Stephen Luce

Stephen Bleecker Luce
Born	(1827-03-25)March 25, 1827 Albany, New York, U.S.
Died	July 28, 1917(1917-07-28) (aged 90) Newport, Rhode Island, U.S.
Place of burial	St. Mary's Episcopal Church, Portsmouth, Rhode Island, U.S.
Allegiance	United States
Service / branch	United States Navy
Years of service	1841–1889
Rank	Rear admiral
Commands	USS Nantucket Training Squadron Newport North Atlantic Squadron Naval War College
Battles / wars	Mexican–American War American Civil War
Signature

Stephen Bleecker Luce (March 25, 1827 – July 28, 1917) was a midshipman, then officer in the United States Navy, rising to the high rank of admiral. Regarded as one of the American Navy's outstanding officers in many fields, including strategy, seamanship, education, and professional development, he is best known for being the founder and first president of the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, and a co-founder and later president of the United States Naval Institute in Annapolis, Maryland.

Early years and personal life

Born in Albany, New York, to Dr. Vinal Luce and Charlotte Bleecker, Luce entered the United States Navy, at the age of 14, on October 19, 1841, as a midshipman. He was instructed at the Naval School in Philadelphia until the newly instituted United States Naval Academy on the Severn River and western shore of the Chesapeake Bay, in Annapolis, the state capital of Maryland, was opened four years later in 1845. He graduated from the Academy in 1848 and was warranted as a passed midshipman to date from August 10, 1847. He was promoted after seven years to the rank of lieutenant on September 15, 1855.

In 1854, Lt. Luce married Elizabeth Henley, who was a grand niece of Martha Washington, wife of first President George Washington and the first First Lady of the United States. Their children included daughter Caroline (1857–1933), who became the wife of Montgomery M. Macomb, later a brigadier general in the United States Army.

American Civil War

Luce served with the Atlantic Ocean / East Coast blockade squadron during the American Civil War (1861-1865), and commanded the ironclad monitor Nantucket at the siege of Charleston, South Carolina. He was promoted to lieutenant commander in 1862. He was assigned to the U.S. Naval Academy, then temporarily relocated during the war in Newport, Rhode Island from January 1862 to October 1863. In 1862, while serving as head of the Department of Seamanship at the Naval Academy in Newport, he prepared one of the first seamanship textbooks used afterwards by the academy. During the war, he also commanded the naval vessels USS Sonoma, USS Canadaigua and USS Pontiac.

Following the war, he was promoted to the rank of full commander in 1866.

Post-Civil War

After the Civil War, Luce organized the Navy's apprentice training program to prepare naval seamen and petty officers for fleet duty. From 1869 to 1872 he commanded the sloop-of-war USS Juniata which was assigned to the Mediterranean Sea Fleet. He was promoted to captain in December 1872 and served as the captain of the yard at the Boston Navy Yard (at Charlestown, Massachusetts, across the Charles River from Boston), until 1875. He then was assigned to command the famous American Naval warship USS Hartford (from its record with Rear Admiral David G. Farragut at the Battle of Mobile Bay (Alabama on the Gulf of Mexico and American southern coast in 1864), from November 1875 to August 1877. From August to December 1877, Captain Luce was the Navy's inspector of training ships, then subsequently from January 1878 to February 1881 he commanded the then assigned training ship USS Minnesota, also noted for its Civil War involvement and damage in the 1862 naval Battle of Hampton Roads harbor in Virginia, between the first two ironclad warships.

From July to September 1884, Capt. Luce commanded the North Atlantic Squadron with the USS Tennessee as his flagship. From June 1886 to February 1889, Capt.n Luce again commanded the North Atlantic Squadron with the USS Richmond this time as his flagship.

Luce was also instrumental in starting the United States Naval Institute in October 1873, now located near the Naval Academy campus in Annapolis, and its highly regarded serial / monthly scholarly publication / journal, Proceedings, issued since 1874, plus more recently a bi-monthly illustrated magazine Naval History, since 1987, along with its Naval Institute Press, founded 1898 with its current extensive catalog of published books on naval affairs, technology, history and biography etc. He served as the Institute's president for 12 years from 1887 to 1898.

Newport

In 1881, Luce was promoted to the high rank of commodore, in which capacity he commanded the U.S. Navy Training Squadron in Newport from April 1881 to June 1884.

