Barnes, James, 1866-1936

American author and historian.

James Barnes was a writer and military historian who lived in Princeton, New Jersey. Born in 1866, Barnes graduated from Princeton University in 1891 and served in the Spanish-American War and World War I. During World War I, he was head of the head of the Princeton Aviation School. He also worked for Scribner's Magazine, was assistant editor of Harper's Weekly, war correspondent for The Outlook in South Africa, and from 1905 to 1908 was editor of Appleton's Booklover's Magazine. Barnes authored a number of books, including For King or Country (1896), Naval Actions of 1812 (1896), A Princetonian (1896), Commodore Bainbridge (1912), Yankee Ships and Yankee Sailors (1898), David G. Farragut (1899), Drake and His Yeomen (1899), The Giant of Three Wars (1903), The Unpardonable War (1904), The Blockaders (1905), Outside the Law (1906), The Clutch of Circumstance (1908), Rifle and Caravan (1912), and Through Central Africa from Coast to Coast (1915). He later served as president of the Naval History Society of America. Barnes died in 1936.

The son of John Sanford Barnes, James Barnes was an editor and newspaper correspondent. He served as president and on the Board of Managers of the Naval History Society, to which he donated his father's collection of naval materials in 1915.