A bold and authoritative maritime history of World War II which takes a fully international perspective and challenges our existing understanding Command of the oceans was crucial to winning World War II. By the start of 1942 Nazi Germany had conquered mainland Europe, and Imperial Japan had overrun Southeast Asia and much of the Pacific. How could Britain and distant America prevail in what had become a "war of continents"? In this definitive account, Evan Mawdsley traces events at sea from the first U-boat operations in 1939 to the surrender of Japan. He argues that the Allied counterattack involved not just decisive sea battles, but a long struggle to control shipping arteries and move armies across the sea. Covering all the major actions in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, as well as those in the narrow seas, this book interweaves for the first time the endeavors of the maritime forces of the British Empire, the United States, Germany, and Japan, as well as those of France, Italy, and Russia.

The story of Britain's colourful maritime past seen through the changing fortunes of the Cornish port of Falmouth. Within the space of few years, during the 1560s and 1570s, a maritime revolution took place in England that would contribute more than anything to the transformation of the country from a small rebel state on the fringes of Europe into a world power. Until then, it was said, there was only one Englishman capable of sailing across the Atlantic. Yet within ten years an English ship with an English crew was circumnavigating the world. At the same time in Cornwall, in the Fal estuary, just a single building - a lime kiln - existed where the port of Falmouth would emerge. Yet by the end of the eighteenth century, Falmouth would be one of the busiest harbours in the world. 'The Levelling Sea' uses the story of Falmouth's spectacular rise and fall to explore wider questions about the sea and its place in history and imagination. Drawing on his own deep connection with Cornwall, award-winning author Philip Marsden writes unforgettably about the power of the sea and its ability to produce greed on a piratical scale, dizzying corruption, and grand and tragic aspirations.

A vogue for travel 'stunts' flourished in England between 1590 and the 1620s: playful imitations or burlesques of maritime enterprise and overland travel that collectively appear to be a response to particular innovations and developments in English culture. This study is the first full length scholarly work to focus on the curious phenomenon of 'madde voiages', as the writer William Rowley called them. Anthony Parr shows that the mad voyage (as Rowley and others conceived it) had surprisingly deep and diverse roots in traditional travel practices, in courtly play and mercantile custom, and in literary culture. Looking in detail at several of the best-documented exploits, Parr situates them in the ferment of such ventures during the period in question; but also reaches back to explore their classical and mediaeval antecedents, and considers their role in creating a template for eccentric English adventure in later centuries. Renaissance Mad Voyages brings together literary and historical enquiry in order to address the implications of an interesting and neglected cultural trend. Parr's investigation of the rash of travel exploits in the period leads to extensive research on the origins of the wager on travel and its role in the expansion of English tourism and trading activity.

Finalist for the 2017 Washington State Book Award in General Nonfiction / History The plaque said this was the winter fishing hut of Thuridur Einarsdottir, one of Iceland's greatest fishing captains, and that she lived from 1777 to 1863. "Wait," anthropologist and former seawoman Margaret Willson said. "She??" So began a quest. Were there more Icelandic seawomen? Most Icelanders said no, and, after all, in most parts of the world fishing is considered a male profession. What could she expect in Iceland? She found a surprise. This book is a glimpse into the lives of vibrant women who have braved the sea for centuries. Their accounts include the excitement, accidents, trials, and tribulations of fishing in Iceland from the historic times of small open rowboats to today's high-tech fisheries. Based on extensive historical and field research, Seawomen of Iceland allows the seawomen's voices to speak directly with strength, intelligence, and - above all - a knowledge of how to survive. This engaging ethnographic narrative will intrigue both general and academic readers interested in maritime culture, the anthropology of work, Nordic life, and gender studies.

Showcasing established and new patterns of research, The Routledge Research Companion to Travel Writing takes an interdisciplinary approach to scholarship and to travel texts themselves. The volume adopts a thematic approach, with each contributor considering a specific aspect of travel writing - a recurrent motif, an organising principle or a literary form. All of the essays include a discussion of representative travel texts, to ensure that the volume as a whole represents a broad historical and geographical range of travel writing. Together, the 25 essays and the editors' introduction offer a comprehensive and authoritative reflection of the state of travel writing criticism and lay the ground for future developments.

