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.

When HMS Dreadnought was commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1906 this revolutionary new class of big-gun iron-clad warship immediately changed the face of naval warfare, rendering all other battleships worldwide obsolete. The Admiralty realised that as soon as the ship was revealed to the global naval community Britain would be a in race to stay ahead, and so the first dreadnoughts were built in record time. While there were those who regarded the vessel as a triumphant revolution in naval design, the dreadnought initially had its critics, including those who thought its slower, heavier guns left it vulnerable to the secondary armament of other warships. Nevertheless, other countries, notably Germany, and the United States soon began to lay down dreadnoughts. The culmination of this arms race would be the confrontation of the British and German fleets at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916 - the greatest clash of naval firepower in history. This book gives detailed insights into the design, operation and combat history of these incredible vessels.

The shipowner and politician William Schaw Lindsay (1816-77) combined a wealth of personal experience with a meticulous approach to research. Originally published in 1874-6, this is his authoritative four-volume history of the world of ships and maritime trade. Its coverage ranges from the legend of Noah's Ark, through ancient commerce and the colonising expeditions of the middle ages, to the progress brought about by the introduction of steam to the shipping of Lindsay's own day. Details on construction and performance sit alongside explanations of the customs and superstitions of seamen, complemented by full accounts of many important nautical events. Volume 1 encompasses shipping in the ancient world, the foundation of a royal and commercial navy in England, and tales of the Norman invasion and the Crusades to the Holy Land, ending with Christopher Columbus' voyages of discovery. Evident throughout the work are Lindsay's practical knowledge and enthusiasm for his subject.

The shipowner and politician William Schaw Lindsay (1816-77) combined a wealth of personal experience with a meticulous approach to research. Originally published in 1874-6, this is his authoritative four-volume history of the world of ships and maritime trade. Its coverage ranges from the legend of Noah's Ark, through ancient commerce and the colonising expeditions of the middle ages, to the progress brought about by the introduction of steam to the shipping of Lindsay's own day. Details on construction and performance sit alongside explanations of the customs and superstitions of seamen, complemented by full accounts of many important nautical events. Volume 2 encompasses Vasco da Gama's expeditions, the Spanish Armada, and a discussion of the varying fortunes of the East India Company. Evident throughout the work are Lindsay's practical knowledge and enthusiasm for his subject.

The shipowner and politician William Schaw Lindsay (1816-77) combined a wealth of personal experience with a meticulous approach to research. Originally published in 1874-6, this is his authoritative four-volume history of the world of ships and maritime trade. Its coverage ranges from the legend of Noah's Ark, through ancient commerce and the colonising expeditions of the middle ages, to the progress brought about by the introduction of steam to the shipping of Lindsay's own day. Details on construction and performance sit alongside explanations of the customs and superstitions of seamen, complemented by full accounts of many important nautical events. Volume 3 describes the extraordinary progress made by the United States of America in the first half of the nineteenth century, discusses Cromwell's Navigation Acts and the causes and effects of their abolition, and concludes with a warning against excessive legislation. Lindsay's practical knowledge and enthusiasm for his subject are evident throughout the work.

The shipowner and politician William Schaw Lindsay (1816-77) combined a wealth of personal experience with a meticulous approach to research. Originally published in 1874-6, this is his authoritative four-volume history of the world of ships and maritime trade. Its coverage ranges from the legend of Noah's Ark, through ancient commerce and the colonising expeditions of the middle ages, to the progress brought about by the introduction of steam to the shipping of Lindsay's own day. Details on construction and performance sit alongside explanations of the customs and superstitions of seamen, complemented by full accounts of many important nautical events. Volume 4 describes the changes produced by the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 and charts the rise of steam propulsion and its implications for modern-day commerce. Lindsay's practical knowledge and enthusiasm for his subject are evident throughout the work.

From muddy creek to naval-industrial powerhouse; from constructing wooden walls to building Dreadnoughts; from maintaining King John's galleys to servicing the enormous new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers: this is the story of Portsmouth Dockyard. Respected maritime historian Paul Brown's unique 800-year history of what was once the largest industrial organisation in the world is a combination of extensive original research and stunning images. The most comprehensive history of the dockyard to date, it is sure to become the definitive work on this important heritage site and modern naval base.

Sir Geoffrey Callender (1875 1946) was a British naval historian who was the first director of the National Maritime Museum. Originally published in 1943, and edited by Callender, this book was developed to provide individuals in naval service with a guide to understanding and writing effective formal English. The text is comprised of a series of small sections, each of which contains a piece of writing by a prominent author relating to life at sea, tasks relating to the piece and explanatory notes. An editorial introduction, guide to further reading and detailed glossary are also included. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in British naval history or linguistics.

