A standing "Navy Royal", with its own secretariat, dockyards and a permanent core of purpose-built warships, emerged during the reign of Henry VIII. Under Elizabeth I England became involved in a war with Spain, which saw privately owned vessels combining with the Queen's ships in highly profitable raids against Spanish commerce and colonies. The Royal Navy was then used in 1588 to repulse the Spanish Armada. In 1603, the Union of the Crowns created a personal union between England and Scotland. While the two remained distinct sovereign states for a further century, the two navies increasingly fought as a single force.
Age of Sail
Royal Navy
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
During the reign of Henry VIII. Sorry. I cannot find the answer based on the context. 1588 During the reign of Henry VIII
what was one of the provisions of the petition of right (1628)
user
No person should be forced to provide a gift, loan or tax without an Act of Parliament.
assistant
what does the term "petition of right" refer to?
user
It is an English constitutional document setting out specific individual protections against the state.
assistant
who formulated it?
user
Charles I
assistant
what kinds of provisions does it have?
user
No person should be forced to provide a gift, loan or tax without an Act of Parliament. No free individual should be imprisoned or detained unless a cause has been shown. Soldiers or members of the Royal Navy should not be billeted in private houses without the free consent of the owner.
assistant
which period marked the age of sail for the navy mentioned above?
user
The peace settlement following the War of the Spanish Succession (1702–1714) granted Britain Gibraltar and Menorca, providing the Navy with Mediterranean bases. A new French attempt to invade Britain was thwarted by the defeat of their escort fleet in the extraordinary Battle of Quiberon Bay in 1759, fought in dangerous conditions. In 1762 the resumption of hostilities with Spain led to the British capture of Manila and of Havana, along with a Spanish fleet sheltering there. British naval supremacy could however be challenged still in this period by coalitions of other nations, as seen in the American War of Independence.
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
The books draw data from Admiralty official records to give details on the location of construction, dates of construction (ordering, keel laying, launch, commissioning and completion of fitting-out), principal dimensions and tonnage, complement of men and armament, machinery (for steam vessels) and fate of every ship of the Royal Navy over the period. Designed dimensions and tonnage are given for every class of vessel planned and built for the Navy, but in addition the actual dimensions measured for each individual vessel completed to those designs are separately given; this treatment has also been applied to the many vessels purchased or captured by British naval forces, and added to the service.
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Scope
Rebel colonists were supported by France, Spain and the Netherlands against Britain. In the Battle of the Chesapeake, the British fleet failed to lift the French blockade, resulting in Cornwallis's surrender at Yorktown. The French Revolutionary Wars (1793–1801) and Napoleonic Wars (1803–1814 & 1815) saw the Royal Navy reach a peak of efficiency, dominating the navies of all Britain's adversaries, which spent most of the war blockaded in port. Under Admiral Nelson, the navy defeated the combined Franco-Spanish fleet at Trafalgar (1805).
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
A standing "Navy Royal", with its own secretariat, dockyards and a permanent core of purpose-built warships, emerged during the reign of Henry VIII. Under Elizabeth I England became involved in a war with Spain, which saw privately owned vessels combining with the Queen's ships in highly profitable raids against Spanish commerce and colonies. The Royal Navy was then used in 1588 to repulse the Spanish Armada. In 1603, the Union of the Crowns created a personal union between England and Scotland. While the two remained distinct sovereign states for a further century, the two navies increasingly fought as a single force.
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
The 1660 Restoration saw Charles II rename the Royal Navy again, and started use of the prefix HMS. The navy however remained a national institution and not a possession of the crown as it had been before. Following the Glorious Revolution of 1688, England joined the War of the Grand Alliance which marked the end of France's brief pre-eminence at sea and the beginning of an enduring British supremacy. In 1707, the Kingdom of Great Britain was formed by the Act of Union, which had the effect of merging the Scottish navy into the Royal Navy. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, the Royal Navy was the largest maritime force in the world, maintaining superiority in financing, tactics, training, organisation, social cohesion, hygiene, logistical support and warship design.
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
During the early 17th century, England's relative naval power deteriorated until Charles I undertook a major programme of shipbuilding. His methods of financing the fleet however contributed to the outbreak of the English Civil War, and the abolition of the monarchy. The Commonwealth of England replaced many names and symbols in the new commonwealth navy, associated with royalty and the high church, and expanded it to become the most powerful in the world. The fleet was quickly tested in the First Anglo-Dutch War (1652–1654) and the Anglo-Spanish War (1654-1660), which saw the conquest of Jamaica and successful attacks on Spanish treasure fleets.
Royal Navy | Age of Sail
The age of sail mostly coincided with the age of discovery, from the 15th to the 18th century. After the 17th century, English naval maps stopped using the term of British Sea for the English Channel. From 15th to the 18th centuries, the period saw square rigged sailing ships carry European settlers to many parts of the world in one of the most important human migrations in recorded history. This period was marked by extensive exploration and colonization efforts on the part of European kingdoms. The sextant, developed in the 18th century, made more accurate charting of nautical position possible.
Maritime history | Age of Sail
British Warships in the Age of Sail is a series of four books by maritime historian Rif Winfield comprising a historical reference work providing details of all recorded ships that served or were intended to serve in the Royal Navy from 1603 to 1863. Similar volumes dealing with other navies during the Age of Sail have followed from the same publisher.
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Introduction
For more data on the ships of the pre-1863 British Navy, see "British Warships in the Age of Sail".
Ships of the Royal Navy | Introduction
During this period, naval warfare underwent a comprehensive transformation, brought about by steam propulsion, metal ship construction, and explosive munitions. These changes marked the end of the age of sail and construction techniques that had dominated the preceding century. Despite having to completely replace its war fleet, the Navy managed to maintain its overwhelming advantage over all potential rivals. Due to British leadership in the Industrial Revolution, the country enjoyed unparalleled shipbuilding capacity and financial resources, which ensured that no rival could take advantage of these revolutionary changes to negate the British advantage in ship numbers. Steam power was of interest to the Royal Navy from the beginning of the 19th century, since it neatly solved the difficult and dangerous sailing problems encountered in estuaries and other inshore areas.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Technology
The Age of Sail (usually dated as 1571–1862) was a period roughly corresponding to the early modern period in which international trade and naval warfare were dominated by sailing ships and gunpowder warfare, lasting from the mid-16th to the mid-19th centuries.
