BGuthrie Photos: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Ship Models

MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Ship Models:

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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[49] NAMUMO_150816_178.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?) $Recruiting & Disciplining the Crew: Manning the fleet was a perennial problem in the Royal Navy. Boys as young as twelve years old often volunteered in search of adventure, while other youngsters were recruited from poor families or orphanages and thus "bred to the sea." Some men were lured to the Navy by the promise of prize money or to collect a substantial recruitment bounty. Their numbers notwithstanding, the constant need for seamen, especially in times of war, forced the Navy time and again to resort to impressment -- a system in which groups of sailors were authorized to seize able-bodied landsmen and merchant seamen and force them into His Majesty's Navy, often for years at a time. To control the surly crews that resulted, stern measures were enacted to punish infractions of the Articles of War. The ship's captain was normally both judge and jury. Punishments ranged from confining the guilty party in irons or stopping his daily ration of run to tying the culprit to a hatch grating and flogging his back with twelve or more lashes of the dreaded "cat-o'-nine-tails." As Adam Smith observed in "The Wealth of Nations" (1776), the life of a seaman in the Age of Sail was "one continual scene of danger and hardship." This chart reveals a shocking statistic more than 93 percent of all fatalities in the Royal Navy during the Wars of the French Revolution and Empire resulted from non combat-related illness or accidents. <table class="ol"><tbody> <tr><th colspan=3>Estimated Fatal Casualties in the Royal Navy, 1793-1815:</th></tr> <tr><td>Cause of death<td>Number<td>Percentage</tr> <tr><td>Individual and non-combative<br>(disease & personal accidents)<td>84,440<td>81.5</tr> <tr><td>Collective, non-combative<br>(foundering, shipwreck, fire & explosion)<td>12,680<td>12.2</tr> <tr><td>Enemy action<td>6,540<td>6.3</tr> <tr><td>Total<td>103,660<td>100</tr> </tbody></table> The press gang was an important means of manning the Royal Navy during periods of armed conflict. Throughout the 18th century, crew members were sent to round up new men for their ships, by force if necessary. Though widely deplored, it was considered an unfortunate necessity by those in office.$	[50] NAMUMO_150816_182.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?)	[51] NAMUMO_150816_185.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?)
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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1]

") are described as follows:

NAMUMO_150816_001.JPG: Sovereign of the Seas, English First Rate 100-gun Ship, 1637 Model built 1918-1920
NAMUMO_150816_027.JPG: Ships' Draughts: Contemporary dockyard models and the ships they represent were built according to drawings known as draughts (pronounced drafts") or plans. Drawn to scale (often 1:48), they show the hull from at least three perspectives: from above, from the broadside, and end-on. The earliest surviving English draughts are those of Matthew Baker from the 1580s. A century later, William Keltridge produced a series of much more sophisticated plans of Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Rates. The collection of draughts at Britain's National Maritime Museum begins in earnest in about the year 1700.
NAMUMO_150816_033.JPG: Ship Rates: Officials of the Royal Navy divided the fleet into rated and unrated vessels. Rated ships were those that were big enough to warrant a captain as their commanding officer. These were subdivided into six rates. The three largest rates were collectively known as ships of the line, or battleships, that carried from 70 to 100 or more guns on two or three complete gundecks. They fought in the line of battle one behind the other, where their broadside batteries would be most effective against an enemy fleet. Fifth and Sixth Rates were designated as cruisers, the most famous of which were the frigates of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The smallest of the rated vessels were Sixth Rates mounting 20 to 28 guns arrayed on a single gundeck. Types of unrated vessels included brigs, sloops, cutters, fireships, and yachts.
NAMUMO_150816_043.JPG: What Models Tell Us: This pristine model of an English Third Rate ship of about 1705 contains several rare examples of contemporary shipbuilding practice. For example, although Royal Navy ships of the line in the 17th and early 18th centuries were habitually fitted with diagonal braces called "pointers" to stiffen the hull, they are rarely found on dockyard models. Yet, in this instance, with the aid of fiber optic equipment, we can see five such pointers in the hold. Few English dockyard models contain furniture, yet here you can see a lovely carved round table and bench similar to ones shown in a contemporary engraving. Best of all is the model's wheel, which is believed to be the earliest example of a traditional ship's wheel in the world.
NAMUMO_150816_052.JPG: British Third Rate, 70-Gun Ship, c 1705-10
NAMUMO_150816_073.JPG: Ship Decoration: Sailing men-of-war were heavily adorned with carved and painted decorations. Reflecting baroque tastes, those built in the 17th century were especially ornate, with imposing, often whimsical or bizarre statues covering nearly every vertical surface from stem to stern. In order to lower expenses, in 1703 the Admiralty directed that henceforth decorative carvings on Royal Navy ships would be restricted to the bow and stern. This coincided with the adoption of neo-classical principles of art and architecture in which Roman-style arches and Greek pillars took the place of the extravagant carved statues that graced English ships in the previous century. Faced with the crisis of the Wars of the French Revolution, in 1796 the Admiralty issued an order to "explode carved works." This resulted in a drastic reduction in costly decorations. Thereafter, painted friezes were abolished and only small bas-relief carvings were allowed, while the formerly huge and costly figureheads were reduced to simple half-length figures or busts.
