Between the last battle fought entirely under oars in 1571 and the first fought entirely under steam in 1866, naval warfare in the Middle Seas and adjacent Atlantic waters was dominated by the sailing warship. This exploration of that distinct period in military history begins with an overview of the galley warfare that dominated the Mediterranean for millennia and a discussion of the technological developments, including the sail and the cannon, which led to the galley's demise. Subsequent chapters discuss the role of sailing ships in every major conflict on the Mediterranean from the Eighty Years War to the late 19th century Austro-Prussian-Italian War. In addition to the major battles, the book also highlights smaller encounters between single ships or light squadrons, important conflicts often overlooked in naval histories.

The infamous Bounty mutiny of 1790 culminated in nine mutineers taking up residence on the small Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific. Rivalry over Polynesian women soon led to homicidal strife and, by 1808, when American sealing vessel Topaz stopped at the island, John Adams was the only mutineer alive. He, however, headed what was soon discovered to be a utopian like Christian society. Beginning with a background look at the circumstances surrounding the mutiny, this volume contains a detailed history of the Pitcairn islanders from the original settlement through the opening years of the 21st century. The island's isolation is contrasted with the international attention garnered from its captivating history, making the society a one-of-a-kind historical conundrum. Unlike previous volumes, this history takes a look at the Pitcairn Island of the 20th and 21st centuries, examining such subjects as the effect of the World War II and the 2004 sexual abuse trial and conviction of six Pitcairners. Helpful maps and photographs enhance the reader's experience.

An expert on perils of the high seas, British native Boxer (1904-2000) translated the Portuguese collection of accounts, originally published as pamphlets, The Tragic History of the Sea 1589-1622 in 1959 and Further Selections from the Tragic History of the Sea 1599-1565 in 1968. They were published

A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 'As brilliant a history of the Vikings as one could possibly hope to read' Tom Holland The 'Viking Age' is traditionally held to begin in June 793 when Scandinavian raiders attacked the monastery of Lindisfarne in Northumbria, and to end in September 1066, when King Harald Hardrada of Norway died leading the charge against the English line at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. This book, the most wide-ranging and comprehensive assessment of the current state of our knowledge, takes a refreshingly different view. It shows that the Viking expansion began generations before the Lindisfarne raid, and traces Scandinavian history back centuries further to see how these people came to be who they were. The narrative ranges across the whole of the Viking diaspora, from Vinland on the eastern American seaboard to Constantinople and Uzbekistan, with contacts as far away as China. Based on the latest archaeology, it explores the complex origins of the Viking phenomenon and traces the seismic shifts in Scandinavian society that resulted from an economy geared to maritime war. Some of its most striking discoveries include the central role of slavery in Viking life and trade, and the previously unsuspected pirate communities and family migrations that were part of the Viking 'armies' - not least in England. Especially, Neil Price takes us inside the Norse mind and spirit-world, and across their borders of identity and gender, to reveal startlingly different Vikings to the barbarian marauders of stereotype. He cuts through centuries of received wisdom to try to see the Vikings as they saw themselves - descendants of the first human couple, the Children of Ash and Elm. Healso reminds us of the simultaneous familiarity and strangeness of the past, of how much we cannot know, alongside the discoveries that change the landscape of our understanding. This is an eye-opening and surprisingly moving book.

This book presents an account of the use and actions of the aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin, one of the primary pieces of the German navy in WWII.

On 2 July 1812, Captain David Porter raised a banner on the USS Essex proclaiming 'a free trade and sailors rights', thus creating a political slogan that explained the War of 1812. Free trade demanded the protection of American commerce, while sailors' rights insisted that the British end the impressment of seamen from American ships. Repeated for decades in Congress and in taverns, the slogan reminds us today that the second war with Great Britain was not a mistake. It was a contest for the ideals of the American Revolution bringing together both the high culture of the Enlightenment to establish a new political economy and the low culture of the common folk to assert the equality of humankind. Understanding the War of 1812 and the motto that came to explain it - free trade and sailors' rights - allows us to better comprehend the origins of the American nation.