Age of Sail | Introduction
The Sail and Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815–1889 by Rif Winfield and David Lyon is a historical reference work providing details of all recorded ships in commission or intended to serve in the Royal Navy from 1815 to 1889. Where available in Admiralty records (from which all the data is sourced), it gives the location of construction, dates of construction (ordering, keel laying, launch and commissioning), principal dimensions and tonnage, armament, machinery (for steam vessels) and fate of every ship of the Royal Navy over the period. David Lyon's "The Sailing Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy, Built, Purchased and Captured, 1688-1860" had been published in 1993, a ground-breaking study of the sailing vessels of the Royal Navy from the Glorious Revolution of 1688 until the close of the Age of Sail.
The Sail and Steam Navy List | Introduction
Rif Winfield's subsequent four-volume "British Warships in the Age of Sail" series has expanded this material to incorporate all vessels of the British (before 1704, English) Navy between 1603 and 1863, and incorporated the results of extra research since the publication of their "Sail and Steam Navy List".
The Sail and Steam Navy List | Introduction
During the Age of Sail, the Royal Navy manned its ships either by recruitment or impressment; crew were retained for as long as they were needed and then usually dismissed when their ship was paid off at the end of a voyage or campaign. The introduction of Long Term Service in 1853, however, prompted the Navy to look at providing more permanent quarters for seamen in home waters. At first, they were almost invariably housed in hulks; it was only towards the end of the century that purpose-built barracks began to be constructed at each of the three principal Royal Navy Dockyards: Chatham, Devonport and Portsmouth.
Royal Naval Barracks, Chatham | History
The costs of building and fitting out each vessel are given (where known), as well as the costs and dates of major refits during each ship's life. Also included are details of their commanders with dates when each served, areas and periods of service, and significant actions in which the ships took part. Each volume contains details of over two thousand separate vessels, and is illustrated by approximately two hundred black-and-white renditions of the design draughts, contemporary portrayals and other depictions of most classes of vessel covered.
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Scope
One of the highest positions for a boy was that of "officer's servant". This position was usually reserved for "young gentlemen" who joined a ship between the ages of 12 and 15 and was seen as a preparatory to becoming a midshipman. Prior service as a ship's boy was recorded as sea-service; officers' servants could further credit their sea time towards the mandatory requirement for sea time in order to attempt the Lieutenants' Commission Board. After the Age of Sail ended, the position of ship's boy became an actual Royal Navy rank known as "Boy seaman".
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Minors in the Royal Navy
A unique readiness condition of some Royal Navy vessels was known as "in ordinary". Such vessels were usually permanently moored with masts and sails removed and manned only by a skeleton crew. In ordinary vessels did not maintain full watch sections and were normally maintained as receiving ships, shore barges, or prison ships.
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Quarters and stations
Before the advent of the all-steel navy in the late 19th century, a capital ship during the Age of Sail was generally understood as a ship that conformed to the Royal Navy's rating system of a ship of the line as being of the first, second, third or fourth rates: Frigates were ships of the fifth rate; sixth rates comprised small frigates and corvettes. Towards the end of the Napoleonic Wars and into the late 19th century, some larger and more powerful frigates were classified as fourth rates.
Capital ship | Age of Sail
a. O'Byrne has the acting-lieutenancy accompanied with a posting to a 50-gun ship named "Gratton". No ship of this name appears in J. J. Colledge's "Ships of the Royal Navy", nor Rif Winfield's "British Warships in the Age of Sail: 1714-1792". This may be , which was in the West Indies at the time, though she was a 74-gun ship.
William Young (Royal Navy officer, born 1761) | Notes
The series on British Warships have been followed by companion volumes covering other Naval forces on the sailing era. The above-mentioned volumes dealing with Russian and French warships - like the equivalent (fourth) volume in the "British Warships" series - also cover steam-powered (both paddle-driven and screw-driven) warships constructed for those navies in the same period. Other volumes are in preparation, including one on Spanish Warships in the Age of Sail 1700-1860 (by Rif Winfield, John M. Tredrea and Enrique García-Torralba Pérez).
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Similar volumes on other Navies
The Glorious Revolution of 1688 rearranged the political map of Europe, and led to a series of wars with France that lasted well over a century. This was the classic age of sail; while the ships themselves evolved in only minor ways, technique and tactics were honed to a high degree, and the battles of the Napoleonic Wars entailed feats that would have been impossible for the fleets of the 17th century. Because of parliamentary opposition, James II fled the country. The landing of William III and the Glorious Revolution itself was a gigantic effort involving 100 warships and 400 transports carrying 11,000 infantry and 4,000 horses.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Glorious Revolution and capture of Gibraltar 1688–1707
Like most periodic eras the definition is inexact and close enough to serve as a general description. The age of sail runs roughly from the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, the last significant engagement in which oar-propelled galleys played a major role, to the Battle of Hampton Roads in 1862, in which the steam-powered destroyed the sailing ships and , finally culminating with the advance of steam power, rendering sail power obsolete.
Maritime history | End of the sail
The series comprises four volumes; the fourth volume in this series, covering the period 1817–1863, includes coverage of all steam-powered warships of this era (paddle-driven as well as screw-driven) as well as purely sailing vessels. The first of the series to be produced, the 1793–1817 volume, was first published in 2005 by Chatham Publishing. The remaining titles, and an updated edition of the 1793–1817 volume, have been published by Seaforth Publishing: Pending availability of the fourth volume in the series, sailing warships after 1817 were covered (in somewhat less detail) by "The Sail and Steam Navy List, 1815–1889", by David Lyon and Rif Winfield.