NAMUMO_150816_084.JPG: The Lower Deck: Because men-of-war carried very large crews (a fact dictated by the need to man the guns, some of which required 10-12 men each), living space on the lower deck was at a premium, and privacy all but unknown. When not on watch, the men ate, slept, and relaxed there, often entertaining one another with music and dance or telling tall tales over a mug of beer.
NAMUMO_150816_098.JPG: Life Between Decks (1650): For a man-of-war's man, life on board ship centered on the lower deck. Not only did the gun crews exercise the main battery guns there, but even the foretopmen who worked aloft in the masts and rigging spent long hours below deck every day. This is because the lower deck served as living quarters for "the people," or the ship's company. It was here that the men slept in their hammocks when not on watch, and here that they ate their meals on tables interspersed among the guns. When in port, British sailors were forbidden to go ashore for fear they would desert. Confined to their ships, they were sometimes permitted to enjoy the company of local women on the lower deck, also called the gundeck -- a practice that gave rise to the expression, "son-of-a-gun!" The models surrounding this vignette are among the oldest in the Naval Academy Museum collection. All were built in the second half of the 17th century.
NAMUMO_150816_102.JPG: Eating At Sea: In the mid 1600s English men-of-war were expected to carry sufficient food and drink to keep them at sea for up to four months at a time. By the outset of the Napoleonic Wars in the late 1700s, this had been extended to six months. Considering the lack of refrigeration and the large size of the crews of Royal Navy ships, the abiliyy to feed every man three square meals (a navy term) each day -- and all from a single fireheath -- was a remarkable achievement.
NAMUMO_150816_105.JPG: This is the iron firehearth aboard the model of the Leda or Phoenix, both British frigates from 1783. It is positioned beneath the forecastle. Officers' food was grilled on a spit on the hearth's fore side (right), while food for the crew was boiled in copper kettles. The part of the hearth projecting upward is the flue to carry away the smoke. This photograph shows the brick firehearth on Model No. 89, an unidentified Third Rate of c. 1735. The hearth is located in its customary place beneath the forecastle. The bench next to it must have been a warm spot to hover on a cold, blustery night! The sides of the hearth are reinforced with panels of wood braced with metal bands to keep the bricks from shaking apart. Hearths made of iron replaced brick ovens during the 1740s and '50s.
NAMUMO_150816_107.JPG: This engraving shows a brick firehearth on a First Rate ship of c. 1700. The Captain's cook prepares fried and grilled food for the officers, while the crew's food is boiled in the copper kettle.
NAMUMO_150816_110.JPG: A goat reposes next to hencoops on the quarterdeck of the Sixth Rate Deal Castle of 1756. Livestock such as this provided fresh meat and eggs in addition to the crew's regular rations.
NAMUMO_150816_114.JPG: The Grafton of 1679
NAMUMO_150816_128.JPG: Sanitation at Sea: Given the overcrowding of sailing men-of-war and the long periods they spent at sea, adequate sanitation was a necessity. Members of the ship's company used "seats-of-ease" located on the ship's head to relieve themselves, or they simply went over the sides while hanging on to the lower ends of the shrouds. Officers performed their daily ablutions in the relative luxury provided by the enclosed quarter galleries at the ship's stern. Shaving was compulsory only twice a week, though few men wore beards.
NAMUMO_150816_131.JPG: A man relieves himself by using what was known as a "seat of ease" located on the ship's head. This is the source of the current nautical phrase, "going to the head."
NAMUMO_150816_135.JPG: Rather than using a ship's sanitary facilities, most of the time members of the crew instead went to "the chains." This entailed climbing over the sides onto the channels ("chains") and grasping the lower ends of the shrouds. There they literally hung on for dear life while they relieved themselves directly over the sea below.
NAMUMO_150816_139.JPG: Some ships (and models) were equipped with urinals called "piss dales." This example is form a ship of c. 1705-10 (Model No. 7). It is even lined with lead, mimicking real practice.
NAMUMO_150816_145.JPG: The two square brown structures with a hole in the top situated directly abaft the ornate figurehead of Model No. 45 are what we would refer to today as "heads" or toilets for the use of the crew. However, in the 1760s when this model was built they were known as "seats of ease." Enclosed "roundhouses" at either end of the beakhead bulkhead were reserved for the ship's standing officers: the boatswain, the gunner, and the carpenter.
NAMUMO_150816_153.JPG: No matter how impressive they appear from the outside, the primary purpose of quarter galleries was really quite humble: they housed private bathrooms for the exclusive use of admirals and ships' captains.
NAMUMO_150816_159.JPG: English Fourth Rate 50-Gun Ship, possibly the Portland of 1693
NAMUMO_150816_170.JPG: The Capstan: The object, that looks like a hub with spokes sticking out, is a capstan, a device that used human power to hoist the anchor or lift heavy spars. You see it in the upper left of the picture below, with marines applying their muscle power. Below them, in a different perspective, are sailors tending the messenger, the continuous line that wraps around the drum of the capstan. To the far right is the anchor cable coming on board through the hawse hole. The cable, itself, is too thick to go around the capstan, so young boys (little nippers) "nip," or seize the messenger and cable together, then release them so that the cable can be stowed in the cable tier below.