A beautifully illustrated selection of stories about the lighthouses and their guardians found in some of the most remote places on earth.

There is something beautiful and wild in the impossible architecture of lighthouses. They have been the homes and workplaces of men and women whose romantic guardianship has saved countless lives from cruel seas. Yet while that way of life fades away, as the lights go out and the buildings crumble, we still have their stories.

From a blind lighthouse keeper tending a light in the Arctic Circle, to an intrepid young girl saving ships from wreck at the foot of her father's lighthouse, and the plight of the lighthouse crew cut off from society for forty days, this is a glorious book full of illuminating stories that will transport the reader to the world's most isolated and inspiring lighthouses.

With over thirty tales that explore the depths to which we can sink and the heights to which we can soar as human beings, and accompanied by beautiful illustrations, nautical charts, maps, architectural plans and curious facts, A Brief Atlas of the Lighthouses at the End of the World is as full of wonder as the far flung lighthouses themselves.

In October 1917, an invasion force of some 25,000 German soldiers, accompanied by a flotilla of 10 dreadnoughts, 350 other vessels, a half-dozen zeppelins, and 80 aircraft, attacked the Baltic islands of Dago, Osel, and Moon at the head of the Gulf of Riga. It proved to be the most successful amphibious operation of World War I. The three islands fell, the Gulf was opened to German warships and was now a threat to Russian naval bases in the Gulf of Finland, and 20,000 Russians were captured. The invasion proved to be the last major operation in the East. Although the invasion had achieved its objectives and placed the Germans in an excellent position for the resumption of warfare in the spring, within three weeks of the operation, the Bolsheviks took power in Russia (November 7, 1917) and Albion faded into obscurity as the war in the East came to a slow end.

In this fascinating and exciting overview, Donald B. Freeman explores the role of the Pacific Ocean in human history. Covering over one third of the globe, the Pacific Ocean plays a vital role in the lives and fortunes of more than two billion people who live on its rim-lands and islands. It has played a crucial part in shaping the histories of the different Pacific cultures, towards which it has appeared in a variety of different guises. Exploring the ocean's place in human history, this wide ranging book draws together the long and varied physical, economic, cultural and political history of the Pacific, from Prehistory through to the present day. It takes an interdisciplinary approach to show the changing viewpoints of those who explored, exploited and settled the Pacific, including the inhabitants of its Asian and American rim-lands. The book draws on new research in a variety of areas, such as early Pacific migrations, impacts of European colonization, the effects of climate change, and current economic and political developments. It provides a uniquely broad overview that will be of vital interest to students and to all those with an interest in World History.

A fascinating personal memoir of underwater combat in World War II, told by a man who played a major role in those dangerous operations. Frank and beautifully written, Submarine Commander's breezy style and irrepressible humor place it in a class by itself. This book will be of lasting value as a submarine history by an expert and as an enduring military and political analysis. In early 1943 the submarine USS Scorpion, with Paul R. Schratz as torpedo officer, slipped into the shallow waters east of Tokyo, laid a minefield, and made successful torpedo attacks on merchant shipping. Schratz participated in many more patrols in heavily mined Japanese waters as executive officer of the Sterlet and the Atule. At war's end he participated in the Japanese surrender, aided the release of American POWs, and had a key role in the disarming of enemy suicide submarines. He then took command of the revolutionary new Japanese submarine I-203 and returned it to Pearl Harbor. But this was far from the end of Schratz's submarine career. In 1949 he commissioned the ultramodern USS Pickerel, the most deadly submarine then afloat, and set a world's record in a 21-day, 5,200-mile submerged passage from Hong Kong to Honolulu. With the outbreak of the Korean War, the Pickerel was immediately sent to Korea to participate in secret intelligence operations only recently declassified and never before revealed in print. Schratz's broad military experience makes this a far from ordinary memoir.

