activities...resulted in the capture of eight vessels in inland waters...one of which was literally blasted apart by the guns of the fortifications at which it was moored in a futile attempt to drive off the boarding parties led by Wood [this was the U.S.S. Underwriter at New Bern, NC, probably Wood's most notable cutting-out expedition of the war]." [14]
""A gem of a book...superb historical writing and research...remarkably objective critique [of the cruise of the commerce raider Tallahassee, a ship commanded by Wood]...original sources from Wood's papers and diary...highly readable--one almost wants to say brilliant. Sparklingly written and based upon sound scholarship, John Taylor Wood will long stand to remind all that history can be interestingly written and when it is, it is as fine a piece of literature as anyone could desire". [15]
"Shingleton sees Henry W. Grady [editor of the influential newspaper Atlanta Constitution, and a friend of Richard Peters] as the greatest symbol and publicist of the New South, he believes that Peters was the major practitioner of the movement. Long before Grady was making his powerful addresses in the North concerning the New South, Peters was practicing the major tenets of the movement with his work in Georgia in the areas of transportation, urbanization, industrialization, and diversified farming....an excellent biography of a major figure." [16]
"Richard Peters, an influential business leader who played a significant role in antebellum and reconstruction Atlanta...was the first person to use the new name Atlanta in place of the official Marthasville, [and] had a hand in moving the capital of Georgia to Atlanta. The author sees Peters as an example of Henry Grady's "New South" businessman...the young Grady spent time as a guest on Peters' farm [near Calhoun in north Georgia] and described his visits there in print....extensive background information on Atlanta and the South." [17]
"This important book chronicles the life and entrepreneurial activities of Pennsylvania-born Richard Peters, who came to Georgia in 1835 as assistant railroad engineer and stayed to help lay the foundations for building the town of Terminus, Georgia [this was the earliest name of Atlanta because the locale was the terminus of a railroad], into the modern city of Atlanta. Shingleton is to be commended for rescuing Peters from relative historical obscurity in this well-researched and beautifully written addition to the literature of southern history. Photographs. Bibliographic essay. Index. Public and academic libraries at all levels." [18]
In the 1992 issue of the Naval War College Review, Russell Ramsey wrote: "Contemporary students of the art of war will be surprised to see riverine tactics, joint operations, logistics, civil-military relations, undercover operations, innovative gadgetry, and battlefield intelligence all systematically treated in Royce G. Shingleton's page-snapping accounts of the 'Gray Ghost' navy. This writer is reminded after reading Shingleton's work of a certain other writer, Thucydides, who attended Plato's Academy hard by the banks of the Ilissus in a long ago and far away place called Athens. The comparison is not strained". [19]
In 1997, an editor of this journal wrote: "Royce Shingleton was featured in an article entitled 'Rising Naval Historian' and as Ramsey stated, and still remains true today - Royce G. Shingleton's hallmarks are precision, deceptively easy prose, flowing narrative, and - vital for the military reader - linkage between resources, decisions and events. Shingleton addresses in detail Maffitťs wartime endeavors; their contribution to the Southern cause is a significant lesson in naval history that must not be forgotten. Hindsight makes clear that the obvious benefits brought by Maffitťs actions - although not realized during his lifetime - confirm the need for and value for a strong navy to a country's survival. This is more than an excellent adventure story of life on the high seas during the Civil War; it is a warning about the use and application of a nation's navy. As Maffitt said, 'the grand mistake of the South was neglecting her Navy'". [20]
"This compact biography is in many senses a model work because it succinctly recounts the story of it protagonist, provides the basic chronology and facts, sets them in their larger matrix, and always allows the sources to speak for themselves. In particular, the details of the life of the young naval officer are presented in greater detail than elsewhere, with solid use of the Maffitt letters and service record....High Seas Confederate will undoubtedly remain the standard biography of John Newland Maffitt, and a key volume in Confederate navel historiography, for years to come." [21]
In addition to the publications listed above, Dr. Shingleton has also written over fifty articles, including peer book reviews, articles in historical journals, popular history magazines, reference books, and newspapers.
The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States between the Union and the Confederacy, which was formed in 1861 by states that had seceded from the Union. The central conflict leading to war was a dispute over whether slavery should be permitted to expand into the western territories, leading to more slave states, or be prohibited from doing so, which many believed would place slavery on a course of ultimate extinction.
The Confederate States of America (CSA), commonly referred to as the Confederate States (C.S.), the Confederacy, or the South, was an unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United States that existed from February 8, 1861, to May 9, 1865. The Confederacy was composed of eleven U.S. states that declared secession and warred against the United States during the American Civil War. The states were South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina.