In 1845, British explorer Sir John Franklin set out on a voyage to find the North-West Passage - the sea route linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific. The expedition was expected to complete its mission within three years and return home in triumph but the two ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, and the 129 men aboard them disappeared in the Arctic. The last Europeans to see them alive were the crews of two whaling ships in Baffin Bay in July 1845, just before they entered the labyrinth of the Arctic Archipelago. The loss of this British hero and his crew, and the many rescue expeditions and searches that followed, captured the public imagination, but the mystery surrounding the expedition's fate only deepened as more clues were found. How did Franklin's final expedition end in tragedy? What happened to the crew? The thrilling discoveries in the Arctic of the wrecks of Erebus in 2014 and Terror in 2016 have brought the events of 170 years ago into sharp focus and excited new interest in the Franklin expedition. This richly illustrated book is an essential guide to this story of heroism, endurance, tragedy and dark desperation.

Henry Mathias Elmore (about whom little is known) was a sailor in the Royal Navy who quit in 1783 and set out for Calcutta to be involved with the East India Company's growing trade. Elmore worked as a commander on its ships, and he decided to write this account of sailing to and within the East, which was published in 1802, in order to share his navigational knowledge and to correct earlier inaccuracies. Although much of the work consists of specific, technical directions for piloting ships around Asia, Elmore's instructions give a vivid picture of the complexities of nineteenth-century navigation and the tribulations of sailing during this time. Some of the voyages he describes include sailing around the Indonesian islands and to the Malay coast, and how to reach China from Calcutta. Elmore also includes notes about locations of valuable commodities, such as spices, tea or gold, available for trade.

This is the first major biography of Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay in fifty years. Ramsay masterminded the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from Dunkirk in 1940. Initially, it was thought that 40,000 troops at most could be rescued. But Ramsay's planning and determination led to some 338,000 being brought back to fight another day, although the Royal Navy and the Merchant Navy paid a high price in ships and men. Ramsay continued to play a crucial role in the conduct of the Second World War - the invasion of Sicily in 1943 was successful in large part due to his vision, and he had a key role in the planning and execution of the D-Day invasion - coordinating and commanding the 7,000 ships that delivered the invasion force onto the beaches of Normandy. After forty years in the Royal Navy he was forced to retire in 1938 after falling out with a future First Sea Lord but months later, with war looming, he was given a new post. However he was not reinstated on the Active List until April 1944, at which point he was promoted to Admiral and appointed Naval Commander-in-Chief for the D-Day naval expeditionary force. Dying in a mysterious air crash in 1945, Ramsay's legacy has been remembered by the Royal Navy but his key role in the Allied victory has been widely forgotten. After the war ended his achievements ranked alongside those of Sir Winston Churchill, Field Marshal Viscount Alanbrooke, Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery and General Dwight Eisenhower, yet he never received the public recognition he deserved. Brian Izzard's new biography of Ramsay puts him and his work back centre-stage, arguing that Ramsay was the mastermind without whom the outcome of both Dunkirk and D-Day - and perhaps the entire war - could have been very different.

Richard Biddle (1796-1847), an American politician and lawyer, published this work on the life of the explorer and cartographer, Sebastian Cabot (c.1481-1557), anonymously in 1831. He was responding to widespread criticisms of Cabot - allegedly an unscrupulous character who played the governments of England and Spain to his own ends. The work includes notes on Sebastian's discoveries on the North American continent along with his father, John, and his search for the North-West Passage. As a governor of the Muscovy Company, Cabot initiated the expansion of English trade to Russia and the East. Cabot's own accounts of his journeys have been lost; therefore, Biddle's research is derived from other sources, particularly the writings of Richard Hakylut (c.1552-1616). This study was recognised at the time as the best review of the history of maritime discovery in the period treated, and prompted further research into the Cabot legacies.

Abby Jane Morrell (b. 1809) was the wife of ship captain and explorer Benjamin Morrell (1795 1839). During the nineteenth century it became more common for women to join their husbands on voyages, and Abby insisted on accompanying her husband on his fourth voyage. They left America for the Pacific in 1829 on board the Antarctic, which visited the Auckland Islands and Pacific Islands in search of commercial gain, before returning via the Azores in 1831. First published in 1833, this is Abby's account of their journey. It was ghostwritten by the American author Samuel Knapp (1783 1838) and followed the publication of Benjamin Morrell's own account as part of A Narrative of Four Voyages (also reissued in this series). It includes an account of the violent conflicts with the inhabitants of some of the Pacific Islands, and also contains Abby's comments on the 'amelioration of the condition of American Seamen'.