Between 1500 and 1750, European expansion and global interaction produced vast wealth. As goods traveled by ship along new global trade routes, piracy also flourished on the world's seas. Pillaging the Empire tells the fascinating story of maritime predation in this period, including the perspectives of both pirates and their victims. Brushing aside the romantic legends of piracy, Kris Lane pays careful attention to the varied circumstances and motives that led to the rise of this bloodthirsty pursuit of riches, and places the history of piracy in the context of early modern empire building. This second edition of Pillaging the Empire has been revised and expanded to incorporate the latest scholarship on piracy, maritime law, and early modern state formation. With a new chapter on piracy in East and Southeast Asia, Lane considers piracy as a global phenomenon. Filled with colorful details and stories of individual pirates from Francis Drake to the women pirates Ann Bonny and Mary Read, this engaging narrative will be of interest to all those studying the history of Latin America, the Atlantic world, and the global empires of the early modern era.

The story of how the fearsome Atlantic Ocean was explored by early sailors, including the Vikings, whose brilliant navigation matched their bravery. The early voyages into the deep waters of the Atlantic rank among the greatest feats of exploration. In tiny, fragile vessels the Irish monks searched for desolate places in the ocean in which to pursue their vocation; their successors, the Vikings, with their superb ship-building skills, created fast, sea-worthy craft which took them far out into the unknown, until they finally reached Greenland and America. G.J. Marcus looks at the history of theseexpeditions not only as a historian, but also as a practical sailor. Besides the problem of what these early explorers actually achieved, he poses the even more fascinating question of how they did it, without compass, quadrant, or astrolabe. From the opening descriptions of the launching of a curach on the Aran Islands, through the great pages of the Norse Sagas describing the first recorded sighting of America, the author brilliantly conveys theexcitement and danger of the conquest of the North Atlantic in a narrative that is based equally on scholarly research and sound seamanship. G.J. MARCUS's previous books include The Maiden Voyage, on the sinking of the Titanic.

The First World War and subsequent peace settlement shaped the course of the twentieth century, and the profound significance of these events were not lost on Harold Temperley, whose diaries are presented here. An established scholar, and later one of Britain's foremost modern and diplomatic historians, Temperley enlisted in the army at the outbreak of the war in August 1914. Invalided home from the Dardanelles campaign in 1915, he spent the remainder of the war and its aftermath as a general staff officer in military intelligence. Here he played a significant role in preparing British strategy for the eventual peace conference and in finalising several post-war boundaries in Eastern Europe. Later, in the 1920s and 1930s, Temperley was to co-edit the British diplomatic documents on the origins of the war; and the vicissitudes of modern Great Power politics were to be his principal preoccupation. Beginning in June 1916, the diary presents a more or less daily record of Temperley's activities and observations throughout the war and subsequent peace negotiations. As a professional historian he appreciated the significance of eyewitness accounts, and if Temperley was not at the very heart of Allied decision-making during those years, he certainly had a ringside seat. Trained to observe accurately, he recorded the concerns and confusions of wartime, conscious always of the historical significance of what he observed. As a result there are few sources that match Temperley's diary, which presents a fascinating and unique perspective upon the politics and diplomacy of the First World War and its aftermath.

Nusantaria - often referred to as 'Maritime Southeast Asia' - is the world's largest archipelago and has, for centuries, been a vital cultural and trading hub. Nusantara, a Sanskrit, then Malay, word referring to an island realm, is here adapted to become Nusantaria - denoting a slightly wider world but one with a single linguistic, cultural and trading base. Nusantaria encompasses the lands and shores created by the melting of the ice following the last Ice Age. These have long been primarily the domain of the Austronesian-speaking peoples and their seafaring traditions. The surrounding waters have always been uniquely important as a corridor connecting East Asia to India, the Middle East, Europe and Africa. In this book, Philip Bowring provides a history of the world's largest and most important archipelago and its adjacent coasts. He tells the story of the peoples and lands located at this crucial maritime and cultural crossroads, from its birth following the last Ice Age to today.