On the morning of 22 September 1914, just six weeks into the First World War, three Royal Navy armoured cruisers were sunk by a German U-boat in the southern North Sea. The action lasted less than 90 minutes but the lives of 1,459 men and boys were lost - more than the British losses at the Battle of Trafalgar or in the sinking of RMS Lusitania. Yet, curiously, few have ever heard of the incident. The Coal Black Sea tells the extraordinary true story of the disaster from the perspectives of the men serving on HMS Aboukir, Hogue and Cressy, and the German submariners who orchestrated the attack. It also examines how the ignominious loss provoked widespread criticism of the highly ambitious First Lord of the Admiralty, the 39-year-old Winston Churchill. While the families of the victims grieved, Churchill succeeded in playing down the significance of the disaster and shifted the blame to those serving at sea to save his faltering career. Using a range of official and archival records, Stuart Heaver exposes this false narrative and corrects over a century of misinformation to honour those who lost their lives in the worst naval catastrophe of the First World War.

The intense rivalry in battleship building that took place between Britain and Germany in the run up to the First World War is seen by many as the most totemic of all armaments races. Blamed by numerous commentators during the inter-war years as a major cause of the Great War, it has become emblematic of all that is wrong with international competitions in military strength. Yet, despite this notoriety, 'the Great Naval Race' has not received the attention that this elevated status would merit and it has never been examined from the viewpoint of both of its participants simultaneously and equally. This volume, which contains a comprehensive survey of the existing scholarship on this topic, both English-language and German, as well as important primary source materials from a range of archives in both Britain and Germany, fills this gap. By putting the actions of the British Admiralty side-by-side with those of its German counterparts, it enables the naval race to be viewed comparatively and thereby facilitates an understanding of how the two parties to this conflict interacted. By offering a comprehensive range of German documents in both their original text and in English translation, the book makes the German role in this conflict accessible to an English speaking audience for the first time. As such, it is an essential volume for any serious student of naval policy in the pre-First World War era.

This is a highly readable and generously illustrated history of piracy and privateering in the Indian Ocean. At the beginning of the 17th century, pirates infested the Caribbean waters, harassing the major European powers, but they were eventually driven from the region. Some pirates took refuge in Madagascar, where they attempted to capture the lucrative cargo carried by vessels on the shipping route of the European East India Companies. At the end of the 18th century, in order to weaken British influence in the Indian Ocean, France hired privateers to attack commercial ships of the British East India Company. This was an alternative to open warfare, and heralded the privateers' era. Author Denis Piat recounts the history of the pirates and privateers in the Indian Ocean, especially in Mauritius, from the pirates' arrival in the region to the wrecked ships still to be found today in deep water, and provides portraits of the most famous privateers among them.

When the Queen Elizabeth 2 entered service in 1969 she was the last of the great transatlantic liners and the sole survivor of a bygone era. The modern ship was 963 feet long, 70,000 gross tons, and boasted a service speed exceeding 30 knots. The QE2 made an instant impact worldwide and went on to have an illustrious career spanning four decades. This long-awaited new edition presents the colourful history of the Cunard Line and an engrossing narrative of the ship's eventful history, including construction and launch, service in the Falklands War, various mishaps, the sale of Cunard to Carnival, and the introduction of the new flagship Queen Mary 2. Also covered is the ship's final decade, leading up to her eventual sale to become a floating hotel in Dubai. The story ends with a personal afterword by Commodore Ronald Warwick, recounting his long and unique association with the renowned vessel.

The Battle of Tsushima was the most decisive naval engagement in the century that elapsed since the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. Although these two battles are often compared, the Battle of Tsushima, in which the Japanese Imperial Navy defeated the Russian Imperial Navy, was also unprecedented in many ways. It marks the first naval victory of an Asian power over a major European power; the most devastating defeat suffered by the Imperial Russian Navy in its entire history; and the only truly decisive engagement between two battleship fleets in modern times. In addition, the Battle of Tsushima was also the most decisive naval engagement of the Russo-Japanese War and one that exerted a major impact on the course of that war. Its impact was so dramatic, in fact, that the two belligerents concluded a peace agreement within three months of the battle's conclusion. At the same time, and because it involved two of the world's largest fleets, the influence this battle exerted was both far reaching and long standing. In subsequent years, the symbolic victory of an "Eastern" power over Tsarist Russia using modern technology was feared and celebrated in both the Western and the Colonial worlds. Similarly, and in both Japan and Russia, the Battle of Tsushima had a prolonged impact on their respective navies as well as on their geopolitical ambitions in Asia and beyond. By relying on a diverse array of primary sources, this book examines the battle in depth and is the first to offer a penetrating analysis of its global impact as well as the way its memory has evolved in both Japan and Russia.