In Maritime Power and the Struggle for Freedom, Peter Padfield presents a superb description and analysis of naval campaigns, conducted between 1788 and 1851, that shaped the modern world. This is the second of Padfield's masterful trilogy that traces the impact of naval power on modern history, and the means by which it has been enacted. The book combines vivid and engrossing descriptions of historically important events with careful analysis and...

In this outstanding book, naval historian Peter Padfield explores the ways in which maritime strength has influenced political power from the mid-nineteenth century to the modern age. Freedom of expression and individual enterprise have distinguished the societies of powers dominant at sea, and since supreme maritime nations have prevailed over their territorial rivals in the great wars of the modern era, it is they who have created today's world. In...