In May 1845, the famous Arctic explorer John Franklin (1786-1847) embarked on another attempt to find the elusive North-West Passage. He never returned from this voyage, and was last seen by whalers in Baffin Bay in July 1845. Some thirty rescue missions were launched between 1847 and 1859 to find the missing men. Franklin was not the first explorer to make the dangerous voyage to find the route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific, and journalist Peter Lund Simmonds (1814-97) draws from a wide range of reports and publications about these expeditions in his history of the search for the North-West Passage, published in 1851. The detailed account also includes descriptions of the many missions to find Franklin, and this second edition was published later in the same year as the first in order to include updated reports on the progress of his rescue.

In 1879, the steamer Jeannette went missing near Alaska. It had been sent by the American Navy in search of a missing Swedish expedition. Having become trapped in ice, the ship was not heard from for almost two years, when her remaining crew finally reached safety. By this time, any American expedition that focused its efforts further north than the sixtieth parallel was usually considered to be within the Arctic, and these invariably perilous expeditions were often launched in search of lost ships. In 1884, Joseph Everett Nourse (1819 89) published details of all the major American expeditions, including the efforts to rescue the Jeannette, Hayes's attempt to prove the existence of the Open Polar Sea, and Schwatka's 3,000-mile sledge journey across the tundra. Written to make the journals of explorers more accessible to young readers, Nourse's comprehensive text is still of relevance to students of American maritime history.

During the time of the Second Opium War between Britain and China (1856 60), sailor Edward Brown (about whom little is known) was discharged from a trading vessel in Hong Kong. He was then offered the opportunity to captain a Chinese-crewed ship bound for Wai-how on the west coast, though he was warned that it was a risky enterprise because of the ongoing hostilities. Soon his ship was chased by Chinese pirates and Brown was taken captive for many months in Cochin-China (southern Vietnam). Published in 1861, this engaging account of his captivity, attempts at escape, and eventual return to his livelihood as a mate on a trading ship is told in a lively style, and gives a first-hand account of both a turbulent time in one of the world's most dangerous seas, and the different people and customs he encountered in the course of his enforced time on land.

Arthur Cornwallis Evans (1860 1935) was chaplain on the steamship HMS Calliope on a three-year voyage to Asia and Australia (January 1887 to April 1890) that covered 76,814 nautical miles (88,395 miles), with more than 500 days spent at sea. He compiled this lively account of the voyage at the request of his shipmates, drawing information from several of their journals, and published it in Portsmouth in 1890 before the crew dispersed. It contains both brief factual entries about the progress of the voyage and more sustained descriptions of life on board ship and in port, including some naval culinary 'delicacies', an encounter with a robber in Hong Kong, the Russian foritifications at Vladivostok, fireworks in Sydney celebrating the centenary of New South Wales, the opening of Calliope Dock in Auckland (still in use today), visits to several Pacific islands, cricket matches and regattas, and an eclipse of the sun."

Henry Duff Traill (1842 1900) was a prolific journalist, satirist and author. The son of a magistrate, he was called to the Bar in 1869 but began working as a journalist at the Yorkshire Post soon afterwards. He contributed to several newspapers, acting as chief political leader writer at The Daily Telegraph from 1882 to 1897 and editing The Observer for two years. He later became the editor of Literature, holding this post until his death. Among his diverse published works were six biographies, of which the most in-depth was that of Arctic explorer Sir John Franklin. Published in 1896 and drawing on personal documents provided by the Franklin family, it provides a picture of Franklin's character and personal life, alongside a detailed account of his career. Written fifty years after Franklin's presumed death, this work also covers the aftermath of his final ill-fated voyage in search of a north-west passage.

The dissenting minister Andrew Kippis (1725-95) was a Member of the Society of Antiquaries and of the Royal Society. With this work of 1788, he was the first biographer of Captain James Cook (1728-79), although several of Cook's colleagues, including Johann Reinhold Forster in 1778 and David Samwell in 1786, had previously published memoirs of their service with him. Believing that 'his public transactions ... are the grand objects to which the attention of his biographer must be directed', Kippis draws on the official Admiralty accounts of Cook's voyages and focuses on his professional life. The book was criticised at the time for failing to convey Cook's personality and motivation, stressing his achievements without putting them in context. However, it remained the only biography for forty years, and shaped public perception of Cook as a brilliant navigator and commander, a fearless explorer and an exemplary British hero.

First published in 1914, this book was created to provide a comprehensive guide to the processes at the heart of ocean trade and shipping. Prior to publication, these processes had not been dealt with collectively, and descriptions of them could only be found scattered through disparate treatises. Originally aimed at naval and military officers, the focus of the text is explanatory, rather than technical, offering a practical grounding in a broad range of topics. The majority of the information relates to peacetime, but additional reflections are given on the position of ocean trade in the event of war. This is a highly informative book that will be of value to anyone with an interest in maritime history.