'A wonderfully quirky history' SUNDAY TIMES 'The perfect read while you wait for your summer holiday to begin' MAIL ON SUNDAY 'Quippy anecdotes are woven with historical reference and geographical context to give full colour' IRISH TIMES A bulwark against invasion, a conduit for exchange and a challenge to be conquered, the English Channel - 21 miles wide at its narrowest point - represents much more than a conductor of goods and people. Criss-crossing the Channel, Charlie Connelly collects its stories and brings them vividly to life, from tailing Oscar Wilde's shadow through the dark streets of Dieppe to unearthing Britain's first beauty pageant at the end of Folkestone pier. We learn that Louis Bleriot was actually a terrible pilot, the tragic fate of the first successful Channel swimmer, and that if a man with a buttered head and pigs' bladders attached to his trousers hadn't fought off an attack by dogfish we might never have had a Channel Tunnel. Charlie Connelly uncovers remarkable tales of swimmers and flyers, pirates and soldiers, heroes and villains, pioneers and refugees. Their stories are all united by the English Channel to ensure the sea that makes us an island will never be the same again.

A familiar sight on the Thames at London Bridge, HMS Belfast is a Royal Navy light cruiser, launched in March 1938. Belfast was part of the British naval blockade against Germany and from November 1942 escorted Arctic convoys to the Soviet Union and assisted in the destruction of the German warship Scharnhorst. In June 1944 Belfast supported the Normandy landings and in 1945 was redeployed to the British Pacific Fleet. After the war she saw action in the Korean War and a number of other overseas actions. She has been part of the Imperial War Museum since 1978, with 250,000 visitors annually.

This fascinating book comprises a series of documents that give information on the building of the ship, her wartime service history and life on board.

Maritime security is of vital importance to the South China Sea, a critical sea route for maritime transport of East Asian countries including China. The adjacent countries have rendered overlapping territorial and/or maritime claims in the South China Sea which complicate the situation of maintaining maritime security and developing regional cooperation there. This book focuses on contemporary maritime security in the South China Sea as well as its connected sea area, the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. It identifies and examines selected security issues concerning the safety of navigation, crackdown on transnational crimes including sea piracy and maritime terrorism, and conflict prevention and resolution. In the context of non-traditional security, issues such as maritime environmental security and search and rescue at sea are included. The book explores ways and means of international cooperation in dealing with these maritime security issues.

Discusses the lessons which Britain learned in the war of 1739-48 which, when applied in later wars, brought about Britain's global naval supremacy. The British involvement in the war of 1739-1748 has been generally neglected. Standing between the great victories of Marlborough in the War of Spanish Succession [1701-1713] and the even greater victories of the Seven Years War[1756-1763], it has been dismissed as inconclusive and incompetently managed. For the first time this book brings together the political and operational conduct of the war to explore its contribution to a critical development in British history during the eighteenth century - the emergence of Britain as the paramount global naval power. The war posed a unique set of problems for British politicians, statesmen and servicemen. They had to overcome domestic and diplomatic crises, culminating in the rebellion of 1745 and the threat of French invasion. Yet, far from being incompetent, these people handled the crises and learned a great deal about the conduct of global warfare. Thechanges they made and decisions they took prepared Britain for the decisive Anglo-French clash of arms in the Seven Years War. In this misunderstood war lie some of the key factors that made Britain the greatest naval power for the next one hundred and fifty years. RICHARD HARDING is Professor of Organisational History at the University of Westminster. He is the author of numerous articles and books on naval history and editor, with Helen Doe,of Naval Leadership and Management, 1650-1950 (Boydell, 2012).

On 22 September 1914 between 6.20am and 7.55am three British cruisers went down off the Dutch coast, HMS Aboukir, Hogue and Cressy. Of the combined crew of 2296 no less than 1459 men perished on their ships or in the sea. There were 837 survivors. The perpetrator was a simple German submarine, U-9. This event in the early days of the First World War came as a big boost to the Germans. But for the British it was a dire blow, the biggest loss ever inflicted on the Royal Navy, hitherto deemed invincible. The suffering was the more grievous now that among the fatalities were thirteen young boys, aged 15 and 16, while most of the other victims were reservists, mainly young family fathers from a few villages in the Chatham area. After some years of research the author has written a uniquely accessible reconstruction of this tragedy. Successively he pictures the build-up to this calamity, the crew's trials and tribulations, as well as the consequences of the incident from both a British and a German point of view. The hard times of the crewmembers had to go through are reflected in the personal accounts of some of the survivors of the catastrophe. Two Dutch merchant vessels had rescued a number of them and the men were then received and looked after in Holland. That too is part of this pitiful tragedy, which, though almost forgotten, was one of the largest calamities ever in the history of naval warfare.

