Page 243 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol V

2020 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

Navies under Sail The Age of Sail reached its apogee during the
The powerful waves of the Atlantic called for a hardier Napoleonic Wars of 1800–1815. Great Britain alone car-
construction than the gentler waters of the Mediter- ried over a thousand vessels on its naval lists manned by
ranean. The clinker-built longships of the Vikings served more than 140,000 men and officers and supported by
for raiding and eventual exploration and settlement of the largest naval infrastructure in history.An estimated 20
Iceland and Greenland, but it was the roundship that rap- percent of the adult population of England owed at least
idly came to dominate European navies. Ideally suited for part of their livelihood to the British Admiralty by 1812,
trade with their deep hulls, nations converted these mer- and the national treasury rapidly depleted supporting
chant ships to warships in times of conflict by adding a that institution despite heavy tax rates and continued
tower at the bow and stern. Soldiers supplemented the income from the largest merchant fleet in the world.The
normal crew, ready to unleash arrows at the enemy Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 confirmed the ascendancy of
before boarding (at Sluys in 1340, the English sent 250 Britain’s Royal Navy to world dominance (despite a
ships against the French; all but three or four had for- notable challenge by an ill-prepared United States during
merly been merchantmen). Only with the development of the War of 1812).That dominance continued for another
the cannon would combat transition from an emphasis century, but the coal-fed fires of the Industrial Revolution
on melee to the use of the warship as a fire platform.The soon eclipsed the Age of Sail.
roundships stretched longer in relation to their beam,
with cannons mounted along their sides to maximize fire- Navies under Steam
power (thus firing “broadsides”). Cannons, mounted on Conservative naval hierarchies initially resisted use of the
naval carriages that could be drawn inboard for rapid first (and least dependable) steam engines, but by the
reloading, fired through closeable embrasures cut in the mid-1800s, the advantages of an unwavering source of
side of the vessel. The resulting shift in tactics was most propulsion outweighed the disadvantages of dirty decks
noticeable during the confrontation between an English and space lost to coal bunkers.The Industrial Revolution
fleet relying on firepower and maneuver and a Spanish created a pace of change in propulsion unheralded in ear-
fleet more dependent on the older boarding techniques. lier ages. In the 1830s steam engines driving side–paddle
This pivotal campaign of 1588 saw the Spanish Armada wheels served as auxiliaries to sails. By the 1860s the
driven from the English Channel by a combination of navies of the American Civil War (1861–1865) devel-
English cannon and adverse weather. oped ironclad hulls moved by steam-driven propellers. In
Naval vessels also played the key role in opening the the 1880s rapid improvement in steam engines allowed
remainder of the world to European hegemony. Begin- sails to drop to an auxiliary form of power. By the
ning in the late 1400s, Portugal’s naval vessels rounded Spanish-American War of 1898 and the Russo-Japanese
Africa and began an exploitation of India and Asia that War of 1905, sails had disappeared from new warship
would be continued by, most notably, Great Britain. In classes. As World War I (1914–1918) approached, oil
the Western Hemisphere, Spain’s arrival in the New began to replace coal as the producer of steam, and the
World signaled the beginning of naval conflicts that newest type of naval vessel, the submarine, used electric
lasted throughout the Age of Sail, as Spain struggled with batteries for subsurface propulsion. Less than fifty years
England, France, and Holland for control of the new rich later, nuclear engines powered warships across, and
lands. As the Europeans squabbled among themselves, beneath, the waves.
their American colonies rebelled, and in the process of The Industrial Revolution also permitted changes in
rebellion found it necessary to rely on converted mer- metallurgy, chemistry, and other sciences, which in turn
chantmen, privateers (privately owned vessels sailing accelerated change in all other aspects of naval technol-
under a government commission known as a letter of ogy. Whereas the ironclads of the American Civil War
marque), and allied naval forces to secure eventual victory. engaged at ranges of a few hundred yards or less, in 1905