NAMUMO_150816_178.JPG: Recruiting & Disciplining the Crew: Manning the fleet was a perennial problem in the Royal Navy. Boys as young as twelve years old often volunteered in search of adventure, while other youngsters were recruited from poor families or orphanages and thus "bred to the sea." Some men were lured to the Navy by the promise of prize money or to collect a substantial recruitment bounty. Their numbers notwithstanding, the constant need for seamen, especially in times of war, forced the Navy time and again to resort to impressment -- a system in which groups of sailors were authorized to seize able-bodied landsmen and merchant seamen and force them into His Majesty's Navy, often for years at a time. To control the surly crews that resulted, stern measures were enacted to punish infractions of the Articles of War. The ship's captain was normally both judge and jury. Punishments ranged from confining the guilty party in irons or stopping his daily ration of run to tying the culprit to a hatch grating and flogging his back with twelve or more lashes of the dreaded "cat-o'-nine-tails." As Adam Smith observed in "The Wealth of Nations" (1776), the life of a seaman in the Age of Sail was "one continual scene of danger and hardship." This chart reveals a shocking statistic more than 93 percent of all fatalities in the Royal Navy during the Wars of the French Revolution and Empire resulted from non combat-related illness or accidents.

Estimated Fatal Casualties in the Royal Navy, 1793-1815:
Cause of death	Number	Percentage
Individual and non-combative (disease & personal accidents)	84,440	81.5
Collective, non-combative (foundering, shipwreck, fire & explosion)	12,680	12.2
Enemy action	6,540	6.3
Total	103,660	100

The press gang was an important means of manning the Royal Navy during periods of armed conflict. Throughout the 18th century, crew members were sent to round up new men for their ships, by force if necessary. Though widely deplored, it was considered an unfortunate necessity by those in office.

NAMUMO_150816_182.JPG: The press gang was an important means of manning the Royal Navy during periods of armed conflict. Throughout the 18th century, crew members were sent to round up new men for their ships, by force if necessary. Though widely deplored, it was considered an unfortunate necessity by those in office.
NAMUMO_150816_185.JPG: Despite bounties such as this, there were never enough volunteers to satisfy the needs of the Royal Navy.
NAMUMO_150816_188.JPG: This allegorical scene from the mid-18th century depicts members of the Marine Society recruiting young boys from poor houses and orphanages for service in the Royal Navy.
NAMUMO_150816_191.JPG: Between 1799 and 1812, an estimated 9,991 men claiming American citizenry were pressed into service by Britain's Royal Navy, then engaged in the Napoleolic [sic] Wars. On June 22, 1807 the infamous encounter between the USS Chesapeake and HMS Leopard took place where four sailors were forcibly removed from the Chesapeake. British impressment was among the reasons for Congress's declaration of War in 1812.
NAMUMO_150816_193.JPG: The cat-o'-nine tails was wielded by the boatswain's mate to flog crew members as punishment for serious crimes. "About eleven o'clock, or six bells, when any of the men are in irons, or on the black list, the boatswain or mate are ordered to call all hands; the culprits are then brought forward by the master at arms.... All hands being now mustered, the captain orders the man to strip; he is then seized to a grating by the wrists and knees; his crime is then mentioned, and the prisoner may plead, but, in nineteen cases out of twenty, he is flogged for the most trifling offence or neglect..." A contemporary account by William Robinson, author of "Jack Nastyface: Memoirs of an English Seaman," first published in 1836.
NAMUMO_150816_204.JPG: Here two members of a ship's company have been placed "in irons" prior to their trial and punishment. A marine watches over them.
NAMUMO_150816_210.JPG: English Third Rate 56-Gun Ship, c 1650
NAMUMO_150816_228.JPG: Colonel Rogers: Most of the models in this gallery came to the Naval Academy in 1938 as a bequest from Colonel Henry Huddleston Rogers (1879-1935). A prominent American industrialist, he also pursued a distinguished military career as an artillery officer in the New York National Guard. Rogers developed his passionate interest in historic ship models during the First World War. He steadily enlarged his collection in the 1920s through purchases from private families and antique dealers on both sides of the Atlantic. Chief among his possessions were his nearly fifty dockyard models, along with nine rare William and Mary display cases from c 1700. However, he also collected outstanding examples of 18th-century clipper ships, whalers, and merchantmen, plus twenty wood and bone models from the Napoleonic Era. This gallery is a tribute to Colonel Rogers' achievement, displaying his models as he would have wished, "for the public benefit."
NAMUMO_150816_231.JPG: Ship Building Manuals: The Naval Academy Museum is fortunate to have in its collection a number of rare books published in the 1600s and 1700s on the subject of shipbuilding. These include examples written not only in English, but in French and Dutch as well. As these examples show, many of the early texts were lavishly illustrated, and all are full of complex mathematical calculations.
NAMUMO_150816_243.JPG: Ship Models from the Age of Sail: From about 1600 until the end of the Age of Sail in the 1830s, English shipwright-modelers built large numbers of scale-model ships known today as dockyard models. Not only are they beautiful works of art, but because they were built at the same time and place as the ships they depict, dockyard models also serve as invaluable sources of information about how sailing men-of-war were designed, fitted out, and decorated. Only a handful of the actual ships remain, but more than four hundred contemporary English models have survived, fifty of them here at Annapolis. Taken together, they reliably illustrate virtually every facet of the shipwright's trade in the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries. All but one of the dockyard models and most of the French prisoner-of-war models on exhibit came to the Naval Academy in 1938 as a bequest of Colonel Henry H Rogers of Southampton, New York. They are organized to held illuminate numerous facets of daily life in England's Royal Navy, both at sea and in the Royal Dockyards where the King's ships were built and maintained.
