“It is many years since British historians felt comfortable in celebrating their country’s triumphs. Once upon a time, Britain’s incontestable naval and commercial supremacy in 1815 would have been explained as the predestined fruit of national virtue, religious truth and political freedom. Among professional historians all three explanations would nowadays arouse varying degrees of amusement, distaste and embarrassment, but no modern consensus of opinion has emerged to replace them. For many years the tendency has been to ignore or belittle the fact as well as the consequences of British naval supremacy. Not many would go so far as to dismiss it outright as a convenient myth, or imply that Napoleon won the Napoleonic War, but a number of intellectual strategies have been devised to ignore it.”
From N.A.M. Roger, The Command of The Ocean, page 575.
This is a quite outstanding book, published a few years ago. I particularly liked its explanation of how the Royal Navy knitted in with the commercial and political world of the time, such as how the need to provide food and supplies for ships going over vast distances encouraged development in things like food preservation, the development of the UK agricultural market, mass production techniques (for things like bits of ship rigging). The famous 17th Century diarist, Samuel Pepys, famously played a key role in developing the administrative machinery that was essential in making the operation work.
And what is also interesting is that the image that we traditionally have of the navy in the 18th century – “rum, sodomy and the lash” – to quote Churchill’s famous phrase about the navy – is not quite the full picture. There were brutal captains, terrible conditions and bad treatment of sailors via the press gang, yes. But Roger balances all this by pointing out how many of the ships we led by relatively humane and considerate men who treated sailors as well as could be reasonably expected (food and conditions were frequently better than on dry land).
It is hard to conceive, as Roger says, that Nelson and the rest would have won their famous victories had the sailors of the fleets been purely driven by the menace of the cat o’ nine tails. Roger explains a great deal of how the Navy was able to play such a massive role in UK history.
For history at its best, this book takes a lot of beating.
3 words (kind of)
Patrick
O
Briain
IMHO This series on The Nelsonic Navy is one of the literary achievements of the 20th Century (with the added bonus of actually being readable)
The Rise And Fall of British Naval Mastery by Paul Kennedy is a good one too.
One of the things that surprised me in that is how dependent we were on foreign imports (in particular from Sweden) to keep constructing and maintaining our ships. I think the ropes and some timber came from that way.
Also agree with your point about management of people not just being about the cat o’nine tails, and have read that elsewhere (despite the fate of Admiral “pour encourager les autres” Byng).
I read The Command of the Ocean last year – an excellent book. Well worth recommending. Two thumbs up.
It seems pretty obvious to me – England was an island nation, with the corresponding need for a strong navy, and it had the economy to provide one. Hence, the RN kicked ass and took names for 350 years. I’d laugh at the religious and nationalistic explanations too.
National virtue, religious truth and political freedom strike me as exceedingly poor explanations for Britain’s strong navy. A few others might be:
1. A large merchant navy and fishing fleet, meaning that in times of war trained sailors could be acquired rapidly and returned to the ‘pool’ after peace had broken out. This also gave men an incentive to serve in the navy at all ranks, as there were civilian employment opportunities that could come from it.
2. The presence of high tides in places with harbours, allowing dry docks to be built. Without regular maintenance in dry dock, a man of war would basically fall apart in 5-6 years, and they were staggeringly expensive to build.
3. A policy of creating large provisioning yards around the world, allowing ships to stay at sea for extended periods of time, and an accounting system that allowed ships to show up un-announced at one of these yards and simply requisition large amounts of materials, giving captains great flexibility. This system resulted in extreme corruption and wastage, but was probably extremely helpful in the larger picture.
5. Problems with the French Admiralty. In many ways Britains supremacy was helped by French failings. Their Admiralty was beset by problems inherent in the French government of the time causing it to repeatedly run out of money, resulting in loss of ships (unable to repair or maintain them) and loss of sailors who simply couldn’t be paid.
6. Development of relatively high quality rations, again allowing ships to stay at sea for extended periods. Britain created an industry dedicated to supplying food for the navy, while other navies simply acquired normal foodstuffs as and when they needed to go to sea.
7. Because we wanted to. A huge generalisation, but 150 years previously, the Dutch had simply wanted a navy to protect their trade routes, and the French had simply wanted one to support and transport their land armies. It was Britain who came to realise that controlling the sea – denying its use to others – was of key importance. Wars with the Dutch in the seventeenth century really formed both the British navy and naval policy, and these were essentially about protectionism.
8. The invention of the carronade (a cheap, light, powerful, inaccurate short-range cannon) probably gave our ships a noticeable edge in several battles.
The one thing that made no difference at all was the quality of our ships, which (if made in Britain rather than captured) were of generally average quality, with the French, Spanish and Americans in particular producing better ones.
This is all based on memory from a number of books I’ve read on the subject – I could dig out references if people were curious. I remember in particular that ships were even more staggeringly expensive than everyone thinks they were, and they rotted of their own accord amazingly fast. Our ability to get wood from the Baltic, and maintain our ships well, made a huge difference.
“To Rule the Waves” – How the British Navy shaped the Modern World – hints at the truth behind Ameica’s independence and much much more.
Worth considering too in light of the real powers in the world of today – the Battle Carrie groups of the USA.
The Nore and Spithead mutinies of 1797?
[deleted. utterly off topic]
Two words.
Prize.
Money.
The Royal Navy paid bounties to its captains and crews for enemy vessels that they captured, whether they be naval or commercial. The bounties were calculated according to a strictly-defined formula based upon the value of the hull (as condemned by a UK Admiralty court), the value of the cargo and/or weaponry, and the number of the captured crew.
