The Birth of Weather Forecasting and the Royal Charter Storm of 1859 Today weather forecasting is regarded as an integral aspect of news reporting but in the mid-nineteenth century that concept was in its infancy. It took the massive "Royal Charter Storm" of 1859 to emphasise the necessity of such a system and the [...]

Guest Blog by Alaric Bond: Introducing Historical Figures into Fiction Old Salt Authors - Antoine, Linda & Alaric Antoine Vanner writes: My fellow naval-fiction authors Alaric Bond and Linda Collision, colleagues at the Old Salt Press, recently attended the 2018 Historic Novelists Society Conference in Scotland. We appeared together on a panel that [...]

Discipline Collapses: The Wreck of HMS Penelope 1815 When reading of the losses of Royal Navy warships in the Age of Fighting Sail, whether in battle or by shipwreck, one is struck by the professionalism and discipline of both officers and men in the most appalling circumstances. An earlier blog, concerning the aftermath of [...]

The Ramming of HMS Prince George by HMS Hannibal, 1903 For some five decades from 1866, when the naval battle of Lissa, when victory was secured by the Austro-Hungarian fleet over its Italian enemy by means of ramming, naval architects were to be fixated on designing ram bows into warships of all sizes. They ignored the [...]

HMS Rattler: The screw propeller comes of age A recent blog told the story of the invention and initial testing of screw-propellers for ships, building on principles established two millennia previously. In the late 1830s the practicality of this concept was proven in a series of exhaustive tests by the experimental steamship SS Archimedes, [...]

Besting a French Privateer in 1807 Privateering was an integral part of sea warfare in the Age of Fighting Sail, striking as it did at the heart-blood of the enemy’s trade, commerce and economy. In an era before radio and radar privateers – essentially private business entities authorised by the home government to act as [...]

“Poor Jack Spratt” at Trafalgar, 21st October 1805 One’s mental image of the Battle of Trafalgar, when Nelson’s defeat of the French and Spanish fleets established the supremacy of British naval power for a century, is dominated by the death of Nelson himself. In this enormous battle – thirty-three British ships against forty-one of [...]

SS Archimedes – arrival of the screw propeller, 1839 If anyone is challenged today to draw a simple picture of a ship, there is probably a high likelihood that they’ll draw a long hull, a smaller superstructure above it, one or more funnels and the assumption that it is driven through the water by [...]