NAMUMO_150816_247.JPG: St. George of 1701: Although this is a beautiful model in every respect, what sets it apart from all others is its pristine rigging. Most British dockyard models were finished as hull models only, with no masts or rigging whatsoever. Of the ten percent that were originally rigged, all but a few sustained at least some damage over the centuries. The St. George, on the other hand, has weathered the past 300 years virtually unscathed, making it the finest, most complete example of a fully rigged model from this early period in this or any other collection. The case in which the St. George is displayed was ordered by the model's original owner, Charles Sergison, in the early 1700s. If you look carefully at the individual panes of glass, you will see that they contain swirls and imperfections -- telltale signs of the handmade process by which they were made.
NAMUMO_150816_252.JPG: The Class of 1951 Gallery of Ships To preserve for future generations outstanding examples of the skill and artistry of model shipbuilders, shipwrights and naval architects.
NAMUMO_150816_254.JPG: British Third Rate 70-Gun Ship, c 1715
NAMUMO_150816_270.JPG: The Model Builders: Despite their remarkable skills, the craftsmen who built British dockyard models were so far down the social totem pole that very little was recorded about them. What we do know today has come about largely from the recent discovery of tantalizing notes and signatures hidden in the interiors of a handful of models, including several in Annapolis. George Stockwell and his son of the same name, for example, both placed notes in models they constructed in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The private modeler Allen Hunt liked to put business cards in his models! And in the late 1720s, two young apprentice shipwrights from Portsmouth Dockyard secretly wrote their names inside the Naval Academy's Model No 22. Armed with this information, researchers have shed new light on the men who created England's dockyard models centuries ago.
NAMUMO_150816_273.JPG: George Stockwell was a respected model maker in the late 18th-century England. His penchant for placing notes inside his models had shed new light on the role of the Royal Navy's mostly anonymous shipwright-modelers. This note was found inside Stockwell's model of the Bristol, a 50-gun ship of 1775, now part of the Thomson Collection at the Art Gallery of Ontario.
NAMUMO_150816_275.JPG: The names of two apprentice shipwrights, Thomas Eastwood and William Page, appear on the underside of the capstan partner of the Naval Academy Museum's model of the 20-gun Aldborough or Flamborough of 1727 *No. 22). The signatures were first discovered by Henry Culver in 1923 when he was restoring the model for Colonel Rogers.
NAMUMO_150816_278.JPG: Putting notes inside models was a Stockwell family tradition. This one by George Stockwell's son of the same name was found inside the USNA Museum's model of the Inconstant, a 36-gun British frigate of 1780 (No. 52). It is dated Oct. 25, 1820. For reasons unknown, the younger Stockwell did not finish the model and the name on the stern was mistakenly changed to Perseverance.
NAMUMO_150816_284.JPG: Ship Model Maker's Shop (1700): Authorities today believe that when a Master Shipwright was ordered to produce a fine dockyard model of the ship he was building, he or his Assistant hand-picked one or more shipwrights who were not only adept at working in miniature but who thoroughly knew every phase of ship construction from the keel up. They were presumably given a place to work -- a shed or hut on the grounds of the dockyard -- and provided with the necessary materiel and tools, plus an exact copy of the building draught used to construct the full-scale ship. The best of the model makers were authorized one or more apprentices, but otherwise they were paid only their regular shipwright's salary. When a model was finished, it was given to its new owner and the modelers either returned to their regular jobs as shipwrights or set to work on another dockyard model.
NAMUMO_150816_287.JPG: Elements of Rigging: To those not accustomed to sailing ships, the spider web of rigging seems almost incomprehensible; to the sailor, every line is understandable and functional. Rigging has three basic purposes: it supports the masts, it raises or lowers the yards, and it controls the sails in maneuvering the ship. Rigging that does not move, such as the stays that hold the masts, is known as standing rigging and was generally coated with tar as a preservative. Running rigging is left natural so that it remains flexible and moves easily through the blocks, or pulleys, that can be easily belayed, or secured to a belaying pin. In the mid-1700s, it could take two-and-a-half years to build a 74-gun ship of the line, but in two weeks the masts could be stepped and all of the rigging set up ready for sea.
NAMUMO_150816_289.JPG: Books on Rigging: Perhaps the most comprehensive and important maritime manual published about the time of the Wars of the French Revolution was David Steel's "The Elements of Rigging, Seamanship, and Naval Tactics." The work covers almost all aspects of ship construction, including a description of rope making and beautiful illustrations on rigging, sails, and maneuvering a ship. A similar work, although not as inclusive, was D'Arcy Lever's "The Young Officer's Sheet Anchor" published in 1808 with equally detailed illustrations.
NAMUMO_150816_303.JPG: Fighting at Close Quarters: Ships' cannon had an effective range of about a mile and a half; carronades about 400 yards. But, if two ships came within close range, small arms could create havoc on an enemy's decks. In the event the two ships became entangled, boarders might carry the day with a variety of edged weapons or even the use of belaying pins as clubs.