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Series
Like most periodic eras, the definition is inexact but instead serves as a general description. The age of sail runs roughly from the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, the last significant engagement in which oar-propelled galleys played a major role, to the Battle of Hampton Roads in 1862, in which the steam-powered ironclad CSS "Virginia" destroyed the sailing ships USS "Cumberland" and USS "Congress", demonstrating that the advance of steam power had rendered sail power in warfare obsolete. The Suez Canal, in the Middle-East, which opened in 1869, was impractical for sailing ships and made steamboats faster on the European-Asian sea route.
Age of Sail | Definition
The lists for the Tudor period are taken primarily from Arthur Nelson's "The Tudor Navy" and David Childs's "Tudor Sea Power" (cited in references at the end of this article).
List of early warships of the English navy | List of English warships 1485–1603
For other sources for Admiral Nelson see Royal Navy
Bibliography of 18th–19th century Royal Naval history | <a href="Admiral%20Nelson">Admiral Nelson</a>
While only used sparingly during the Napoleonic Wars, fire ships as a distinct class were part of the British Royal Navy until 1808, at which point the use of permanently designated fire ships attached to British squadrons disappeared. Fire ships continued to be used, sometimes to great effect, such as by the U.S. Navy at the Battle of Tripoli Harbor in 1804 and by the British Navy's Thomas Cochrane at the Battle of the Basque Roads in 1809, but for the most part they were considered an obsolete weapon by the early 19th century. Warships of the age of sail were highly vulnerable to fire.
Fire ship | Age of fighting sail, refinement
Since the Spanish Armament of 1790, the Royal Navy had been at sea in a state of readiness for over three years. The Navy's dockyards under First Lord of the Admiralty Charles Middleton were all fully fitted and prepared for conflict. This was quite unlike the disasters of the American Revolutionary War ten years earlier, when an ill-prepared Royal Navy had taken too long to reach full effectiveness and was consequently unable to support the North American campaign—which ended in defeat at the Battle of Yorktown due to lack of supplies. With British dockyards now readily turning out cannon, shot, sails, provisions and other essential equipment, the only remaining problem was that of manning the several hundred ships on the Navy list.
Glorious First of June | Royal Navy
The game covered the naval campaigns of the French Revolutionary Wars, Napoleonic Wars and other more minor conflicts in the period 1775 to 1820. In addition to the campaigns there are more than 100 independent scenarios based on significant naval actions including the battles of Trafalgar and Camperdown. The game includes a scenario editor with over 2,000 historically accurate sailing ships allowing the extension of the game by the user.
Age of Sail (video game) | Gameplay
Reviewing the 1793–1817 work, the "Journal for Maritime Research" wrote that 'It is well-researched, well-presented, easy to navigate and exhaustive in its coverage. It is a reference work that will be used by students and scholars of the sailing Navy for years to come.' When reviewing the 1714–1792 volume, the second work to be published, the South West Maritime History Society described it as 'frankly quite superb', and 'the most complete analysis of the ships of the Royal Navy ever prepared.' The third volume to be produced, covering 1603-1714, was likewise described by the South West Maritime History Society as 'In a single word "SUPERLATIVE"' and 'This book is frankly quite superb and deserves to be included in the library of anyone interested in this period of maritime history.'
British Warships in the Age of Sail | Reception
The original Royal Naval College closed in 1837, after which the only method for training midshipmen in the Royal Navy was aboard ships. In 1844 the rank of naval cadet was created, and to qualify as a midshipman a candidate had to be 14 years old, successfully pass an admiralty examination and have two years of service as a naval cadet or three years of service in the Navy. A decline in qualified officers prompted the Navy to order training in a ship at anchor for all cadets, which began in 1857 aboard HMS "Illustrious", which was replaced by HMS "Britannia" in 1859.
Midshipman | Royal Navy from 1836
The Royal Navy impressed many merchant sailors, as well as some sailors from other, mostly European, nations. People liable to impressment were "eligible men of seafaring habits between the ages of 18 and 55 years". Non-seamen were sometimes impressed as well, though rarely. Impressment was strongly criticized by those who believed it to be contrary to the British constitution; unlike many of its continental rivals at the time, British subjects were not subject to conscription for military service, with the exception of a brief experiment with army impressment from 1778 to 1780. Though the public opposed conscription in general, impressment was repeatedly upheld by the courts, as it was deemed vital to the strength of the navy and, by extension, to the survival of the British influence and realm.
Impressment | Introduction
Naval artillery in the Age of Sail encompasses the period of roughly 1571–1862: when large, sail-powered wooden naval warships dominated the high seas, mounting a bewildering variety of different types and sizes of cannon as their main armament. By modern standards, these cannon were extremely inefficient, difficult to load, and short ranged. These characteristics, along with the handling and seamanship of the ships that mounted them, defined the environment in which the naval tactics in the Age of Sail developed.
Naval artillery in the Age of Sail | Introduction
Six of their vessels were captured off Plymouth in July 1556. In 1580 Spanish and Portuguese troops were sent to Ireland, but were defeated by an English army and naval force.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Tudor, 1485–1603
During the Age of Sail, ships were identified by figureheads and gilded carvings. However, the extravagance of these decorations began to reach the point of flamboyance, and an Admiralty directive in the early 18th century restricted the amount that could be spent, and eventually banned it outright. Ships' badges first appeared in the 1850s, as identification markings on the stationery used by some Royal Navy ships. These marks were quickly used to mark the boats assigned to a ship, to aid crew in finding their boat at a dark or crowded wharf. The creation of badges was haphazard, and eventually came into use for the ships themselves.
