powered blockade runners actually decreased during the war. The two do assert, however, that it did prevent large cargo ships from participating in the trade, and that the maintenance of the blockade greatly affected the events of the war, emphatically claiming that the blockade was successful and important to Union victory. The greatest contribution of this book is the fresh look at the blockade’s effectiveness. Importantly, they look at the cost-benefit ineffectiveness argument as well as the material and effectiveness argument. The tables provided by the authors to support their claims are valuable. There are a few trifling errors. The most vexing is their continual reference to Rear Admiral Samuel Phillips Lee as “Stephen.” Nevertheless, this work shines new and important light on the topic and everyone investigating the blockade should start with this book. Robert Browning Roxboro, North Carolina Armageddon in the Arctic Ocean: Up the Hawse Pipe from Galley Boy to Third Mate on a Legendary Liberty Ship in the Biggest Convoy Battle of World War II by Paul G. Gill, edited by Paul G. Gill Jr. (Hellgate Press, Ashland, Oregon, 2022, 402pp, illus, notes, index, isbn 978-195416-338-6; $19.95pb) Paul Gill’s memoir—a 20th-century tale of grit, seafaring, bravery, and patriotism—is skillfully woven together by his son, Paul Gill Jr., from his father’s dusty notes and manuscripts compiled over the years. Paul Gill Sr. tells his story of perseverance starting as a youngster in South Boston in an Irish-American family of six kids, scavenging for driftwood for his mother’s kitchen stove during the frigid winters of the Great Depression. With jobs scarce, at age fifteen he joined the Civilian Conservation Corps in Vermont. A year later—after doctoring his birth certificate to say he was 18—he secured Seaman’s Papers and shipped out as a galley boy in an oil tanker, the beginning of his many adventures at sea. With a stroke of good fortune in the merchant marine, Gill then put to sea as a crewmember in an ocean liner, and subsequently made eight trips across the Atlantic. A high school dropout, he taught himSEA HISTORY 180, AUTUMN 2022
self mathematics, history, and literature somehow woke up and managed to crawl during his off-watch hours. out of his cabin through the debris. Five In the late 1930s shipping jobs dried crewmembers were killed; many others up and Gill and his older brother, Steve, were injured. The ship was towed and heard about a federal homesteading project beached in Algeria. Gill finally got home in Alaska that had a need for workers to and married his fiancée. At this stage in his support new communities. Thinking it life, his high-sea adventures were mostly would be a great opportunity, they planned over, but not quite. He taught for a while a 5,000-mile journey to Alaska via the West at the Maritime Officers Training School Coast. But they hardly had any money. but, getting restless, accepted a Navy ReTheir only solution was to ride the rails as serve commission. He was assigned as a hobos, dashing onto boxcars, hiding from stevedore officer in the 37th Naval Mobile the rail yard police, and sharing mulligan Construction Battalion (Seabees) at Pearl stew with fellow hobos while heading west. Harbor. When the war was finally over, he Unfortunately, things didn’t work out. was discharged from the Navy in 1946. They heard from other rail travelers that Although he lacked a high school diploma, good jobs weren’t available in Alaska after he used the GI Bill and attended college, all. The rails carried Gill to San Francisco, graduating in three years. Amazingly, he where he secured a berth aboard a merchant then applied for admission to, and was The Glencannon Press ship carrying cargo to East and West Coast accepted at, Harvard Business School, 4 col.Canal. inches inches)with an MBA! ports via the Panama At(2.25 sea, hex 4.5 graduating Preferseamanship right handand page, bottom right.is full of adventure and worked hard to master Gill’s book navigation. With war soon approaching, determination, a terrific read. Many autoGill was accepted at the US Maritime Ser- biographies aren’t page-turners, but this vice Officer Training School. In December one is. 1941—three days after the attack on Pearl James A. Noone Harbor–he graduated as an ensign. Later Fairfax, Virginia that month, the Coast Guard issued his approval as a third mate. In early 1942, at age 21, Gill accepted a third mate position THE GLENCANNON on the Liberty ship SS Nathanael Greene, PRESS departing from New York on a mission to deliver weapons and ammunition to AmerMaritime Books ican ally Russia. The US/UK convoy to Archangel, Russia—by way of the Arctic Ocean—was a NEW! treacherous voyage, during which they Black Knight encountered enemy attacks and severe The Life and Times of weather. The Nathanael Greene and other Capt. Hugh Mulzac ships of the convoy were continuously attacked by German U-boats and torpedo bombers. According to the British AdmiThe complete life story of ralty, it was the biggest convoy battle of the first black man to have World War II. Gill repeatedly fired from and sail on an American his machine gun station as German tormaster’s license and the first pedo bombers flew close to the water, dito command a Liberty Ship rectly at their targets. After running the gauntlet of German attacks, the battered throughout World War II. Nathanael Greene finally arrived at its desMore than 300 pages, 14 in tination in Russia, its mission accomfull color. plished. In a subsequent Atlantic crossing to FREE Catalog the Mediterranean, the Nathanael Greene Tel. 1-510-455-9027 was torpedoed by a U-boat. Gill was jolted by the explosion and blacked out, but
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