NAMUMO_150816_306.JPG: Even with the development of paper cartridges, flintlock muskets and pistols needed a fine gunpowder to prime their weapons. A Powder Horn carried a ready supply. The scrimshaw on this horn shows a naval action in Delaware Bay against British forces on July 29, 1813.
NAMUMO_150816_310.JPG: Issues for service in the Royal Navy from the late 1600s through the War of 1812, the sea service pistol is a .62 caliber flintlock with a belt hook instead of a holster.
NAMUMO_150816_313.JPG: The tomahawk style boarding axe was an effective weapon in the hand-to-hand combat of a boarding party.
NAMUMO_150816_316.JPG: British Coehorn Mortar, bronze, cast in the reign of George II, was probably used by the British during the American Revolution.
NAMUMO_150816_326.JPG: The Quarterdeck (1800): Being the realm of the officers, seamen visited the quarterdeck only on business or in the conduct of their duties. From this raised location, midshipmen would learn their naval skills, the officer of the watch would supervise the activities of the ship, and the captain would command in battle. In frigates and larger ships, the quarterdeck was armed with lighter guns, such as the cannonade,a short, lightweight gun of heavy caliber.
NAMUMO_150816_330.JPG: Types of Shot: Ship-borne cannon and carronades fired a wide variety of specialized projectiles designed for specific purposes. Some, such as round shot, were designed to punch holes in the sides of a ship. Others, like bar shot and chain shot, were intended to disable an enemy ship by cutting up its sails and rigging. Grape shot and canister, which spread small projectiles like buckshot from a shotgun, were meant to kill the enemy.
NAMUMO_150816_338.JPG: Location of Capstans: Almost every vessel of any size would have one or more captains. In the Royal Navy, their placement was determined by need, custom, and Navy regulations. To give an idea of the number and location of captains on board the rated ships of the Navy, three models typical of one-, two-, or three-deckers are illustrated with the capstans indicated. The small photos show the capstans in each ship. Note that most of the capstans were built without the removable bars in place.
NAMUMO_150816_340.JPG: Signaling: Communication between ships at sea is difficult; the vessels must get close enough so that the captains can speak to one another or they must use some form of signals. Flags of various designs and colors have been used since antiquity and still undergo constant refinement. Shown here are samples of two signal books from the late 18th century. Flags and pennants in various combinations, identified in the books, carry the meaning of the signal.
NAMUMO_150816_345.JPG: An anonymous naval officer published his Essay on Signals in 1788, just a few years after the American War for Independence. Perhaps experience in some of the fleet actions during the war proved the need for a better system of signals.
NAMUMO_150816_350.JPG: Princess Royal, British Second Rate 90-Gun Ship of 1773
NAMUMO_150816_369.JPG: Determining Longitude: Sailors could determine their position north or south of the equator -- their latitude -- with reasonably accuracy by the 1400s. Determining their longitude -- their position east or west of a base line (the prime meridian in Greenwich, England) -- was a far harder task. As lives continued to be lost due to mistakes in navigation, in 1714 the British government offered a prize of 20,000 pounds to the first person who could devise instruments sufficiently accurate to provide a ship's longitude to within half-a-degree accuracy. An Englishman named John Harrison eventually solved the problem through his invention of not one, but four remarkable clocks. His early marine chronometers gave sailors the capability of keeping the time at sea accurate to within two minutes of the time in Greenwhich. With this information, they could then measure the angle of the sun or certain stars at a precise moment and, by consulting pre-printed mathematical tables, calculate their longitude.
NAMUMO_150816_375.JPG: The Tools of Navigation and Piloting: Navigation is the ability to find your location and adjust your course when out of sight of land; piloting is the safe maneuvering of your vessel using visual landmarks, knowledge of the depth of the water, and the character of the sea bottom. Over the centuries, many instruments have been developed to help seamen find their way.
NAMUMO_150816_378.JPG: The telescope, or long glass, was indispensable at sea for identifying other ships, reading signals, and identifying landmarks. This long glass was used by Danforth Nettleton, a captain of a clipper ship in 1867.
NAMUMO_150816_380.JPG: The nautical term for speed -- "knots" -- comes from the use of the chip log, the pie-shaped piece of wood attached to the light line with knots at set intervals. The log is dropped in the water and the line allowed to run free through the fingers of a sailor who counts the knots for a set amount of time.
NAMUMO_150816_383.JPG: The sextant is a navigational instrument used to measure altitudes of celestial bodies to determine latitude and longitude at sea. It was evolved from the octant about 1757 by Adm John Campbell, RN.
NAMUMO_150816_385.JPG: Magnetic compasses were used to keep the ship on course or indicate the bearing of a landmark. This version, dating from the 1850s, is a tell-tale compass. Suspended from the overhead above the captain's bunk, it told him whether the man at the wheel was attending to his duty.
NAMUMO_150816_390.JPG: Navigation and Signaling (1750): It's no great feat to leave port in a ship and go to sea out of sight of land. What is critical is to be able to get to your destination, whether that is another port or to return home. Knowing the location, heading, and speed of a ship are vital to its safe navigation. Over many centuries, many tools have been developed to guide seamen in the wilderness of the sea. It is also important, especially for a naval commander, to relay orders for the effective maneuvering of the fleet or just to exchange information between ships. Signaling and communications were constantly refined and improved in the Age of Sail.
