Gustavus Vasa Fox had, among the men of his day, the reputation of being a great man, yet he occupied a minor position, and the only expedition that he commanded—namely, the expedition for the relief of Fort Sumter—failed, although through no fault of his own. But he commanded the boat that brought away the embattled garrison from that fort. The great value and interest of these letters are that they were written in confidence during a time of great national peril—the American Civil War. Fox is frank about his hopes and anxieties, his opinions of the talents of other men, and the overwhelming events of his day. As a sailor in the Mexican-American War he served in the brig Washington in the squadron of Commodore Matthew Perry. He knew and understood the technology of his era and when Civil War came, he was brought into the administration of Abraham Lincoln as Assistant Secretary of the Navy under Gideon Welles.