Naval heraldry | Royal Navy
The age of naval dominance at low cost was ended by increased naval competition from old rivals, such as France, and new ones such as Imperial Germany and Japan. These challenges were reflected by the Naval Defence Act 1889, which received the Royal Assent on 31 May 1889, to increase the United Kingdom's naval strength and formally adopt the country's "two-power standard". The standard called for the Royal Navy to be as strong as the world's next two largest navies combined (at that point, France and Russia) by maintaining a number of battleships at least equal to their combined strength.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Two-power standard
The London Naval Treaty of 1930 deferred new capital ship construction until 1937 and reiterated construction limits on cruisers, destroyers and submarines. As international tensions increased in the mid-thirties, the Second London Naval Treaty of 1936 failed to halt the development of a naval arms race and by 1938 treaty limits were effectively ignored. The re-armament of the Royal Navy was well under way by this point; the Royal Navy had constructed the "King George V" class of 1936 and several aircraft carriers including . In addition to new construction, several existing battleships, battlecruisers and heavy cruisers were re-constructed and new anti-aircraft weaponry reinforced.
Maritime history of the United Kingdom | Twentieth-century navy
Enlisted sailors had no established uniform, but were often issued standardised clothing by the ship on which they served to create a uniform appearance among seaman.
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Chronology of uniforms
Before the creation of the Royal Navy, the English navy had no defined moment of formation; it started out as a motley assortment of "King's ships" during the Middle Ages assembled only as needed and then dispersed, began to take shape as a standing navy during the 16th century, and became a regular establishment during the tumults of the 17th century.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Introduction
As the age of steam eclipsed the age of sail, Coaling Yards were established alongside several yards, and at strategic points around the globe. In addition to naval personnel and civilian workers, there were substantial numbers of military quartered in the vicinity of the Royal Dockyards. These were there to ensure the defence of the yard and its ships. From the 1750s, naval yards in Britain were surrounded by 'lines' (fortifications) with barracks provided for the soldiers manning them. A century later these 'lines' were superseded by networks of Palmerston Forts. Overseas yards also usually had some fort or similar structure provided and manned nearby.
Royal Navy Dockyard | Associated establishments
This list includes several earlier ships which were "rebuilt" for the Royal Navy in this period—specifically the first-rate "Prince Royal" (in 1663), the second-rate "Victory" (in 1666), the third-rate "Montague" (in 1675) and the fourth-rates "Bonaventure" (in 1663) and "Constant Warwick" (in 1666). The process, which generally involved the dismantling in dry dock of the old ship and constructing it to a new design incorporating part of the materials from the old vessel, produced what were in effect substantially new ships with altered dimensions and sizes, and generally mounting a somewhat larger number of guns. The above list excludes two smaller fourth-rates not designed for the line of battle—the galley-frigates "Charles Galley" and "James Galley" of 1676.
List of ships of the line of the Royal Navy | The early Restoration period (1660–77)
The Restoration of the English monarchy occurred in May 1660, and Charles II assumed the throne. The Restoration Monarchy inherited this large navy and continued the same policy of expansion, focusing on large ships in order to provide a strong defence under Charles II. At the start of the Restoration, Parliament listed forty ships of the Royal Navy (not of the Summer's Guard) with a complement of 3,695 sailors. One of his first acts was to officially name the Royal Navy, The prefix HMS was also officially attached to its vessels for the first time. Nevertheless, the navy remained a national institution, rather than the personal possession of the reigning monarch, as it had been before the civil war.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Restoration (1660-1688)
This is a list of early warships belonging to the English sovereign or the English Government, the precursor to the Royal Navy of England (from 1707 of Great Britain, and subsequently of the United Kingdom). These include major and minor warships from 1485 until 1660, the latter being the year in which the Royal Navy came formally into existence with the Restoration of Charles II (before the Interregnum, English warships had been the personal property of the monarch and were collectively termed "the king's ships"). Between Charles I's execution in 1649 and the Restoration eleven years later, the Navy became the property of the state (Commonwealth and Protectorate), under which it expanded dramatically in size.
List of early warships of the English navy | Introduction
Now listed as part of the National Historic Fleet, following her recent restoration "Trincomalee" has become the centrepiece of the National Museum of the Royal Navy based in Hartlepool. "Trincomalee" holds the distinction of being the oldest British warship still afloat as , although 52 years her senior, is in dry dock. Until his death in 1929, the Falmouth-based painter Henry Scott Tuke used the ship and its trainees as subject matter.
HMS Trincomalee | Later years
In the 18th century Royal Navy, rank and position on board ship was defined by a mix of two hierarchies, an official hierarchy of ranks and a conventionally recognized social divide between gentlemen and non-gentlemen. Royal Navy ships were led by commissioned officers of the wardroom, which consisted of the captain, his lieutenants, as well as embarked Royal Marine officers, all of whom were officers and gentlemen. The higher ranked warrant officers on board, the Sailing Master, Purser, Surgeon and Chaplain held a warrant from the Navy Board but not an actual commission from the crown. Warrant officers had rights to mess and berth in the wardroom and were normally considered gentlemen; however, the Sailing Master was often a former sailor who had "come through the ranks" therefore might have been viewed as a social unequal.
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Shipboard hierarchy
In numeric terms the Royal Navy has significantly reduced in size since the 1960s, reflecting the reducing requirement of the state. This raw figure does not take into account the increase in technological capability of the Navy's ships, but it does show the general reduction of capacity. The following table is a breakdown of the fleet numbers since 1960. The separate types of ship and how their numbers have changed are shown.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Trends in ship strength
This led to changes with the pay cuts reduced to 10%, though around 200 sailors were jailed in the aftermath.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Disarmament and pay cuts, 1922-1935
Under the Acts of Union 1707 in 1707 the Royal Scots Navy merged with the English navy and the British Royal Navy came into being. The early 18th century saw the Royal Navy with more ships than other navies. Although it suffered severe financial problems through the earlier part of this period, modern methods of financing government, and in particular the Navy, were developed, This financing enabled the Navy to become the most powerful force of the later 18th century without bankrupting the country. The Napoleonic Wars saw the Royal Navy reach a peak of efficiency, dominating the navies of all Britain's adversaries.