NAMUMO_150816_396.JPG: New Treatise on Navigation: Pierre Bouguer was a brilliant 18th-century French mathematician who published important works on a variety of topics, many of which had to do with aspects of ship design and ship handling. His book, "Nouveau Traite de Navigation," or "New Treatise on Navigation," published in 1753, made important contributions to the theory and practice of navigating a ship out of sight of land.
NAMUMO_150816_399.JPG: A detailed map of the world indicated the direction and force of the winds at sea. By 1753, much of the world was well mapped, but note that western Canada is not defined and Australia, or Nouveau Hollande, seems to incorporate much of the East Indies.
NAMUMO_150816_402.JPG: This beautifully illustrated diagram of the constellations found in the northern hemisphere helps the seaman find the stars most important for navigation.
NAMUMO_150816_404.JPG: A plate from Bougeur's Treatise illustrates many of the instruments used to find the altitude of the sun or a star. Detailed descriptions accompanied the diagrams.
NAMUMO_150816_407.JPG: The Wreck of the Sussex: Launched at Chatham Dockyard in April 1693, Sussex sailed from Portsmouth that December as flagship of a fleet of 48 warships escorting 166 merchantmen bound for the Mediterranean. In her hold were a million pounds sterling in gold and silver coins intended to purchase the allegiance of the Duke of Savoy in a war against France. After a brief layover in Cadiz, the fleet entered the Mediterranean. On February 27, 1694, a storm struck the fleet; on the third day Sussex foundered, taking with her all but two of the ship's crew, including Adm Sir Francis Wheeler. Recently, wreckage has been found off Gibraltar that is believed to be the remains of the ship. The painting by Tom Freeman depicts Sussex struggling to stay afloat.
NAMUMO_150816_410.JPG: Sussex, British Third Rate 80-Gun Ship of 1693
NAMUMO_150816_415.JPG: Unidentified British Second Rate 90-Gun Ship, c 1720
NAMUMO_150816_434.JPG: Britannia, English Rate Rate 100-Gun Ship of 1682
NAMUMO_150816_436.JPG: Britannia: The huge, 100-gun ship of the line Britannia was the pride of the fleet of King James II. Completed in 1682, she served until 1714 when she was broken up and some of her timbers were used in the construction of a new 100-gun Britannia. The lavish decorations and carvings of the stern can more clearly be seen in the photo to the right. A contemporary print of Britannia shows her decked out with flags indicating her status. Fore to aft they are; the Union Jack, flag of the Lord High Admiral, the Royal Banner of the Stuarts, a Union Jack, and the Red Ensign. James II, King and Lord High Admiral at the time of the print, would soon flee England and be superceded by William and Mary.
NAMUMO_150816_452.JPG: East Indiamen: From 1600 until its demise in the 1850s, The Honourable East India Company ruled a vast empire in the Far East, with armed outposts (factories) located throughout India, China, and the East Indies. These were visited regularly by specially designed ships known as East Indiamen. Although they outwardly resembled Navy warships, British East Indiamen were in fact armed merchant ships whose primary mission was not to fight battles, but rather to carry precious cargoes of spices and other exotic goods such as tea, silk, and porcelain from the Orient back to England. Their impressive-looking armament provided adequate defense against pirates and privateers, but their small crews and light guns made them no match against enemy men-of-war.
NAMUMO_150816_456.JPG: Logbook entitled "Journal of a Voyage to Madras and Bengal in the Hon'ble Companys Ship Princess Amelia, George Millet, esq. Commander, 1792-94" The entry for August 8, 1793, reads in part: "Confin'd in Irons James Jones, a Common Recruit, on the suspicion of having broken open the Steward's Cabin." Fortunately for Jones, he was found innocent of the charges and released the following day.
NAMUMO_150816_462.JPG: In 1804, a convoy of 16 British East Indiamen chased a squadron of heavily armed French warships from the Strait of Malacca by masquerading as ships of Britain's Royal Navy. For this the triumphant officers and men of the Honourable Company were feted and awarded lavish sums of money. This medal was issued to commemorate the British victory.
NAMUMO_150816_483.JPG: Cutters: The cutter was a small naval vessel whose design originated with smugglers operating in the area of Folkstone, England. ... Cutters carried a huge rig of both fore-and-aft and square sails on one mast. The vessels were built for speed, making them useful as dispatch vessels, but their deep-draft limited their usefulness for patrolling close inshore.
NAMUMO_150816_492.JPG: The American Challenge: Following the War of Independence, Britain withdrew the protections that the Royal Navy once provided American shippers. Merchant vessels from the United States were increasingly harassed by North African corsairs and, when England and France again went to war, by the navies and privateers of the two European powers. Calls for the construction of a fleet were rejected as impractical and far too costly. Yet something had to be done to protect American merchantmen abroad. The solution was simple, but brilliant. After heated debate, Congress and President George Washington ordered the construction of just half a dozen frigates, but frigates unlike any the world had ever seen. These were to be super ships, far larger, stronger, and more heavily armed than any other frigates on the high seas. The wisdom embodied in the Navy Act of 1794 was later confirmed by the success of the first six frigates of the United States Navy (three of them "44s") in the Quasi-War with France (1798-1800), the Barbary Wars against Tunis and Tripoli (1801-05), and especially the War of 1812, when Constitution and United States won a series of stirring ship-to-ship duels against their British counterparts.
