author
Samuel Dana Greene
1839–1884
Best remembered for his service aboard the USS Monitor, he left behind one of the vivid firsthand accounts of the famous clash between Monitor and CSS Virginia. His life joined Civil War action at sea with a later naval career that lasted until his death in 1884.
1 Audiobook
The Monitor and the Merrimac : Both sides of the story
by John Lorimer Worden, Samuel Dana Greene, H. Ashton Ramsay, Eugene Winslow Watson
About the author
Born in Cumberland, Maryland, in 1839, he entered the United States Naval Academy in 1855 and graduated in 1859. During the Civil War he became executive officer of the ironclad USS Monitor, the ship at the center of the Battle of Hampton Roads.
When Captain John L. Worden was wounded during the battle on March 9, 1862, Greene took command. He later wrote a detailed letter describing the fight, and that eyewitness account helped preserve the drama and significance of one of the most important naval engagements of the war.
Greene remained in the U.S. Navy after the war, rising to the rank of commander. Although he is not chiefly remembered as a literary figure, his surviving account of the Monitor has made his voice part of Civil War history as well as naval history.