While in command of the Training Squadron, Luce developed and implemented the apprentice training program—the first formal program for training enlisted sailors / seamen for service in the American Navy. Luce's plan was to have bright and healthy young men (in the age range of 14 to 17 years old) serve a three-year apprenticeship with the Training Squadron during which they received an academic education as well as hands-on technical training to learn various seamanship skills.

The "boys", as the apprentices were officially referred to, were typically enlisted around the ages of 14 / 15 by their parents until they would reach the age of 21 whereupon they could decide if they wished to extend their service in the Navy. Previously, the Navy had taken recruits with no prior experience and all training of enlisted sailors was "on the job", aboard ship or naval base / shipyard. The problem with this older approach was that many recruits lacked the discipline and skills necessary to be totally useful to the Navy. Luce's vision from the apprentice program was to develop sailors who were fully trained and accustomed to navy life prior to joining the fleet. The program ended when the United States entered the First World War in April 1917 as the Navy needed to train sailors rapidly for service as it greatly expanded during the Great War.

Based on Luce's urgings and exhaustive reports, the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island, was established October 6, 1884 with Luce as its first president. In 1885 he was promoted to rear admiral, and in 1886 he was succeeded as president by Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, whose writings had greatly influenced the Navy's decision to establish the War College.

Retirement

The wooden-hulled, steam-powered sloop-of-war U.S.S. Richmond (1860-1919), was Luce's last assignment at sea before retiring, having reached the mandatory retirement age of 62, on March 25, 1889. Despite being retired, Luce continued his interest in the improving the efficiency of the Navy. He returned to the War College in 1901 and served for nearly a further decade as a faculty member. He finally retired in November 1910 at the age of 83, seven years before his death in 1917, during the beginning of American involvement overseas in the First World War in Europe.

Affiliations

Luce belonged to several military societies. In 1894 Luce joined the Aztec Club of 1847, a military society of officers who had served during the Mexican War, and served as its vice president from 1909 until 1910 and as its president from 1910 to 1911.

He joined the Military Order of Foreign Wars (MOFW) and became the founding commander of the Rhode Island Commandery of the MOFW in 1900. He was also a member of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States (insignia number 13,113) and the Naval Order of the United States.

In 1901 he was elected to the board of directors of the Redwood Library in Newport.

Luce was an active member of the Protestant Episcopal Church. He was a vestryman of All Saints Memorial Chapel in Newport, Rhode Island and was also a parishioner of St. John's Episcopal Church in Newport, where he served as a vestryman and as a warden.

Death and burial

Luce died on July 28, 1917 and was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary's Episcopal Church in Portsmouth, Rhode Island.

Publications

In 1863 David Van Nostrand published Stephen Luce's textbook Seamanship (available through Google Books). The work was intended for use at the United States Naval Academy. A later edition appeared in 1905.

In December 1891, The North American Review published Luce's paper "The Benefits of War" (available through JSTOR).

Luce also edited The Patriotic and Naval Songster (1883).

Dates of rank

Reference – U.S. Navy Register, 1899. p. 70.

• Midshipman – October 19, 1841
• Passed Midshipman – August 10, 1847
• Lieutenant – September 16, 1855
• Lieutenant Commander – July 16, 1862
• Commander – July 25, 1866
• Captain – December 28, 1872
• Commodore – November 25, 1881
• Rear Admiral – October 5, 1885
• Retired list – March 25, 1889
• Retired on active duty – February 13, 1901
• Final retirement – November 1910

Awards

• Civil War Campaign Medal
• Spanish Campaign Medal

Legacy

Three ships have been named USS Luce in his honor.

The United States Naval Academy and the Naval War College both have buildings named Luce Hall in his honor.

The auditorium at the erstwhile Naval Training Center, constructed in 1941 in San Diego, California, was named Luce Auditorium. The library at the State University of New York Maritime College is the Stephen B. Luce Library.

There is a memorial window at St. John's Episcopal Church in Newport in Luce's honor.

There is a plaque in honor of Admiral Luce at the corner of Kay Street and Rhode Island Avenue in Newport.

References

•  This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.

Further reading

• John A. S. Grenville and George Berkeley Young, Politics, Strategy, and American Diplomacy: Studies in Foreign Policy, 1873–1917 (1966) pp 1–38, on "The Admiral and politics: Stephan B. Luce and the foundation of the modern American Navy".

External links

• Media related to Stephen Luce at Wikimedia Commons