NAMUMO_150816_495.JPG: French Prisoners-of-War: During the Wars of the French Revolution and Empire (1793-1815), thousands upon thousands of French sailors and soldiers were captured, taken to England, and there incarcerated in often deplorable conditions for years on end. To while away their time, many began hand-crafting trinkets from materials they found in the prison yards. British officials encouraged the practice, permitting them to sell their wares to members of the public at open-air fairs in the prison courtyards or in nearby village markets. With their profits, the prisoners could buy food or clothing from town merchants. The French POWs made all manner of objects from the simplest of materials -- wood, straw, and the bones from their beef rations -- all held together by animal hide glue and tiny tacks. Working singly or in teams, they produced decorative boxes, straw hats, game boards, and toys such as miniature spinning jennies and even tiny guillotines!
NAMUMO_150816_497.JPG: This is one of the largest and most elaborate wooden French prisoner-of-war ship models in existence. Virtually every facet, from the figurehead of a Roman consul to the brightly colored stern with two projecting galleries, is of the highest quality. The hancing pieces at the breaks of the sides are a whimsical fantasy, though the carronades on the poop deck, the flag lockers in the after side of the poop railing, and the scuttlebutts on the forecastle are all rendered accurately.
NAMUMO_150816_508.JPG: This is one of the finest prisoner-of-war models in this or any other collection. It depicts a huge three-decker about to be launched. The model bears the name Caton on the stern.
NAMUMO_150816_513.JPG: Dietrich Constitution Model: The choice of which flags to place on the French POW models probably had more to do with the nationality of the prospective buyer than with the design of the ship! Although no name is written on this model's stern, it has long been called the American frigate Constitution.
NAMUMO_150816_523.JPG: Model Ship on a Paper Sea
NAMUMO_150816_549.JPG: Here we have another highlight of the Naval Academy Museum collection. The small bone model of a three-decker rests inside a case that replicates a miniature stage. To the back and sides are six front-silvered mirrors. The prisoners who made it decorated the wooden case inside and out by gluing to it thousands of pieces of straw, painstakingly arranging them to form geometric patterns. At least three dozen similar models and straw-work cases were produced by the French POWs, though in which prison or prisoners remains a mystery.
NAMUMO_150816_559.JPG: This model, a gift of Mrs. Leslie F Smith, was left in its dilapidated state to illustrate how all but the smallest bone ship models were made. The core of the hull was wood, often soft pine. To this were affixed thin strips of bone and, for the wales, dark strips of baleen. The two tiers of cannon can be retracted by pulling on a pair of draw strings that project through the stern chaser ports.
NAMUMO_150816_567.JPG: Mr. Sterling Morton of Chicago purchased this fine bone model of a French two-decker in London in the 1920s or '30s. He later had it restored and, at his death in 1961, bequeathed it to the US Naval Academy Museum. No one can say today why it has traditionally been called L'Achille (Achilles), as no name is inscribed on the model's stern. The real French ship L'Achille was captured by the British in 1794 during the first fleet engagement of the French Wars. Dubbed "The Glorious First of June," the battle produced the first significant influx of French POWs into England.
NAMUMO_150816_580.JPG: Round Sterns: A fundamental problem associated with wooden ships was the weak construction, and defense, of the ends of the ship, particularly the stern. Traditionally, the stern was built by placing a large timber across the stern post, when setting vertical timbers atop the cross piece, much like a large table fork in appearance. This was inherently weak and guns could not be placed to defend the quarters adequately. Firing into the ends of the enemy ship took advantage of these weaknesses. Royal Navy Surveyor Sir Robert Seppings designed a new form of stern that not only strengthened the construction, but allowed guns to be mounted that could defend the entire aft part of the ship.
NAMUMO_150816_592.JPG: This huge bone model of Adm Horatio Nelson's legendary flagship Victory is said to have taken fifteen French prisoners-of-war two years to build following the resounding British triumph at Trafalgar on October 21, 1805. According to the legend, the model was displayed atop Nelson's tomb in St. Paul's Cathedral for 27 years before it was removed for repairs in 1834. In 1915, it was acquired by the famous Wall Street financier EF Hutton, who brought it to the United States.
NAMUMO_150816_603.JPG: In this vignette, a French prisoner-of-war offers to sell a wooden ship vessel, complete with officers, seamen, and a contingent of red-coated Marines, to English residents from a nearby town. Such negotiations often took place in a prison courtyard opened to the public on a weekly or even daily basis. In other cases, a representative of the POWs took one or more models to the local town to sell on behalf of his compatriots.
