1. USS Monitor: A Historic Ship Completes Its Final Voyage by John D. Broadwater (TAMU Pr, 2012).
Monitor books have been published in great numbers, but this heavily illustrated history of the discovery, recovery, and preservation of pieces of the vessel (most prominently, the turret), as well as the creation of the national marine sanctuary, is the work of an NOAA archaeologist with a leadership role in these projects since 1974.
2. The Peninsula Campaign and the Necessity of Emancipation: African Americans and the Fight for Freedom by Glenn David Brasher (UNC Pr, 2012).
Brasher argues that the contributions of Virginia blacks to the 1862 Peninsula Campaign not only shaped military events directly but were central to advancing the viewpoint of emancipation as a national strategic necessity.