"The Royal Navy During the War of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic War" - читать интересную книгу автора (King Dean)

The Royal Navy During the War of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic War

John B. Hattendorf

When a sailor was swimming on the surface of the open ocean, his horizon was a mere 1.1 miles away. But climbing to the maintop? about 100 feet above the water on a 74-gun ship?extended the distance he could see to nearly 12 miles. The height of any object on the horizon, whether ship or shore, also increased that distance. Perched in the rigging of a large ship, a lookout might see the sails of another large ship at 20 miles, even if the ship was hull-down (with only its sails visible above the horizon).
Height was the key. Yet a person's range of view could be affected by many circumstances, such as fog or even loud distractions on deck. At long distances, the atmosphere could create strange refractions, causing mirages.
For a naval man, there is a direct analogy between climbing the mast to extend the horizon at sea and climbing up the hierarchy of command to view the wider operations of the Navy. The top of the Royal Navy hierarchy was not in a ship at sea, but ashore, in London. It was only from there that one's vision was global, encompassing the Navy's numerous theaters of operation and distant exploits. And it was from there that the Navy's basic directions emanated? everything from grand strategy to pay, from ship construction to uniforms, from navigation charts to food allowances. Officers of the Crown, including naval officers like Jack Aubrey, were ultimately governed by Parliament, the King's Cabinet, and the King himself.

King, Cabinet, and Parliament
For all those who served in the Navy, King George III stood at the pinnacle of command. Not only was the King a symbol of sovereignty, but he also played a tangible role in day-to-day affairs. Maintaining the prerogative of the Crown to appoint its own ministers, George III was an important influence on national policies and was certainly able to prevent the government from taking measures in which he did not acquiesce. Although after his first bout with insanity in 1788, George III began to leave an increasing amount of business to his ministers, he retained considerable influence over national policy and ministerial appointments throughout the years of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars.
In the King's name and through his authority, the prime minister and the other ministers in the Cabinet collectively exercised the executive power of government through the means provided by Parliament. In this, the Cabinet was controlled on one side by the King and on the other by Parliament. When a cabinet was appointed and received the King's support, it could normally expect the support of a majority in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords as well as a victory in the next general election, providing that it did not prove incompetent, impose undue taxation, or fail to maintain public confidence. When any of these were joined by public outcry over a defeat in battle or disappointment in foreign policies, Cabinet ministers were clearly in political danger.
Because of its representative nature and its exclusive ability to initiate financial measures, the House of Commons was the stronger of the two Houses of Parliament, but the House of Lords, usually siding with the King, retained enormous power. Its assent was essential to the passage of any law. In the 18th century, when most Cabinet ministers, including the head of the Navy, were Lords, it was normal for the Cabinet's views to be more in harmony with those of the House of Lords. Together, the two could kill inconvenient measures arising in the Commons.
The Cabinet dealt with questions of broad naval policy and strategy, including finance, ship construction, and logistical support, obtaining funding from Parliament and sometimes even giving broad operational directives to the Admiralty and to senior naval commanders.

The Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty
Traditionally, the Crown vested the powers and functions of the Admiralty in the office of Lord High Admiral. An ancient office of state, it had not been held by an individual since 1709. Instead, these powers were delegated to a board of seven men who were the "Commissioners for Executing the Office of Lord High Admiral." Of these seven, three were usually naval officers, called professional Lords, and four civilians, or civil Lords. In theory, each commissioner was equal in authority and responsibility, but in practice the person whose name appeared first on the document commissioning the board was the senior member, or First Lord. During this period, the First Lord was more often a civilian member of the House of Lords than a naval officer.

First Lords of the Admiralty, 1788-1827
John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham - Jul. 16, 1788-Dec. 19, 1794
George John Spencer, 2nd Earl Spencer - Dec. 19, 1794-Feb. 19, 1801
Admiral John Jervis, 1st Earl of St. Vincent - Feb. 19, 1801-May 15, 1804
Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville - May 15, 1804-May 2, 1805
Admiral Charles Middleton, Lord Barham - May 2, 1805-Feb. 10, 1806
Hon. Charles Grey, Viscount Howick - Feb. 10, 1806-Sep. 29, 1806
Thomas Grenville - Sep. 29, 1806-Apr. 6, 1807
Henry Phipps, 3rd Lord Mulgrave - Apr. 6, 1807-May 4, 1810
Charles Philip Yorke - May 4, 1810-Mar. 25, 1812
Robert Saunders Dundas, 2nd Viscount Melville - Mar. 25, 1812-May 2, 1827

Source: J. C. Sainty, Admiralty Officials, 1660-1870 (1975).