Maritime history of the United Kingdom | Eighteenth-century navy
In recent years, pay raises had also been granted to the army, militia, and naval officers. At the same time, the practice of coppering the submerged part of hulls, which had started in 1761, meant that British warships no longer had to return to port frequently to have their hulls scraped, and the additional time at sea significantly altered the rhythm and difficulty of seamen's work. The Royal Navy had not made adjustments for any of these changes, and was slow to understand their effects on its crews. Finally, the new wartime quota system meant that crews had many landsmen from inshore who did not mix well with the career seamen, leading to discontented ships' companies.
Spithead and Nore mutinies | Spithead
He had planned a follow-up on the ships of the Royal Navy in the era of transition from sail to steam power, and began work in preparation for that volume. This was cut short by his death in a diving accident during 2000 in the Bahamas (he was an enthusiastic underwater archaeologist). Shortly after his death, his colleague Rif Winfield, author of the best-selling "Fifty Gun Ship", and subsequently the author of a series of volumes under the heading "British Warships in the Age of Sail", took over David's accumulated notes, added them to his own extensive research on Royal Naval warships, and carried on this work to produce what the "Journal for Maritime Research" described as The book is a valuable reference work and the only complete single-volume published record for ships of the late Georgian era (1714-1837) and of the early (1837-1860) and middle (1860-1889) Victorian Royal Navy.
The Sail and Steam Navy List | Introduction
Promotion and advancement within the 18th and 19th century Royal Navy varied depending on the status of the sailor in question. At the lower levels, most inexperienced sailors began in the rank of landsman – those joining ships at a very young age were typically entered in the navy as cabin boys or officers' servants. After a year at sea, landsmen were normally advanced to ordinary seaman. Three more years, with appropriate ability displayed, would see a sailor advanced to able seaman. For the "common seaman", this level is where the career path usually ended, and many sailors spent their entire Royal Navy careers as able seaman on various vessels.
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Promotion and advancement
In 1814, only 1 out of 14 American merchantmen risked leaving port as a high probability that any ship leaving port would be seized.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | War of 1812
The United Kingdom possessed the largest navy in the world for the whole of the ironclad period. The Royal Navy was the second to adopt ironclad warships, and it applied them worldwide in their whole range of roles. In the age of sail, the British strategy for war depended on the Royal Navy mounting a blockade of the ports of the enemy. Because of the limited endurance of steamships, this was no longer possible, so the British at times considered the risk-laden plan of engaging an enemy fleet in harbor as soon as war broke out. To this end, the Royal Navy developed a series of 'coast-defence battleships', starting with the "Devastation" class.
Ironclad warship | Navies
This Bibliography covers sources for Royal Navy history through the 18th and 19th centuries. Some sources may be duplicated in sections when appropriate. Among the contemporary and earlier historical accounts are , historical accounts, often derived from letters, dispatches, government and military records, captain's logs and diaries, etc., by people involved in or closely associated to the historical episode in question. Primary source material is either written by these people or often collected, compiled, and/or written and published by other editors also, sometimes many years after the historical subject has passed. Primary sources listed in this bibliography are denoted with an uppercase bold ' (P) before the book title.
Bibliography of 18th–19th century Royal Naval history | Introduction
Although there is no evidence for a conscious change of policy, Henry soon embarked on a programme of building larger ships than previously. He also invested in dockyards, and commissioned the oldest surviving dry dock in 1495 at Portsmouth.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Houses of Lancaster and York (1399-1485)
Working and living conditions for the average sailor in the Royal Navy in the 18th century were very harsh by modern standards. Naval pay was attractive in the 1750s, but towards the end of the century its value had been steadily eroded by rising prices. Sailors' pay on merchant ships was somewhat higher during peacetime, and could increase to double naval pay during wartime. Until 19th-century reforms improved conditions, the Royal Navy was additionally known to pay wages up to two years in arrears, and it always withheld six months' pay as standard in order to discourage desertion. Naval wages had been set in 1653, and were not increased until April 1797 after sailors on 80 ships of the Channel Fleet based at Spithead mutinied.
Impressment | Royal Navy recruiting and desertion
He was appointed foreman of works with the Works Department of the British Royal Navy, responsible for development of the strategic Royal Naval Dockyard, Bermuda. By the time the first phase of development was complete, in the 1860s, the convict establishment was no longer seen as politically expedient. The last convicts were withdrawn in 1863, returned to Britain on the Bermudian merchant clipper, "Cedrine" (which was wrecked on the Isle of Wight, on its maiden voyage, costing Captain Thomas Melville Dill, grandfather of the parliamentarian and Attorney General of the same name, his Master's certificate).
Royal Naval Dockyard, Bermuda | 19th century
Ships built for the Royal Navy included: These ships were all armour-clad with a tonnage of 26,938 tons and the engines together represent 5,450 horsepower
Robert Napier and Sons | Royal Navy
Sail yielded to steam and cannon supplanted by large shell-firing guns, and ending with the race to construct bigger and better battleships. That race, however, was ultimately a dead end, as aircraft carriers and submarines came to the fore and, after the successes of World War II, the Royal Navy yielded its formerly preeminent place to the United States Navy. The Royal Navy has remained one of the world's most capable navies and currently operates a fleet of modern ships, though the size of the fleet has declined significantly since the 1980s.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Introduction
As international tensions increased in the mid-1930s the Second London Naval Treaty of 1935 failed to halt the development of a naval arms race and by 1938 treaty limits were effectively ignored. The re-armament of the Royal Navy was well under way by this point, with construction underway on the still treaty-affected new battleships and its first full-sized purpose-built aircraft carriers. In addition to new construction, several existing old battleships, battlecruisers and heavy cruisers were reconstructed, and anti-aircraft weaponry reinforced, while new technologies, such as ASDIC, Huff-Duff and hydrophones, were developed. The Navy had lost control of naval aviation when the Royal Naval Air Service was merged with the Royal Flying Corps to form the Royal Air Force in 1918, but regained control of ship-board aircraft with the return of the Fleet Air Arm to Naval control in 1937.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Tensions and arms race, 1937-1939
The Royal Navy actively employed children and minors within their ranks and indeed joining the Royal Navy as a boy was an often and unwritten prerequisite for a path towards an officer commission. Positions for minors began with the generic term "ship's boy" which was open to young boys between the ages of eight to twelve, although there was no established cut off and there are records of boys as old as 15 to 17 joining ships as boys. Once a boy, further advancement could be obtained through various specialties. A cabin boy assisted with the ship's kitchen, as well as other duties, while a powder monkey helped in the ship's armory.