James Weddell (1787-1834) a self-taught navigator, started his sailing career aged 9 and later led several voyages towards the Antarctic. This book, first published in 1825, is his account of the voyage of the Jane, which went on a sealing trip to the Falklands and beyond, but turned back before reaching Antarctica itself. It features detailed scientific measurements, careful observations of wildlife, and descriptions of the islands and coasts visited by the expedition, including an important early account of the South Shetlands. It also provides first hand insight into the hardships of a long and perilous voyage. Weddell speaks warmly of the Jane's crew, who withstood frostbite, reduced rations and frequent danger from icebergs. He also reports encounters with other ships, mutiny, scurvy and even the alleged sighting of a mermaid. His thoughtful approach to his mission makes this fascinating exploration narrative an especially valuable historical source.

First published in 1831, this account of a notorious event in the history of the navy makes extensive use of letters, papers and the testimony of those involved. Sir John Barrow (1764-1848) was Second Secretary to the Admiralty, and so had unrivalled access to official documents. He begins with a chapter detailing the first visit to Tahiti by Captain Cook. The mutiny, Bligh's 4,000-mile voyage in an open boat, the capture and court martial of some of the mutineers and the fate of the remainder who settled on Pitcairn Island are described with clarity and even-handedness. Whilst acknowledging that Bligh was 'a man of coarse habits' with 'mistaken notions with regard to discipline', Barrow is unequivocal that the episode 'ought to operate as a warning ... to our brave seamen, not to be led astray ... either by order or persuasion of some hot-brained, thoughtless, or designing person'.

Piracy on the coast of China in the nineteenth century inflicted chaos and serious economic damage, with large mobs of bandits attacking coastal villages as well as wreaking havoc at sea. Yung-lun Yuan's account of this period, published in Chinese in 1830 and in English in 1831, is a colourful depiction of the pirate scourge. Interwoven with the narratives of the pirates themselves as well as those of the courageous civilians who resisted them, the text describes the organisation and rules of the pirates as well as the authorities' attempts to broker peace. Also included is Sir John Dalrymple Hay's account of battling pirates in the 1840s, first published in 1849. Hay (1821-1912) describes his tenure as a British naval commander struggling to suppress piracy. As well as providing a naval perspective on the pirate problem, Hay recounts numerous anecdotes of daring and heroism on the seas.

Racundra's First Cruise is Arthur Ransome's account of Racundra's maiden voyage, which took place in August and September 1922. The cruise took him from Riga, in Latvia to Helsingfors (Helsinki) in Finland, via the Moon Sound and Reval (Tallinn) in Estonia and back. His first book on sailing, it was also the first of his titles that achieved such high levels of success. Although reprinted many times in various editions and formats, Fernhurst Books' hardback edition of the title (2003) was the first to use the original text in its entirety - with the original layout, maps and photographs - and also includes an excellent introduction by Brian Hammett containing a treasure trove of previously unpublished writings, essays and photographs. Ransome's first attempts at Baltic sailing, in his two previous boats, Slug and Kittiwake, are also explained in detail using his writings and illustrations. The life of Ransome's beloved Racundra is chronicled to its conclusion and there is an explanation of how he came to write the book. The original illustrations are enhanced by the inclusion of present day photographs of the same locations. Having gone out of print in 2012, this new paperback edition retains all of the original and additional features; bringing back to life Ransome's epic first cruise in his pride and joy, his treasured Racundra.

Provides a detailed picture of the lives of the commanders and those around them, both at home and at sea. An original and evocative window onto the lives of men who bridged the two worlds of eighteenth century Europe and the Far East.' Professor Nicholas Rodger. This book represents a major contribution to our knowledge and understanding of the East Indian maritime world of the European trading companies. The Dutch East India Company, which ruled large and important parts of what is now Indonesia, and which controlled the highly lucrative trade from the Dutch East Indies to Europe, much of it a monopoly trade in pepper and other spices, was in this period larger and better established than its British counterpart. The book reconstructs and explores the careers of the highlyimportant and influential commanders of the Dutch East Indiamen, the ships which plied the trade routes between the East Indies and the Netherlands. It covers the company's system of examinations, how mates and masters acquired their navigational knowledge, how they lived their lives at sea and on land, and how, making use of the enormous opportunities for private trade, they were able to make substantial fortunes and climb the social ladder. The book contains a wealth of material on the social history of the commanders and those around them, both at home and at sea. JAAP R. BRUIJN is Professor Emeritus of Maritime History at Leiden University. He is one of the leadingmaritime historians in the Netherlands.