When the British invaded Washington in 1814, this collection, containing the finest works on naval history from America and abroad, was rushed to safety outside the Federal City.

Six years later, the United States Congress appropriated the funds to print the first volume in a monumental documentary series, Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion.

Completed in 1927 with the publication of volume 31, the series marked the beginning of a commitment to collect, edit, and publish historical naval documents, a mission that the History Command continues to carry out in its American Revolution and War of 1812 documentary projects.

When the war ended, Admiral Sims' London collection and photographs and new motion pictures from the various Navy bureaus were transferred to the Historical Section.

In 1921, a former member of Admiral Sims' wartime staff, Captain Dudley W. Knox, was named head of the Office of Naval Records and Library and the Historical Section.

For the next twenty-five years, he was the driving force behind the Navy's historical program, earning for the office an international reputation in the field of naval archives and history.

He immediately began a campaign to gather and arrange operation plans, action reports, and war diaries into well-controlled archives staffed by professional historians who came on board as naval reservists.

Ten official Navy museums are dedicated to making available the artifacts, documents, and art that best embody U.S. naval history and heritage for present and future generations.

Their collection effort contributes to the Navy's lessons learned and preserves the history of current naval operations during crisis response, wartime, declared national emergency, or in situations as directed.

Teams have documented the Navy's role in the Persian Gulf War, Operation Restore Hope (Haiti) and Operation Allied Force (Kosovo); counter-narcotics actions in the Caribbean; fleet exercises, special warfare activities, Information Technology (IT-21); the attack on, and the rebuilding of USS Cole (DDG-67); the 11 September 2001 attack on the Pentagon; and the Global War on Terrorism.

For Operation Iraqi Freedom and in support of the Navy's Task Force History, four unit members were recalled to active duty.

Media related to Naval History and Heritage Command at Wikimedia Commons This article incorporates public domain material from the United States Navy