Most historians trace the origins of the Continental Navy to George Washington’s official inauguration of the Federal Navy in 1793, but the story actually begins years earlier: in 1775, at the advent of the American Revolution. In If By Sea, historian George C. Daughan uses decades of primary research to brilliantly trace the navy’s little-recognized origins, showing that the battles of Lexington and Concord—as well as many subsequent battles, including Bunker Hill, New York, and Philadelphia—cannot be fully understood without taking the role of naval power into account.

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