In 1805, Lord Barham was the first to assign specific duties to each of the professional Naval Lords, leaving the civil Lords to handle routine business and sign documents. Under the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, the senior official was the First Secretary of the Admiralty. Usually an elected member of the House of Commons, he was the senior civil servant. More often than not, it was the First Secretary who communicated the decisions of the Commissioners to naval officers in the fleet, although from 1783, a Second Secretary assisted in carrying out the administrative burdens of the office.

The Admiralty Office
The heart of the Admiralty was the Admiralty Office on the west side of Whitehall. It was a neighbor of the War Office, which administered the Army at a building called the Horse Guards, both overlooking St. James's Park to the rear. In this location, the Admiralty was close to the nerve centers of national power: 10 Downing Street (the Prime Minister's residence), the Treasury, the Houses of Parliament, St. James's Palace, and the residence of George III.
Designed by Thomas Ripley, the Master Carpenter to the Crown, the Admiralty Office was built between 1725 and 1728 to replace one that had stood on the same site. Masked from the unruly mob on the street by a stone screen added in 1760, the brick building's tall portico and small courtyard were often filled with arriving or departing naval officers and chastened messengers bringing news from the fleet.
It was a place where naval officers' careers were made or lost. As O'Brian describes a visit by Jack Aubrey to seek a commission from
Lord Melville in Post Captain, that tension is palpable: "The plunge into the Admiralty courtyard; the waiting room, with half a dozen acquaintances?disconnected gossip, his mind and theirs being elsewhere; the staircase to the First Lord's room and there, half-way up, a fat officer leaning against the rail, silent weeping, his slab, pale cheeks all wet with tears. A silent marine watched him from the landing, two porters from the hall, aghast."
The Admiralty Office's oak-paneled boardroom was the site of the Admiralty Commissioners' daily meetings. Saved from the earlier building, a working wind-direction indicator mounted on the wall over the fireplace served as a constant reminder of the fleets at sea, while charts covering the walls kept the Commissioners abreast of the various theaters of action. Together, the Commissioners deliberated at a long table, preparing the fleet for war, selecting its commanders, and making officer assignments. While the Board itself did not make strategic decisions, the First Lord was involved in this process as a member of the Cabinet, and the Admiralty Secretary often forwarded the Cabinet's instructions on strategy and fleet operations to the fleet commanders.
The Admiralty managed a wide range of other administrative and judicial duties as well. For this, the First Secretary of the Admiralty supervised a bustling office with many clerks, visitors, and activities, making it a prime target for spies; indeed, security leaks were a problem.
In 1786, the growing Admiralty bureaucracy expanded into a new yellow brick building joined to the Admiralty on the south. Here on the ground floor were three large state rooms for the First Lord's official entertaining. Above that, two floors housed mainly the private apartments of the First Lord but also the Admiralty Library.
The Admiralty was not the only office that managed naval affairs. There were a variety of other boards and offices in London that dealt with specific aspects of the Navy. The most important of these was the Navy Board.



The Navy Board
The Principal Officers and Commissioners of the Navy, who formed the Navy Board, worked in the Navy Office building at Somerset House in the Strand. They were concerned with three main areas: (1) the material condition of the fleet, including building, fitting out, and repairing ships, managing dockyards, purchasing naval stores, and leasing transport vessels; (2) naval expenditure, including the payment of all salaries and auditing accounts; and (3) the health and subsistence of seamen. The last function was delegated to subsidiary boards, also located at Somerset House:
* The Sick and Wounded Board, or the Commissioners for taking care of Sick and Wounded Seamen and for the Exchanging of Prisoners of War.
* The Commissioners of the Victualling, who were responsible for acquiring, storing, and delivering food supplies to the fleet.
* The Transport Board, which hired merchant vessels to carry troops and supplies, took over from the Sick and Wounded Board the responsibility for prisoners of war in 1796. The two boards merged in 1806. Originally composed of three senior naval officers, the Transport Board also included a civil administrator and a physician after 1806.