Fire in the Dockyard
The Royal Dockyard at Portsmouth was one of the largest industrial concerns of the 18th century. It was a huge site in the heart of the...
The Ship’s Compass – A History
The Earth has a core of molten iron which provides it with a strong magnetic field. This is not true of all planets, and it transpires...
The First Woman to Circumnavigate the World
In 1766 Captain Louis Antoine de Bougainville left France in command of the ships La Boudeuse and Étoile. He was leading a three-year...
The Ugly Duckling’s Last Stand
The sloop HMS Arrow was one of the least attractive commands in the Royal Navy. Along with her sister ship HMS Dart, she was built to an...
The Buccaneering career of Robert Surcouf
Robert Surcouf was born in 1773 in the Breton port of St Malo. Positioned in a relatively poor part of France, for centuries the only...
The Royal Dockyards
At the start of the 18th century it was unclear which of several European naval powers would go on to dominate the seas of the world. The...
A Tug-of-War, Naval style – HMS Rattler vs HMS Alecto
The Industrial Revolution that swept through 18th and 19th century Britain was driven by steam. Coal-fired engines were everywhere,...
Cochrane’s Castle
In 1808 Napoleon Bonaparte made his momentous decision to invade Spain, an ally at the time, and replace its government with one headed...
Blackbeard the Pirate
The years from 1713 to 1725 are thought of as the Golden Age of Piracy. The popular image of a pirate is firmly rooted in this period,...
Clash in the Gut – the First and Second Battles of Algeciras
The British naval base at Gibraltar lies on one side of a small bay, directly opposite its Spanish equivalent at Algeciras. Both were...
