416 



NAVY 



show the IOMM on both side* up to the peace of 

 Amiens (1803). 



Brlttahihlp.ofUielln 5 



1 .. 



41 



rwnch .blp. of tht l!n 



Dutch " 18 



; 



H t. 



Total... 



French mailer veaael* . 

 Dutch .. i. 



bluh . . 



68 



57 



Grand Total ........ 443 



11 

 



t 

 



10 



6 



10 



7 



This estimate does not include 807 privateers, 

 chictly Fiench, uk_en and destroyed. Of the 

 above, 50 sail of the line and 94 under that size 

 were added t<> the British navy. 



1 Miring the peace of Amiens preparations for 

 war were actively continued on botn sides, and 

 \x hen war broke" out again in March 1803 the 

 Biitish licet consisted of 153 ships of the line and 

 41 1 under that size, manned bv 120,000 seamen and 

 marines. ' In the year 1809, to quote the words 

 of Alison, ' the British fleet was at the zenith of 

 its power, and Great Britain first appeared in the 

 field on a scale adequate to her mightv strength. 

 With a fleet of near 1100 vessels, including 24< of 

 the line, manned by 140,000 men, she blockaded 

 every hostile harliour in Europe, and still had 37 

 ships of the line to strike a blow at the Scheldt. 

 With 100,000 regular troops she maintained her 

 immense colonial empire; with 191,000 more she 

 niled India; with 400,000 militia she guarded the 

 British Isles ; while her fleet could convey yet 

 another 100,000. with which she menaced, at once, 

 Antwerp, Madrid, and Naples; while Lord Minto, 

 the Governor-general of India, announced in his 

 despatches with well-founded pride that "from 

 Cape Coinorin to Cape Horn a French flag could 

 nowhere be found flying." ' 



The following alistract shows the losses on each 

 side from Iso.'l to the end of the war, during which 

 33 sail of the line and 68 under were added to 

 the British navy. 



Captura*. 







7 



Brltlih ihlptofUiellne 



. under 



Total. 



-.; 



KnemW hip of tlie line 66 li 



n under 78 tt 



Total. 



1S4 



S7 



Since the peace in 1815 the number of vessels has 

 been greatly diminished, although their power has 

 vastly increased. 



The progressive augmentation of size in vessels 

 may lie judged from the increase in first-rate*. In 

 ItlTT the hii-g.M vessel was from 1500 to 1600 tons; 

 by 170), iHtm tons had been reached ; l.y 174"), 2000 

 tons j 1808, 281(1 ton- ; IS53, 4000 tons; 1860, 6059 

 tons the \'irl<,rin, the last three-decker built in 

 England ; while the \Vnrrinr, the liist ironclad 

 built in Britain, and launched in lv,l. is 9210 

 : m.l iii isixi ironclads were building of 



14,000 tons. We may observe by the way that 

 up to the year I860 the ships were practically 

 the slii|H of the last two centuries, improved and 

 developed largely certainly by the introduction 

 of steam, of increased tonnage anil of IwlU-r lines, 

 but still the same ship-, and in the mailer of 

 armament with but little improvement to record 

 over the beginning of the century. In 1786 the 

 Victory was launched ; she was at that time the 

 largest three-decker in the English service ; she is 



186 feet long, has a tonnage of 2100 tons, and 

 carried 100 guns, the bulk of which were hmg 

 : |M>unders, 'weighing ."><> cxvt. In 1859 the flag- 

 ship in the Mediterranean was the screw three- 

 dicker, the .MtirllHiininj/i : she was 2*'J feet long, 

 6100 tons, and carried 121 guns; her lower deck 

 guns were (>."> cxxt. S inch shell guns throwing .1 

 shell with bin-sling, charge inclusive of 56 lb., while 

 her remaining guns were the long 66 cwi. .').> 

 IMHIII.ICIS, witii which the \'ii-tnry had been armed 

 nearly a century before. But since 1860 a \.-i-t 

 revolution has IH'CM ellected in our naval forces, 

 and it seems almost incredible that in so short 

 a space so great a transformation should have 

 taken place. Masts and sails have disappeared, 

 the wooden walls of old England are things of 

 the past, and, instead of the graceful frigate and 

 stately line-of-battle ship, our battle -hips of the 

 present day are floating castles protected with 

 massive armour, crammed with engines, without 

 which they could neither move, light their guns, 

 nor l>e even habitable for their crews, the breath- 

 ing air below lieing driven down by fans worked bv 

 steam : while the 32 pounders and 10-inch shell 

 guns have given place to 67- ton and 110-ton rilled 

 guns, throwing projectiles of 2000 lb. weight. 

 The use of steam as a propelling DO WOT il tli< 

 by which this change has been effected. From 1S41 

 a gradual sulistitution of steam for sailing vessels 

 began, which was not completed, however, until 

 I860 in fact, the last sailing frigate in commission, 

 the Calypso, only returned from the 1'acilic at the 

 latter end of 1861. The lirst war steamers were all 

 naddle-wheel vessels, and this mode of propulsion 

 iirought a change in the armament, or rather in 

 the method of mounting guns. The paddle-wh 

 being quite exposed, and the machinery also being 

 mostly almve the water line, there was great danger 

 that a lucky shot would soon put a ship out of 

 action, if compelled to tight broadside to broadside, 

 as ships hail tioen accustomed to do formerly. To 

 obviate this danger as far as jwssible, the few puns 

 these paddle ships carried were mounted us pixot- 

 guns, l>y which a far larger arc of training was 

 |.ossil,lc than to a pin mounted on the hi^.uUidc, 

 thus enabling a ship to tight her guns without 

 exposing her whole broadside to an enemy's fire. 

 A fexv paddle-frigates, hoxvever, of huge size, - 

 built, and in their day did good service; of ti 

 the well-known Terrible, nicknamed during the 

 Russian war of 1834-56 the 'Black -Sea Cat/ was 

 tin- largest; she was a ship of some 3600 I 

 can led sixteen tis poumleis. and had engines of 800 

 horse-power. At the bombardment of Sebastopol 

 the sailing line-of-lwUtle ships were all towed into 

 their places by the paddle-frigates, xvhich were 

 lashed on their oil sides. But it was the applica- 

 tion of the screw as a means of |iro|ielling ships 

 which bus really revolutionised ships of war. Its 

 vast sn|teriority over the paddle was at once ! 

 and by the commencement of the Russian war in 

 1854 many ships of the line, frigates, and smaller 

 vessels had lieen either converted or built as -I-H-U 

 ships. After the conclusion of the war main of 

 the sailing three-deckers were converted into 

 st. Mm two-deckers, lieing lengthened amidships, 

 and engines IxMiig then fitted to them; while 

 dining the three and four succeeding years naval 

 architecture seemed to have reached its acme, the 

 line-of - liat t le ships and frigates which were launched 

 at the time lieing quite unsurpassed for beauty 

 of their hulls, their si/e, and their sailing and 

 steaming qualities. Strangely enough, for the 

 In-t time in hi.story, the new ships at this time 

 were far superior to the French, especially the 

 HIM- of battle ships, which all carried their lower 

 deck guns twice as high out of the water as the 

 French ships, and were altogether liner and 



