Europe, where he mingled with other literary Americans including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and fellow New Yorker Washington Irving, a lifelong friend. Mackenzie's first work, A Year in Spain, by a Young American (1829), made him known in America as well as in England. Other works followed: Popular Essays on Naval Subjects (1833), The American in England (1835), Spain Revisited (1836), Life of John Paul Jones (1841), Life of Commodore Oliver H. Perry (1841), and Life of Commodore Stephen Decatur (1846). Mackenzie also wrote a manuscript, A Journal of a Tour in Ireland, The Case of the 'Seiners'''; "Defence of A. S. Mackenzie", 1843. Personal life Mackenzie married Catherine Alexander Robinson (b. 1814), eldest daughter of Morris Robinson, a founder of the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York. Together, they were the parents of: General Ranald Slidell Mackenzie, who, after a successful Civil War career, commanded the 4th Cavalry Regiment (United States), securing the line of settlement in Texas and throughout the West. Ranald Mackenzie was arguably the best Indian fighter of the American West. Another son was Lieutenant Commander Alexander Slidell MacKenzie. According to a letter written by Captain D.W. Knox, USN (ret.) on July 1, 1938, in response to a query to the Department of the Navy, "Commander MacKenzie died suddenly September 13, 1848, at his residence, near Tarrytown, N.Y., of heart disease. The Department was notified of his death on September 14, by Captain Isaac McKeever, Commandant at New York, who stated that he had been informed of it by Commodore Matthew C. Perry." He was a resident of Scarborough, New York. Published works Mackenzie, Alexander Slidell. (1915) Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry : famous American naval hero, victor of the battle of Lake Erie, his life and achievements (Akron, Ohio: Superior Printing Co.) Mackenzie, Alexander Slidell (1840) The life of Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry. (New York, Harper) Volume 1, Volume 2. See also Alexander Slidell MacKenzie, Jr. Civil War Officer References Further reading Morison, Samuel Eliot, "Old Bruin": Commodore Matthew C. Perry, 1794-1858 (1967) pp 144–62; strongly defends MacKenzie. McFarland, Philip Sea Dangers: The Affair of the Somers'' (New York: Schocken Books, 1985), 308p., illus. 1803 births 1848 deaths United States Navy officers United States Navy personnel who were court-martialed American naval historians American male non-fiction writers People from Briarcliff Manor, New York Historians from New York (state)