Flag and Fleet | Page 2

by the sea. Keep the seaways open and we live. Close them and we die.
This looks, and really is, so very simple, that you may well wonder why we have to speak about it here. But man is a land animal. Landsmen are many, while seamen are few; and though the sea is three times bigger than the land it is three hundred times less known. History is full of sea-power, but histories are not; for most historians know little of sea-power, though British history without British sea-power is like a watch without a mainspring or a wheel without a hub. No wonder we cannot understand the living story of our wars, when, as a rule, we are only told parts of what happened, and neither how they happened nor why they happened. The how and why are the flesh and blood, the head and heart of history; so if you cut them off you kill the living body and leave nothing but dry bones. Now, in our long war story no single how or why has any real meaning apart from British sea-power, which itself has no meaning apart from the Royal Navy. So the choice lies plain before us: either to learn what the Navy really means, and know the story as a veteran should; or else leave out, or perhaps mislearn, the Navy's part, and be a raw recruit for life, all thumbs and muddle-mindedness.

CONTENTS
BOOK I
THE ROWING AGE
WHEN SOLDIERS FOUGHT ROWBOAT BATTLES BESIDE THE SHORES OF THE OLD WORLD
From the Beginning of War on the Water to King Henry VIII's First Promise of a Sailing Fleet 1545
CHAPTER
I
THE VERY BEGINNING OF SEA-POWER (10,000 years and more B.C.) II THE FIRST FAR WEST (The last 5,000 years B.C.) III EAST AGAINST WEST (480 B. C.-146 B.C.) IV CELTIC BRITAIN UNDER ROME (55 B.C.-410 A.D.) V THE HARDY NORSEMAN (449-1066) VI THE IMPERIAL NORMAN (1066-1451) VII KING OF THE ENGLISH ERA (1545)

BOOK II
THE SAILING AGE
WHEN SAILORS FOUGHT ON EVERY OCEAN AND THE ROYAL NAVY OF THE MOTHER COUNTRY WON THE BRITISH COMMAND OF THE SEA BOTH IN THE OLD WORLD AND THE NEW
DRAKE TO NELSON
1585-1805

PART I--THE SPANISH WAR
VIII OLD SPAIN AND NEW (1492-1571) IX THE ENGLISH SEA-DOGS (1545-1580) X THE SPANISH ARMADA (1588)

PART II--THE DUTCH WAR
XI THE FIRST DUTCH WAR (1623-1653) XII THE SECOND AND THIRD DUTCH WARS (1665-1673)

PART III--THE FRENCH WAR
XIII THE FIRST WAR AGAINST LOUIS XIV (1689-1697) XIV THE SECOND WAR AGAINST LOUIS XIV (1702-1713) XV WAR AGAINST FRANCE AND SPAIN (1739-1748) XVI PITT'S IMPERIAL WAR (1756-1763) XVII THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION (1775-1783) XVIII NELSON (1798-1805) XIX "1812"

BOOK III
THE AGE OF STEAM AND STEEL
WHEN THE BRITISH COMMAND OF THE SEA SAVED THE WORLD FROM GERMAN SLAVERY IN THE GREATEST OF ALL WARS
1914-1918

PART I--A CENTURY OF CHANGE (1814-1914)
XX A CENTURY OF BRITISH-FRENCH-AMERICAN PEACE (1815-1914) XXI A CENTURY OF MINOR BRITISH WARS (1815-1914)

PART II--THE GREAT WAR (1914-1918)
XXII THE HANDY MAN XXIII FIFTY YEARS OF WARNING (1864-1914) XXIV WAR (1914-1915) XXV JUTLAND (1916) XXVI SUBMARINING (1917-1918) XXVII SURRENDER! (1918) XXVIII WELL DONE!

POSTSCRIPT THE FREEDOM OF THE SEAS

[Transcriber's note: The following two errata items have been applied to this e-book.]
ERRATA
Page XIII. For "Henry VII's" read "Henry VIII's."
Page 254. L. 20 for "facing the Germans" read "away from Scheer,"

ILLUSTRATIONS
VIKING MAN-OF-WAR. . . . . . . . . Frontispiece
"DUG-OUT" CANOE
ROMAN TRIREME--A vessel with three benches of oars
WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR'S TRANSPORTS
Eddystone Lighthouse, 1699. The first structure of stone and timber. Build for Trinity House by Winstanley and swept away in a storm. Eddystone Lighthouse, 1882. The fourth and present structure, erected by Sir J. N. Douglass for Trinity House.
The Santa Maria, flagship of Christopher Columbus when he discovered America in 1492. Length of keel, 60 feet. Length of ship proper, 93 feet. Length over all, 128 feet. Breadth, 26 feet. Tonnage, full displacement, 233.
DRAKE
One of Drake's Men-of-War that Fought the Great Armada in 1588.
ARMADA OFF POWEY (Cornwall) as first seen in the English Channel.
SIR FRANCIS DRAKE ON BOARD THE REVENGE receiving the surrender of Don Pedro de Valdes.
SAILING SHIP. The Pilgrim Fathers crossed in a similar vessel (1620).
LA HOGUE, 1692.
H.M.S. Centurion engaged and took the Spanish Galleon Nuestra Senhora de Capadongo, from Acapulco bound to Manila, off Cape Espiritu Santo, Philippine Islands, June 20, 1743.
The ROYAL GEORGE
NELSON
FIGHTING THE GUNS ON THE MAIN DECK, 1782.
THE BLOWING UP OF L'ORIENT DURING THE BATTLE OF THE NILE.
THE BATTLE OF COPENHAGEN, APRIL 2nd, 1801. (Note the British line ahead.)
The VICTORY. Nelson's Flagship at Trafalgar, launched in 1765, and still used as the flagship in Portsmouth Harbour.
TRAFALGAR. 21st October, 1805.
MODEL OF THE BATTLE OF TRAFALGAR. (Reproduced by permission from the model at the Royal United Service Institution.)
THE SHANNON AND THE CHESAPEAKE.
THE ROYAL WILLIAM. Canadian built; the first boat to cross any ocean steaming the whole way (1833), the first steamer in the world to fire a shot in action (May