Europe, the first port they reached was in Liverpool where a joyous reunion took place. Although T.R. at first seem to show no interest in his uncle's exploits, he was no johnny-come-lately to naval topics and history. In fact, Bulloch's nephew's childhood had been filled with stories told him by Bulloch's sister, Mittie. T.R. would write that his mother used "to talk to me as a little shaver about ships, ships, ships and the fighting of ships, until they sank into the depths of my soul." Both uncles were denied entrance to USA, but through family influence they entered through Canada and visited their sister Mittie. Filled with his mother and uncle's stories, by the time T.R. went to Harvard, he was already dreaming of writing a book on a neglected aspect of American military history, the role played by the U.S. Navy during the War of 1812. Indeed, right in the middle of classes on mathematics at Harvard, (Morris TR Vol 1, 565) T.R.'s mind would wander from his tedious course work to the accomplishments of the infant U.S. Navy, the clash of the "fighting tops". When T.R.'s father took the family on their grand tour in 1869, TR spent time with those uncles in Liverpool, their first port of call on the trip. When T.R. graduated from Harvard, he published his first book, the excellent story of the U.S. Navy's origins and actions in the War of 1812 called The Naval War of 1812, which, in part, was an outgrowth of the influence of his two Bulloch uncles and the more direct influence of Irvine's brother, James. Military service Irvine and his elder half-brother James Dunwoody Bulloch, who had served in the U.S. Navy for 14 years before joining a private shipping company, were both seafaring men. When the Southern states left the Union and the Civil War began in 1861, one of the first Union acts was to begin a strangling naval blockade on the Confederacy. With these developments, the two brothers decided to serve the southern cause. In 1861, Irvine Bulloch became a midshipman on the CSS Alabama, its construction having been arranged by James D. Bulloch and a secret purchase made by the Confederacy, to use the ship as a raider to prey upon Union shipping. Irvine fought against the U.S. government long after the surrender of General Lee. He fired the last gun on