CSS Florida was a sloop-of-war in the service of the Confederate States Navy. She served as a commerce raider during the American Civil War before being sunk in 1864.
John Newland Maffitt was an officer in the Confederate States Navy who was nicknamed the "Prince of Privateers" due to his success as a blockade runner and commerce raider in the U.S. Civil War.
CSSOwl was a blockade runner in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. It was built by Jones Quiggen, a ship builder in Liverpool, England and launched on June 21, 1864.
The Confederate Powderworks was a gunpowder factory during the American Civil War, the only permanent structures completed by the Confederate States of America. Colonel George Washington Rains chose the old United States Arsenal site between the Augusta Canal and Savannah River in Augusta, Georgia, as a secure inland location with good rail and water connections.
Charles Manigault Morris was an officer in the United States Navy and later in the Confederate States Navy. Morris was a descendant of several of the most prominent Northern and Southern families in colonial America.
John Taylor Wood was an officer in the United States Navy and the Confederate Navy. He resigned from the U.S. Navy at the beginning of the American Civil War, and became a "leading Confederate naval hero" as a captain in the Confederate Navy. He was a lieutenant serving aboard CSS Virginia when it engaged USS Monitor in 1862, one of the most famous naval battles in Civil War and U.S. Naval history. He was caught in 1865 in Georgia with Confederate President Jefferson Davis's party, but escaped and made his way to Cuba. From there, he got to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he settled and became a merchant. His wife and children joined him there, and more children were born in Canada, which is where he lived out the remainder of his life.
Richard Peters was an American railroad man and a founder of Atlanta, Georgia, in the 1840s.
CSS Savannah, later called Old Savannah and Oconee, was a gunboat in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War.
The Crenshaw Company was a blockade running company established during the American Civil War.
USS Crusader was a screw steamer of the United States Navy that served prior to, and during, the American Civil War.
Joseph Nicholson Barney was a career United States Navy officer (1835–1861) who served in the Confederate States Navy in the American Civil War (1861–1865).
Georgia was one of the original seven slave states that formed the Confederate States of America in February 1861, triggering the U.S. Civil War. The state governor, Democrat Joseph E. Brown, wanted locally raised troops to be used only for the defense of Georgia, in defiance of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, who wanted to deploy them on other battlefronts. When the Union blockade prevented Georgia from exporting its plentiful cotton in exchange for key imports, Brown ordered farmers to grow food instead, but the breakdown of transport systems led to desperate shortages.
The bibliography of the American Civil War comprises books that deal in large part with the American Civil War. There are over 60,000 books on the war, with more appearing each month. Authors James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier stated in 2012, "No event in American history has been so thoroughly studied, not merely by historians, but by tens of thousands of other Americans who have made the war their hobby. Perhaps a hundred thousand books have been published about the Civil War."
William Norwood Still Jr. was an American maritime historian. He was the first director of the program in maritime history at East Carolina University and a noted author of works on U.S. Civil War history and U.S. naval history.
During the American Civil War, blockade runners were used to get supplies through the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America that extended some 3,500 miles (5,600 km) along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coastlines and the lower Mississippi River. The Confederacy had little industrial capability and could not produce the quantity of arms and other supplies needed to fight against the Union. To meet this need, British investors financed numerous blockade runners that were constructed in the British Isles and were used to import the guns, ordnance and other supplies, in exchange for cotton that the British textile industry needed greatly. To penetrate the blockade, these relatively lightweight shallow draft ships, mostly built in British shipyards and specially designed for speed, but not suited for transporting large quantities of cotton, had to cruise undetected, usually at night, through the Union blockade. The typical blockade runners were privately owned vessels often operating with a letter of marque issued by the Confederate government. If spotted, the blockade runners would attempt to outmaneuver or simply outrun any Union Navy warships on blockade patrol, often successfully.
Historical accounts for early U.S. naval history now occur across the spectrum of two and more centuries. This Bibliography lends itself primarily to reliable sources covering early U.S. naval history beginning around the American Revolution period on through the 18th and 19th centuries and includes sources which cover notable naval commanders, Presidents, important ships, major naval engagements and corresponding wars. The bibliography also includes sources that are not committed to the subject of U.S. naval history per se but whose content covers this subject extensively.
Edward Clifford Anderson Sr. was a naval officer in the United States Navy, Mayor of Savannah, Georgia and a Colonel in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. He commanded Fort James Jackson near Savannah before its capture in 1864. He was elected mayor of Savannah eight times, before and after the war, and on December 6, 1865, he became the first mayor after the civil war.
Sir John Campbell Lees was an English lawyer and colonial judge.