Royal Navy ranks, rates, and uniforms of the 18th and 19th centuries | Minors in the Royal Navy
In 1666 the Four Days Battle was a defeat for the English but the Dutch fleet was crushed a month later off Orfordness. In 1667 the Dutch mounted the Raid on the Medway, breaking into Chatham Dockyard and capturing or burning many of the Navy's largest ships at their moorings, which resulted in the most humiliating defeat in the Royal Navy's history. The English were also defeated at Solebay in 1672. The experience of large-scale battle was instructive to the Navy; the Articles of War regularizing the conduct of officers and seaman, and the "Fighting Instructions" establishing the line of battle, both date from this period.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Restoration (1660-1688)
This is a list of ships of the line of the Royal Navy of England, and later (from 1707) of Great Britain, and the United Kingdom. The list starts from 1660, the year in which the Royal Navy came into being after the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II, up until the emergence of the battleship around 1880, as defined by the Admiralty.
List of ships of the line of the Royal Navy | Introduction
The fleet began to increase in size under Henry VIII, from five ships in 1509 to thirty in 1514, including the "Henri Grâce a Dieu" (""Great Harry"") of 1500 tons and the "Mary Rose" of 600 tons. Most of the fleet was laid up after 1525 but, because of the break with the Catholic Church, 27 new ships, as well as forts and blockhouses, were built with money from the sale of the monasteries. A detailed and largely accurate contemporary document, the Anthony Roll, was written in 1540. It gave a nearly complete account of the English navy, which contained roughly 50 ships, including carracks, galleys, galleasses and pinnaces.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Tudor, 1485–1603
English naval power seemingly declined as a result of the Norman conquest. Following the Battle of Hastings, the Norman navy that brought over William the Conqueror seemingly disappeared from records, possibly due to William receiving all of those ships from feudal obligations or because of some sort of leasing agreement which lasted only for the duration of the enterprise. There is no evidence that William adopted or kept the Anglo-Saxon ship mustering system, known as the "scipfryd." Hardly noted after 1066, it appears that the Normans let the "scipfryd" languish so that by 1086, when the Doomsday Book was completed, it had apparently ceased to exist.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Normandy (1066-1135)
In addition to varying shot weights, different types of shot were employed for various situations:
Naval artillery in the Age of Sail | Shot
"Britannia" was moved to Portland in 1862, and to the present location of the Britannia Royal Naval College, Dartmouth in 1863. Beginning in the 1840s, the normal entry age for executive officer cadets, those destined to command ships and fleets, was between 12 and 13, and instruction consisted of two years of classroom training, during which time trainees were rated as naval cadets. Cadets who received a first-class passing grade in studies, seamanship and conduct on their final examination could receive a credit for up to a year of sea time, and could be rated as midshipmen immediately after passing out of the college.
Midshipman | Royal Navy from 1836
The interregnum between the execution of Charles I in 1649 and the Restoration of royal authority in 1660 saw the full emergence of the ship-of-the-line and its employment during the first Anglo-Dutch War. During this period the English navy technically became first the Commonwealth Navy, later the Protectorate Navy and subsequently the Commonwealth Navy again; the prefix "HMS" is thus not applicable to any English warship during the Interregnum. The following lists include ships of the line, i.e. vessels of the first, second, third and fourth rates which were judged fit to stand in the line of battle. Smaller warships of the fifth and sixth rates, and the even smaller unrated vessels, appear in the subsequent section.
List of early warships of the English navy | List of major English warships of the English Civil War, the Commonwealth and Protectorate (1642–1660)
The Royal Navy was formally founded in 1546 by Henry VIII though the Kingdom of England and its predecessor states had possessed less organised naval forces for centuries prior to this.
Royal Navy | History
In 1141 Henry II invaded Ireland while a fleet of 167 ships sailed from Dartmouth on a crusade to capture Lisbon from the Moors. A further fleet was raised for the Third Crusade in 1190. The Norman kings had a regular need for cross-Channel transport and raised a naval force in 1155, with the Cinque Ports required to provide a total of 57 ships crewed by 21 sailors apiece. However, with the loss of Normandy by King John (who even so had a fleet of 500 sail in an attempt to regain it), this had to become a force capable of preventing invasion and protecting traffic to and from Gascony.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Anjou (1154-1216)
During much of the medieval period, fleets or "king's ships" were often established or gathered for specific campaigns or actions, and these would disperse afterwards. These were generally merchant ships enlisted into service. Unlike some European states, England did not maintain a small permanent core of warships in peacetime. England's naval organisation was haphazard and the mobilization of fleets when war broke out was slow. In the 11th century, Aethelred II had an especially large fleet built by a national levy. During the period of Danish rule in the 11th century, the authorities maintained a standing fleet by taxation, and this continued for a time under Edward the Confessor, who frequently commanded fleets in person.
Royal Navy | Earlier fleets
Also under the treaty, three "large light cruisers"—, and —were converted to aircraft carriers. New additions to the fleet were therefore minimal during the 1920s, the only major new vessels being two s and fifteen s and heavy cruisers. This was followed by the 1930 London Naval Treaty which deferred new capital ship construction until 1937 and reiterated construction limits on cruisers, destroyers and submarines. There were significant pay cuts in the 1920s, amounting to 25% for some. This culminated in the Invergordon Mutiny of 1931, with crews of various warships refused to sail on exercises, which caused great shock.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Disarmament and pay cuts, 1922-1935
Under William III and Mary II a hospital at Greenwich was founded to relieve the sufferings of British seamen.