NAMUMO_150816_622.JPG: Whittling away the Time: Not surprisingly, the French prisoners-of-war made countless ship models. These range in size from impossibly tiny gems to large and imposing models more than four feet long. Many of those in between were perfectly suited for display on a mantlepiece. The Naval Academy collection contains examples of nearly every size and style of ship model produced by the ingenious French prisoners. Twenty were part of the Rogers bequest of 1936; another fifteen are gifts from various other donors. [Dartmoor Prison] was opened in 1809 as the first prison in England built specifically to house prisoners-of-war. It took three years to build, and at its peak in 1812 it held 9,000 prisoners. In 1813 and 1814, it became the sole prison in England designed to hold Americans captured in the War of 1812. Rather than being confined in prison or worse, sent to a floating prison hulk, captured French officers who pledged their word (in French, "parole") not to try to escape were permitted to reside in specific Parole Towns. There they lodged in houses or cottages and were free to wander about, so long as they remained within one mile of the town's borders. Some of the finest ship models were presumably made under these relatively relaxed conditions.
NAMUMO_150816_624.JPG: Rather than being confined in prison or worse, sent to a floating prison hulk, captured French officers who pledged their word (in French, "parole") not to try to escape were permitted to reside in specified Parole Towns. There they lodged in houses or cottages and were free to wander about, so long as they remained within one mile of the town's borders. Some of the finest ship models were presumably made under these relatively relaxed conditions.
NAMUMO_150816_627.JPG: An anonymous watercolor entitled "18th century British dockyard and harbour." It is believed to be a view of Portsmouth by Duclos-Legris, a French prisoner-of-war there from 1806 to 1814. The ships in the foreground are the dreaded "pontons" or prison hulks.
NAMUMO_150816_633.JPG: Although portrayed a dozen years after the end of the Napoleonic Wars, this foreboding image of a convict ship in Portsmouth Harbor in 1828 conveys the sense of dread that must have greeted the mostly-French prisoners-of-war captured by the British and sent to the "pontons," or prison hulks, during the Wars of the French Revolution and Empire (1793-1802/1803-1815).
NAMUMO_150816_636.JPG: An anonymous pen-and-wash drawing of a British prison hulk, c. 1810. Note the flue or chimney of the fire hearth amidships and the bars on all the gunports.
NAMUMO_150816_650.JPG: This is one of the smallest bone models in the Museum's collection. Unlike the bigger models, whose hulls are normally of wood covered with strips of bone, here the hull was fashioned entirely from a single piece of bone.
NAMUMO_150816_655.JPG: Often confused with French prisoner-of-war bone models from the Napoleonic Era (1793-1815), this is actually a model made entirely of ivory, to include the sails and even the rigging. Moreover, ti was not made by captive sailors or soldiers, but rather by skilled artisans working in the city of Dieppe, France, in the 1830s and 40s. Dieppe was renowned for the ivory work produced by its artisans in the 18th and 19th centuries.
NAMUMO_150816_666.JPG: Naval Manuals: Although much sea lore was passed through oral tradition, numerous books were available on all aspects of ship building and ship handling. Perhaps the most famous of these works was David Steel's "The Elements and Practice of Rigging and Seamanship" first published in 1794. Virtually every dimension of every line and spar in every class of ship and boat in the Royal Navy is identified. Other works focused on more limited, and more technical subjects. Two samples are shown here.
NAMUMO_150816_682.JPG: The weight of a round shot identifies the size of a cannon or carronade. A typical figure mounted 12- or 18-pounder long guns, whereas a ship of the line could mount 24- or 32-pounders as well as batteries of smaller guns.

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- 2003_MD_USNA_Museum_Models: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Ship Models (11 photos from 2003)
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- 2018_MD_USNA_Museum_Prints: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Prints (Beverley R. Robinson Collection) (1 photo from 2018)
- 2015_MD_USNA_Museum_Prints: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Prints (Beverley R. Robinson Collection) (4 photos from 2015)
- 2013_MD_USNA_Museum_Prints: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Prints (Beverley R. Robinson Collection) (15 photos from 2013)
- 2017_MD_USNA_Museum_Prints: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Prints (Beverley R. Robinson Collection) (15 photos from 2017)
- 2018_MD_USNA_Museum_Moran: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Edward Moran Staircase (18 photos from 2018)
- 2017_MD_USNA_Museum_Moran: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Edward Moran Staircase (18 photos from 2017)
- 2011_MD_USNA_Museum_Moran: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Edward Moran Staircase (12 photos from 2011)
- 2003_MD_USNA_Museum_Moran: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Edward Moran Staircase (1 photo from 2003)
- 2015_MD_USNA_Museum_Moran: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Edward Moran Staircase (13 photos from 2015)
- 2018_MD_USNA_Museum_Misc: MD -- Annapolis -- US Naval Academy -- Museum -- Miscellaneous (7 photos from 2018)
- ...More (List all 33 pages)...
Same Subject: Click on this link to see coverage of items having the same subject: [US Naval Academy] [Display ALL US Naval Academy photos] [Military (Non-Events)] [Museums (History)]
2015 photos: Equipment this year: I mostly used my Fuji XS-1 camera but, depending on the event, I also used a Nikon D7000. I retired from the US Census Bureau in god-forsaken Suitland, Maryland on my 58th birthday in May. Yee ha! Trips this year: a quick trip to Florida. two Civil War Trust conferences (Raleigh, NC and Richmond, VA), and my 10th consecutive San Diego Comic-Con trip (including Los Angeles). Ego Strokes: Carolyn Cerbin used a Kevin Costner photo in her USA Today article. Miss DC pictures were used a few times in the Washington Post. Number of photos taken this year: just over 550,000.
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Photo Contact: [Email Bruce Guthrie].