Maritime

Undoubtedly our greatest naval administrator since Pepys, at the height of his career, Lord Barham had just entered his eightieth year. Bernard Pool documents his unique achievements.

Christopher Lloyd traces the development of naval missile technology alongside the often adverse reactions these “infernal machines” provoked.

From 1650 onwards, writes Elka Schrijver, a Postmaster in Rotterdam organized Dutch seafaring mail.

For more than four years after the death of Nelson, Admiral Collingwood held naval command from the southern tip of Portugal to the Dardanelles. Piers Mackay writes how, in that time, Collingwood became the prime and sole Minister of England, acting upon the sea.

One of Nelson’s proteges, William Hoste, patrolled the Adriatic Sea at a time when its coasts were largely under Napoleon’s control, as P.C. McFarlan writes.

David Woodward describes how the Confederacy's hope of continuing to exist depended upon gaining command of the sea and of vital coastal and inland waters.

“Perhaps... not the noblest of victories”. This haphazard action, in which the forces of Great Britain, France and Russia destroyed a gallant Ottoman fleet, did much to ensure the achievement of Greek independence. By Robin Fedden.

Off the Shetlands and along the English Channel, writes C.R. Boxer, Dutch East-Indiamen, wrecked by storm, are now being carefully salvaged.

Impressment for Naval Service of seamen in British ports dates back to the reign of Edward I; Christopher Lloyd describes the practice and how it ceased in the mid-nineteenth century.

During an industrial conflict that lasted five weeks and brought the Port of London to a standstill, writes R.B. Oram, the “close fraternity of the docks” struck for better working conditions and more generous rates of pay.