Iron from the Deep: The Discovery and Recovery of the USS Monitor.

Iron from the Deep: The Discovery and Recovery of the USS Monitor. By Robert E. Sheridan. (Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, c. 2004. Pp. xiv, 261. $34.95, ISBN 1-55750-413-X.)

Robert E. Sheridan's boyhood passion for the USS Monitor was realized when he participated in the search for and discovery of this shipwreck in the summer of 1973. Like many people who are intrigued by the Civil War, Sheridan traces his interest to his great-grandfather who was a Union soldier. From preface to conclusion Sheridan gives a very personal and detailed account of the search for and discovery of the Monitor and the decades of bureaucratic frustration before the hull components and associated artifacts were recovered.

The bulk of the book focuses on the author's involvement in the early years of the search for and the finding of the Monitor--a period now obscured by the more recent and dramatic events of the 2001 recovery of the engine and 2002 lift of the turret. Readers who hope to learn more about these significant events will be disappointed with the abbreviated manner in which they are handled. Sheridan's story at times becomes the bitter personal account of one who participated in the discovery of the Monitor but was forced to sit back and watch others direct the project and reach the goal.

This book does serve the author's purpose in giving more credit to his team, which was led by John Newton. The author bestows on them due recognition for the confirmed discovery of the Monitor and acknowledges several individual actors despite their peripheral role. The book is also autobiographical in that Sheridan provides many anecdotes about his ocean surveys, which he finds comparable to the problems his team faced in the search for the Monitor. These stories chronicle the development of ocean surveying during the 1970s--a period when advances in technology were making it possible to discover many shipwrecks and map the ocean floor.

The book might be disappointing to those who hope for a work that provides more specifics on the archaeology and history of the Monitor but will be enlightening for readers who are interested in the personal and political dynamics that are inevitable in such a high-profile recovery effort. The details of the bureaucratic meetings given in the chapter titled "Meetings, Meetings, Meetings" can be difficult to fathom for those unfamiliar and uninterested in the bureaucracy of various federal and state agencies, which inevitably flexed the muscle of federal preservation laws. There is also the lesson that with the finding of any famous shipwreck there are no quitclaim rights for the finders, but instead a myriad of interested parties and competing agendas. The warning here is that a great deal of bureaucracy accompanies the dream of shipwreck recovery and rightfully so, considering the chances for failure and the costly human and financial resources necessary to achieve success.

Naval History Center

ROBERT NEYLAND