One good prize could set a man up for the rest of his life, whether he be officer or rating. The formula was weighted to the benefit of the captain and his flag officer, to be sure, but between 3/8 and 1/2 of the total assessed prize money (the formula was re-jiggered several times in the C18/C19) went to the most junior officers and the ratings. On several occasions in the late C18/early C19, individual RN vessels took prizes that paid their captains tens of thousands of pounds – and paid their lowliest ratings several hundred pounds each. In either case, enough that either man could have come home from his service (if he made it) and be set for life.
The chance of something like that can be a powerful incentive.
llater,
llamas
J writes:
Fortunately, Roger does not assert this, and many of your excellent points are mentioned, in great detail, in his book, as the reasons the navy prospered for all that time.
However, there is a legitimate reason for mentioning Britain’s political and religious culture. As a Protestant power, it was inevitably at odds with many Continental powers, who at times tried to invade, or damage the seaborne trade, of the “heretic” power. There was a clear link in the minds of those who shaped the Royal Navy that this navy was an emblem of English liberty. It was something that politicians played upon in justifying tax-raising to pay for it.
Just read the book(s) — Start with the preceeding volume, Sovereign of the Seas, if you can. If you want something shorter, read Rodger’s The Wooden World — basically, Patrick O’Brien in non-fiction. He deals exhaustively, and authoritatively, with every point mentioned in the above comments. You can’t really understand England or the Anglosphere without reading these books.
Oh yeah — Churchill never said the thing about rum, sodomy, etc. That’s an urban legend.
Illamas got in there before me for the number one reason, the awesome power of money, but the individual contributions should not be forgotten either. The RN probably wouldn’t have been as sucessful as it was without the example of Admiral John Byng, in other navies you could get away with not being very good. Byng showed that even if you had lots of political clout you could still end up shot on your own quatre deck if you didn’t try to fight. This lead to a culture that by Nelson’s time was aggressive to the point of being rabid.
J, what happened to Point #4?
Last time I saw what is now left of our ‘hearts of oak & jolly tars’ the girls were donning the veil as a nice gesture in true Stockholm fashion…and one of our brave lads was crying because a nasty persian had nicked his iPod…and the Iranian branch of Moss Bros was kitting out our smiling lads with Erich Honeker suits. An excellent time was being had by all…and the Americans simply lurved it
If today, Nelson were to remark that he could see no ships, Hardy wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow.
Yes we have gone a long way from when “show a leg” meant show a leg from you hammock to show whether you were male or female (women being spared some forms of work aboard ship), and when “son of a gun” meant a baby who had spent the start of his time out in the world sleeping in a little hammock slung between naval guns aboad ship.
The Victorians did not like women and children aboard ship – and stopped it.
However, they would never have dreamed of a time when the liberal “humanitarians” would have so softened the Royal Navy that the sort of thing permanentexpat discribes could happen.
The biggest “joke” being if the Royal Navy people and marines had made a fight of it (and had held on till help arrived) they would have been punished for not obeying standing orders.
These orders being to submit to a superior force.
On these grounds Nelson should have raised the white flag in 1805 – as he was outnumbered.
Nelson was at war, Lieutenant Carmen was not and there is a lot more to the Naval Service than those fifteen men and women as anyone who has browsed a recent OP awards list knows. Anyway in the Navy you don’t run up a white flag, you strike your colours.
But you are quite right, had the fifteen fought then any survivors (wouldn’t have been many, IWs and maybe the odd GPMG up against Dushkas and cannon…) would have been dragged back to Tehran in chains and I wouldn’t be suprised that the Government would have disowned them.
The fact is that OF2 officers like RN Lieutenants and RM Captains are not allowed to start wars.
Starting wars is one thing; defending themselves is quite another.
Are those ships even armed? If so, why bother?
Quite so Laird.
My point was that the orders these sailors and marines were under orders not to fight – in which case they should not have been there.
The Iranian regime has been hostile to the “little Satan” since 1979 and the regime considers itself at war with all infidels anyway. Even sending all the Jews to “Canada or Alaska” would not alter that.
So the war was started long ago – Another James.
You send people to search ships near Iran, and where you know the Revolutionary Guard are operating. Well then you support them with helecopters (or whatever is needed).
As for being “taken back to Iran in chains” people sign on to fight.
“But you are too cowardly to fight”.
Perhaps true – but my moral flaws alter nothing.
It is the duty of the Royal Navy and British Marines to fight – otherwise there is no point to them.
Maybe their surrender was the tactically-correct move.
The Government, OTOH, failed to give anything approximating a correct response:
“If our men are not returned unharmed within 24 hours, the base from which the attack was launched will be leveled. No surrenders will be accepted and no more than ordinary efforts will be made to avoid noncombatant losses. Each additional 24 hours’ delay will result in similar attacks against other Revolutionary Guards bases. All persons in the Revolutionary Guards hierarchy, including their political masters, shall be considered legitimate targets.”
After all, it simply would not do for the mean old Iranians to take away Seaman Schmuckatelli’s iPod.
However unfairly at least the incident has given the army a song – sung to the tune of “What to do you do with a drunken sailor”.
What do you do with a captured sailor, what do you do with a captured sailor, what do you with a captured sailor – earli in the morning?
Take away his ipod and make him blubber!
Take away his ipod and make him blubber!
Take away his ipos and make him blubber!
Earli in the morning.
I am told this song is especially popular with the Parachute Regiment, and the Royal Marines have special dislike for it.
Paul,
You owe me for that, big time. I had a cat in my lap and a mouthful of Odell’s 5-Barrel Pale Ale when I read that. Now I’m bleeding and my laptop screen is covered in beer.
Thanks a bunch.
:-B