Gideon Welles

Gideon Welles (July 1, 1802 – February 11, 1878) was the United States Secretary of the Navy from 1861 to 1869. His buildup of the Navy to successfully execute blockades of Southern ports was a key component of Northern victory of the Civil War. Welles was also instrumental in the Navy's creation of the Medal of Honor.

Read more about Gideon Welles:  Biography, Tenure in Lincoln's Cabinet, Tenure in Johnson's Cabinet, Later Life and Death, The Diary of Gideon Welles, Posthumous Dedications, Trivia

Famous quotes containing the word welles:

    In Italy for thirty years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed—they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did they produce? The cuckoo clock!
    —Orson Welles (1915–84)