Maritime history of the United Kingdom | Eighteenth-century navy
In the British naval forces, where there was a need to recruit enough hands to man the vast fleet of the British Empire, extensive regulations existed concerning the selection and status of boys enlisted to keep filling the ranks. Various specific terms were introduced for different, age- and exam-related stages in a boy's potential career:
Boy seaman | Royal Navy
Fathers who were Army and Navy officers or civilian officers working for the Board of Admiralty could plead straitened circumstances, in which event the fees could be reduced to £40 a year, if the merits of the case were accepted.
Royal Naval College, Osborne | The college
After World War I ended, opposition to the Selborne-Fisher scheme led to re-segregating executive and engineering officers into separate branches, while common entry and special entry were maintained. After World War II another series of reforms, influenced by the quality of officers produced by the special entry scheme and other nations' experience with training officer candidates in a university setting, were initiated to increase the quality of officers in the Navy. In 1949 the entry age was increased to 16, and by 1955 the entry age was increased to 18 and entry required a minimum of two A levels. After 1957 midshipmen no longer served in the fleet.
Midshipman | Royal Navy from 1836
This change has sometimes been connected with the Washington Naval Treaty in 1922, however this is incorrect as the treaty limited maximum fleet scale, not minimum fleet scale. British naval supremacy was lost in 1943, when the United States Navy overtook the Royal Navy in size amid the Second World War.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | One-power standard
In 1546, to support the Admiralty and Marine Affairs Office in the civil administration of the Royal Navy, Henry VIII established a second organisation, the Office of the Council of the Marine. This consisted of the "Chief Officers of the Admiralty" who acted as advisers to the Lord Admiral of England. In 1576 it moved to Deptford Strand, where it became part of the Navy Office. In the 1550s English gentlemen opposed to the Catholicism of Philip and Mary took refuge in France and were active in the English Channel as privateers under letters of marque from the French king.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Tudor, 1485–1603
In the 18th century, the frigate and sloop-of-war – too small to stand in the line of battle – evolved to convoy trade, scout for enemy ships and blockade enemy coasts.
Warship | The Age of Sail
However, 21st-century reductions in naval spending have led to a personnel shortage and a reduction in the number of warships.
Royal Navy | Introduction
Although this was the official name the school was always known as the Indefatigable. Boys entered at aged fourteen, graduating at age sixteen to either the Merchant or Royal Navy. The Indefatigable was divided into four divisions; Drake, Raleigh, Rodney and Hood, with approximately thirty boys to each division. The school had three types of students, fee paying, orphans, and council subsidized boys. Up until the mid-1960s, positions were readily available in the British Merchant fleet and Royal Navy for graduating students. However, as the British Merchant Navy declined from a high of 3,112 British registered ships in 1957, to a low of 368 registered ships in 2001, positions at sea for the boys became difficult to find, and the school had to change from a sea-training school to a regular academic public school in an effort to attract more students.
TS Indefatigable | Anglesey
It also excludes four fifth-rates of 36 guns (the "Falcon" and "Sweepstakes" of 1666, the "Nonsuch" of 1668, and the "Phoenix" of 1671) which were re-classed as 42-gun fourth rates some years after their original completion, but later reverted to being fifth-rates.
List of ships of the line of the Royal Navy | The early Restoration period (1660–77)
Originally subordinates would remove their headgear to a superior. In a book called "New Art of War", printed in 1740, it is stated that; During the age of sail, ships' officers were always worried about mutiny and it therefore became custom that whenever an officer approached, the rating would prove that he was not armed. This was done by knuckling the forehead and later evolved into the modern Navy salute with the hand at 45 degrees, palm facing in. The reason that the palm faces in is because sailors' hands were covered in tar from the sheets and rigging and it was considered unseemly to show an officer or a member of the Royal family a dirty palm.
Customs and traditions of the Royal Navy | Naval salute
The English Navy began to develop during the 12th and 13th centuries, King John having a fleet of 500 sails. In the mid 14th century Edward III's navy had 712 ships. There then followed a period of decline.
Maritime history of England | Early Navy
Several "Age of Sail" merchant ships of the United Kingdom have been named Perseverance:
Perseverance (ship) | British Age of Sail merchant hulls
The rating system of the Royal Navy and its predecessors was used by the Royal Navy between the beginning of the 17th century and the middle of the 19th century to categorise sailing warships, initially classing them according to their assigned complement of men, and later according to the number of their carriage-mounted guns. The rating system of the Royal Navy formally came to an end in the late 19th century by declaration of the Admiralty. The main cause behind this declaration focused on new types of gun, the introduction of steam propulsion and the use of iron and steel armour which made rating ships by the number of guns obsolete.
Rating system of the Royal Navy | Introduction
The Nore has been the site of a Royal Navy anchorage since the age of sail, being adjacent to both the city and port of London and to the Medway, England's principal naval base and dockyard on the North Sea. During the French Revolutionary War it was the scene of a notorious mutiny, when seamen protesting against their poor pay and working conditions refused orders and seized control of their ships in May 1797. The mutiny ended in June, but while the ringleaders were punished, much was done by the Admiralty to improve pay and conditions for the seamen. From 1899 to 1955, the Royal Navy maintained a Commander-in-Chief, The Nore, a senior officer responsible for protecting the entrance to the port of London, and merchant traffic along the east coast of Britain.
Nore | Royal Navy
The British Admiralty was also enraged by the practice of American merchant and naval vessels to poach sailors from the Royal Navy at a time when its manpower was stretched to the limit. The US also had its own interest in breaking Britain's supremacy on maritime trade, and from the first days of the Republic it has often claimed to champion free trade.
Royal Naval Dockyard, Bermuda | Post 1783
In the first years of the 13th century William de Wrotham appears in the records as the clerk of a force of galleys to be used against Philip Augustus of France. In 1206 King John ordered 54 royal galleys to be constructed and between 1207 and 1211 £5000 was spent on the royal fleet. The fleet also started to have an offensive capability, as in 1213 when ships commanded by the Earl of Salisbury raided Damme in Flanders, where they burned many ships of the French fleet. When King John’s campaign to recover Normandy from the French was at a breaking point, the northern barons of England began to rise in revolt.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | House of Anjou (1154-1216)
"Royal Admiral" first appears in the "Lloyd's Register" for 1800 with William Wilson as captain and Gillet & Co. as owners, destination Botany Bay, and her age is given as 23 years old. She appears among the list of vessels sailing for the EIC, but as a separate listing from the above. She also does not appear in the Hardy & Hardy (1811) list of vessels serving the EIC between 1760 and 1810, indicating that the EIC had sold her. She sailed from Portsmouth on 23 May 1800, under a letter of marque issued to Wilson on 10 February 1800.