Maritime Musicians and Performers on Early Modern English Voyages aims to tell the full story of early English shipboard performers, who have been historically absent from conversations about English navigation, maritime culture, and economic expansion. Often described reductively in voyaging accounts as having one function, in fact maritime performers served many communicative tasks. Their lives were not only complex, but often contradictory. Though not high-ranking officers, neither were they lower-ranking mariners or sailors. They were influenced by a range of competing cultural practices, having spent time playing on both land and sea, and their roles required them to mediate parties using music, dance, and theatre as powerful forms of nonverbal communication. Their performances transcended and breached boundaries of language, rank, race, religion, and nationality, thereby upsetting conventional practices, improving shipboard and international relations, and ensuring the success of their voyages.

Since its publication in 1911, Sir Julian's Corbett's Some Principles of Maritime Strategy has remained a key document within naval strategic thinking. Yet despite his undoubted influence, Corbett's theories have not been subjected to scientific review and systematic comparison with other naval thinkers. In this assessment, Dr Widen has provided a fresh interpretation of Corbett's legacy and his continued relevance as a classic theorist of naval war. Divided into three parts, the book begins with a brief biographical overview of Corbett's life, highlighting in particular his bibliographic history and the influences on his thinking. The latter two sections then describe and assess Corbett's views on military and naval theory, respectively. Together these two parts represent his overall theory of maritime strategy, including his conception of limited war, his intellectual debt to Clausewitz, command of the sea, his critic of decisive battle, as well as the different methods of naval operations. By means of a thorough assessment of Corbett's theory of maritime strategy, Dr Widen highlights the continued relevance of his theories. Both the strengths and shortcomings of Corbett's thinking are discussed and reflections offered on their intellectual, practical and doctrinal value. In so doing, Dr Widen has written a book that deserves to be read by anyone with an interest in the past, present or future of maritime strategy.

'A vivid account of a forgotten chapter of British naval history.' Dan Snow, Historian, TV Presenter and Broadcaster The true story of one of the most notorious mutinies in naval history, which provided inspiration for Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin and C.S. Forester's Hornblower novels. In 1797 the 32-gun Royal Navy frigate HMS Hermione was serving in the Caribbean, at the forefront of Britain's bitter sea war against Spain and Revolutionary France. Its commander, the sadistic and mercurial Captain Hugh Pigot ruled through terror, flogging his men mercilessly and pushing them beyond the limits of human endurance. On the night of 21 September 1797, past breaking point and drunk on stolen rum, the crew rebelled, slaughtering Pigot and nine of his officers in the bloodiest mutiny in the history of the Royal Navy. Handing the ship over to the Spanish, the crew fled, sparking a manhunt that would last a decade. Seeking to wipe clean this stain on its name, the Royal Navy pursued the traitorous mutineers relentlessly, hunting them across the globe, and, in 1801, seized the chance to recover its lost ship in one of the most daring raids of the Age of Fighting Sail. Anchored in a heavily fortified Venezuelan harbour, the Hermione - now known as the Santa Cecilia - was retaken in a bold night-time action, stolen out from under the Spanish guns. Back in British hands, the Hermione was renamed once more - its new identity a stark warning to would-be mutineers: Retribution. Drawing on letters, reports, ships' logs, and memoirs of the period, as well as previously unpublished Spanish sources, Angus Konstam intertwines extensive research with a fast-paced but balanced account to create a fascinating retelling of one of the most notorious events in the history of the Royal Navy, and its extraordinary, wide-ranging aftermath.