Books

The contents of this, the eighth of the Navy Records Society’s Miscellany series, chronicles the activities and adventures of the Royal Navy, its officials, its officers and its men – both in British employment and out of it – over a period of some six hundred years. Ranging from the reign of Edward III to… Read Abstract »

By the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the seven home dockyards of the British Royal Navy employed a workforce of nearly 16,000 men and some women. On account of their size, dockyards add much to our understanding of developing social processes as they pioneered systems of recruitment, training and supervision of large-scale workforces. From 1815-1865… Read Abstract »

This seventh volume of Naval Miscellany contains documents which range in date from the late thirteenth century to the Korean War. They illustrate the many different ways in which the naval forces of the crown have served the realm. Topics covered include the role of ships in campaigns against Scotland under Edward I and Edward… Read Abstract »

The capacity of navies to influence world events through control of seaborne trade was profoundly affected by nineteenth-century developments in economic theory, commercial organization, and naval technology. In turn, these changing circumstances led, from the outbreak of the Russian war in 1854, to repeated attempts to rewrite the international law of belligerent rights at sea…. Read Abstract »

Edited documents in this Naval Miscellany include the 14th-century repair of Bayonne Galleys, Armada correspondence, the building of Plymouth dockyard, letters of Admiral Collingwood, Nelson’s Public Order Book during his 1801 blockade of Boulogne, Louis Parsons’ journal 1882-1901, Captain Clayton’s letters from the Australia Station 1885-8, Dudley Pound’s Grand Fleet diary 1914-15, and HMS Aurora’s… Read Abstract »

To celebrate its centenary in 1993, the Society produced a special volume covering seven hundred and fifty years of British naval history, containing 535 documents carefully selected by leading experts. See the contents of British Naval Documents 1204-1960.

This edition contains documents from the seventeenth century to the Second World War. There is additional material to complement NRS Volume 116 from the Commission of Enquiry in 1608, an account of the Earl of Warwick’s voyage to the Mediterranean in 1627 and documents relating to the management of the Royal Dockyards between 1672 and… Read Abstract »

How should the Royal Navy be manned? Was impressment the best answer to this question? Was the seizure of men off the streets by Press Gangs acceptable to a freedom-loving society? What was the alternative? This issue provoked considerable debate, especially with reference to the Georgian and Victorian Navy, and attracted the attention, not only… Read Abstract »

The defence of trade has always been a priority for the Royal Navy. This volume details the operations of the squadrons deployed in South American waters amid the turmoil which began with the French occupation of the Iberian Peninsular and ended with the independence of Argentina, Chile, Peru and, eventually, Brazil. British trade, ships and… Read Abstract »

The causes of the Second China War were complex; one factor went back deep into China’s past when the country was the predominant power in the Far East and had developed a civilisation that, culturally and technically, was far ahead of that of Europe. This gave them a superiority complex which they retained when the… Read Abstract »

This volume contains letters and official despatches that mainly relate to the operations ashore by the ship’s companies of Shannon and Pearl during the Indian Mutiny of 1857-8. Both were engaged in numerous actions against the rebel forces and most notably in the campaign that led to the relief of Lucknow. To support these operations,… Read Abstract »

The second Cabinet print of January 1856 deals with the naval campaign, excluding the work of the Naval Brigade ashore throughout the siege of Sevastopol. While the latter operation dominated the theatre Vice Admiral Sir Edmund Lyons’ fleet maintained an effective blockade of the Russian coast, secured the vital logistics lifeline that fed armed and… Read Abstract »

This volume reproduces the January 1856 Cabinet Confidential print, compiled when the British Government still anticipated further campaigns in both main theatres. Following the successful bombardment of Sweaborg in August, extensive planning for an assault on Cronstadt and the decision to retain Admiral Sir Richard Dundas in command the material is significantly less contentious than… Read Abstract »

This volume reproduces the Cabinet Confidential print of January 1855, a time of crisis in British Government, when the Aberdeen Ministry, heavily defeated on a vote of confidence, was eventually replaced by Lord Palmerston’s Ministry. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Sir James Graham, survived the change and the print reflected his decision to use… Read Abstract »

A selection from the papers of the commander in chief of the Mediterranean station, Sir Edward Codrington, which shows the British government’s determined policy following on from the bombardment of Algiers to try to end attacks on trade in that sea. The target on this occasion was ‘privateers’ operating out of the impoverished Aegean islands… Read Abstract »

These are not for the most part shanties, but ballads about (and in many cases by) sailors and their exploits, from the fourteenth century to the nineteenth, with a learned introduction on their historical value. The tunes are named, but the music is not printed

This was the first of the Miscellany volumes and while it contains documents from the sixteenth century to the turn of the nineteenth century, the majority relate to the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Of the two sixteenth century documents, one relates to French warship signals and the other is a narrative of the Cadiz… Read Abstract »