Royal Admiral (1777 ship) | Botany Bay ship
The official history of the Royal Navy began with the establishment of the "Navy Royal" by Henry VIII in 1546. The modern incarnation of the institution re-emerged as the national naval force of the Kingdom of England in 1660, following the Restoration of King Charles II to the throne. However, for more than a thousand years before that there had been English naval forces varying in type and organization. In 1707 it became the naval force of the Kingdom of Great Britain after the Union between England and Scotland which merged the English navy with the much smaller Royal Scots Navy, although the two had begun operating together from the time of the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | Introduction
Despite this, there were still many volunteers for naval service. The work for individual sailors was less than on merchant ships, since the naval crew size was determined by the number needed to man guns - around four times the number of crew than was needed to simply sail the ship. Furthermore, the food supplied by the Navy was plentiful, regular, and of good quality by the standards of the day. In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, it was not at all unusual for impressed men to view life in the navy (hard though it was) as still preferable to their previous lives on shore, and to volunteer for further service when the opportunity came to leave the ship.
Impressment | Royal Navy recruiting and desertion
a. Several sources, including John Marshall's "Royal Naval Biography" and James Ralfe's "The Naval Biography of Great Britain" give a birth month and year of August 1771. Nicholas Tracy's entry in "Who's Who in Nelson's Navy" uses August 1770, but goes on to incorrectly state his age of death in 1831 as sixty-nine. Bligh's obituary in "The United Service Magazine" notes that he was sixty at his death on 19 January 1831, ruling out his birth in August 1771. b. While sources agree that Bligh studied at Guildford, they vary on the date of his entry to the navy. "The United Service Magazine" and "Royal Naval Biography" both use 1782, "The Naval Biography of Great Britain" 1783, and "Who's Who in Nelson's Navy" 1780.
John Bligh (Royal Navy officer) | Notes
Operations under James I did not go well, with expeditions against Algerian pirates in 1620/1, Cadiz in 1625, and La Rochelle in 1627/8 being expensive failures.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | After Union of the Crowns, 1603-1707
The official history of the Royal Navy reached an important juncture in 1707, when the Act of Union merged the kingdoms of England and the Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain, following a century of personal union between the two countries. This had the effect of merging the Royal Scots Navy into the Royal Navy. The Navy grew considerably during the global struggle with France that had started in 1690 and culminated in the Napoleonic Wars, a time when the practice of fighting under sail was developed to its highest point. The ensuing century of general peace saw Britain virtually uncontested on the seas, and considerable technological development.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Introduction
The Glorious Revolution of 1688 rearranged the political map of Europe, and led to a series of wars with France that lasted well over a century. This was the classic age of sail; while the ships themselves evolved in only minor ways, technique and tactics were honed to a high degree, and the battles of the Napoleonic Wars entailed feats that would have been impossible for the fleets of the 17th century. Because of parliamentary opposition, James II fled the country. The landing of William III and the Glorious Revolution itself was a gigantic effort involving 100 warships and 400 transports carrying 11,000 infantry and 4,000 horses.
Admiralty in the 18th century | Introduction
Next the shot was rammed in, followed by another wad to prevent the cannonball from rolling out of the barrel if the muzzle was depressed. The gun in its carriage was then 'run out'; men heaved on the gun tackles until the front of the gun carriage was hard up against the ship's bulwark, the barrel protruding out of the gun port. This took the majority of the gun crew manpower, as the weight of a large cannon in its carriage could total over two tons, and the ship would probably be rolling. The touch hole in the rear (breech) of the cannon was primed with finer gunpowder (priming powder) or from a quill (from a porcupine or the skin-end of a feather) pre-filled with priming powder, then ignited.
Naval artillery in the Age of Sail | Firing
These ships retained a full capacity for sail as steam engines were not yet efficient enough to permit long ocean voyages under power. Steam power was intended only for use during battle and to allow ships to go to sea at will instead of being held in port by adverse winds. A triple expansion steam engine was introduced in 1881 which was more efficient than earlier ones. These changes were followed by the steam turbine, invented by Charles Parsons, demonstrated by the Turbinia in 1899. Iron in ship construction was first used for diagonal-cross-bracing in major warships. The adoption of iron hulls for ocean-going ships had to wait until after Admiralty experiments had solved the problem of an iron-hull's effect on compass deviation.
History of the Royal Navy (after 1707) | Technology
Prior to the First World War, the United States Navy allowed males under the age of 18 to serve on ships who were officially referred to as "boys". In 1828 ships were allowed to have boys between 14 and 18 at the ratio of one boy for every two guns the ship carried. (i.e. a 44 gun frigate could have up to 22 boys in its crew.) Article 464 of Naval Regulations published in 1833 stated, "A recruiting officer shall enter no boy under thirteen years of age; nor any person under twenty-one years of age, without the consent of their parent or guardian".
Boy seaman | United States Navy
Some evidence of English ship construction in the Anglo-Saxon period is available from the boat burials at Snape (about 550) and Sutton Hoo (about 625), though warships would probably have been larger than the vessels interred there. There is little evidence of the naval activities of the English kingdoms before the mid-9th century, but King Edwin of Northumbria (616/7-633/4) conquered the Isle of Man and Anglesey, and another King of Northumbria, Ecgfrith, sent a military expedition to Gaelic Ireland in 684. The threat from Vikings increased significantly in the early 9th century, and invasions became a serious menace from about 835.
History of the Royal Navy (before 1707) | The early English kingdoms