Library Results | Royal Museums Greenwich

Voyages to the East Indies Fryke, Christopher 1929 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.4(5:91)"16"

Mutiny on the Spanish Main : HMS Hermione and the Royal Navy's revenge /Angus Konstam. "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 Drawing on letters, reports, ships' logs, and memoirs of the period, as well as previously unpublished Spanish sources, Angus Konstam intertwines extensive research with a fast-paced but balanced account to create a fascinating retelling of one of the most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."--Provided by the publisher. 2020. • BOOK • 2 copies available. 359.1334

The first mapping of America : the general survey of British North America /Alexander Johnson. "The First Mapping of America tells the story of the General Survey. At the heart of the story lie the remarkable maps and the men who made them - the commanding and highly professional Samuel Holland, Surveyor-General in the North, and the brilliant but mercurial William Gerard De Brahm, Surveyor-General in the South. Battling both physical and political obstacles, Holland and De Brahm sought to establish their place in the firmament of the British hierarchy. Yet the reality in which they had to operate was largely controlled from afar, by Crown administrators in London and the colonies and by wealthy speculators, whose approval or opposition could make or break the best laid plans as they sought to use the Survey for their own ends."--Provided by the publisher. 2020. • BOOK • 2 copies available. 526/.097/09033

Favourite of fortune : Captain John Quilliam, Trafalgar hero /Andrew Bond, Frank Cowin and Andrew Lambert. "The Royal Navy of Nelson's time was not short of heroes, nor of outstanding achievements, but even in this crowded field the career of Captain John Quilliam stands out - so often the right man in the right place at the right time, he was justly described by a contemporary as 'the favourite of fortune'. Born on the Isle of Man 250 years ago, Quilliam has until now evaded detailed study of his extraordinary life. Indeed, while celebrated as a Manx hero, in the wider world beyond the Island one of the most important men on the quarterdeck of HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar remains largely unrecognised. Trafalgar, however, was not even the high point of Quilliam's professional journey. From the lowest rung of the ladder in the dockyard at Portsmouth he climbed to become Victory's First Lieutenant, having already survived two of the bloodiest sea-battles of the era at Camperdown and Copenhagen. In the process he won a share in undreamed of wealth through the seizure of one of the largest hauls of Spanish gold ever taken by the Georgian navy. Promoted Post-Captain, Quilliam reached the apogee of his profession, commanding frigates in the Balitc and on the Newfoundland station in the War of 1812. There, in a bizarre twist worthy of an O'Brian or Forester novel, he defeated an accusation of shirking an engagement with the American super-frigate President in a COurt Martial brought by his own First Lieutenant. This first fully biography of a far-from-ordinary naval officer is itself an unusual collaboration between three writers, each interested in different aspects of Quilliam's career, but united by a belief that it deserves a wider audience."--Provided by the publisher. 2021. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 941.073092

Spreading canvas : eighteenth-century British marine painting /edited by Eleanor Hughes. "Spreading Canvas takes a close look at the tradition of marine painting that flourished in 18th-century Britain. Drawing primarily on the extensive collections of the Yale Center for British Art and the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London, this publication shows how the genre corresponded with Britain's growing imperial power and celebrated its increasing military presence on the seas, representing the subject matter in a way that was both documentary and sublime. Works by leading purveyors of the style, including Peter Monamy, Samuel Scott, Dominic Serres, and Nicholas Pocock, are featured alongside sketches, letters, and other ephemera that help frame the political and geographic significance of these inspiring views, while also establishing the painters' relationships to concurrent metropolitan art cultures. This survey, featuring a wealth of beautifully reproduced images, demonstrates marine painting's overarching relevance to British culture of the era."--Provided by publisher. 2016 • FOLIO • 2 copies available. 75.047(26:42)

A maritime history of the American Revolutionary War : an Atlantic-wide conflict over independence and empire /Theodore Corbett. "While many books have been written on the naval history of the Revolution, this is one of the first to treat it in its entirety as an Atlantic-wide conflict. While its geographical scope is vast, it features overlooked aspects of the war in which sloops and barges fought, actions which proved to be as decisive as the familiar ship of the line confrontations. It is also history from the bottom up, emphasizing the role of the crew as much the not always heroic officers. From naval perspective the rebellious colonies did not gain a military victory, though Benjamin Franklin was able to secure their independence at the peace table in Europe." -- 2023. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 973.35

The memoirs of Captain Hugh Crow : the life and times of a slave trade captain /[introduction by John Pinfold]. Memoirs of Captain Hugh Crow (1765-1829), originally published in 1830 after his death. Crow was involved in the slave trade for seventeen years, making thirteen transatlantic voyages on slave-trading vessels, the last seven of these as master. Crow's Memoirs were written during his retirement but unlike other slave-trade captains he continued to justify his position and defend the trade after abolition. Crow remained convinced that the slave trade was a legitimate form of commerce and even that enslaved people were treated better and had a better life on the plantations than in Africa, both arguments being used by other supporters of the trade at the time. The Memoirs also provide an account of the conditions and practicalities of life at sea on board a slave-trading ship. 2007. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 92CROW

Journey back to freedom : the Olaudah Equiano story /Catherine Johnson ; with illustrations by Katie Hickey. "Aged only eleven, Olaudah Equiano was cruelly snatched from his home in Africa and sold into slavery. He spent much of the next ten years serving various masters at sea, travelling to the far corners of the globe. He witnessed horrendous cruelty and occasional kindness, while experiencing daring adventures and extreme peril. Throughout it all, he never gave up hope that one day he would be free again."-- 2022. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 306.362092

Maxims of state Savile, George 1700 • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. 094:355.6(42)"1694"

Paths of glory : the life and death of General James Wolfe /Stephen Brumwell. "Ugly, gangling, and tormented by agonising illness, Major General James Wolfe was an unlikely hero. Yet in 1759, on the Plains of Abraham before Quebec, he won a battle with momentous consequences. Wolfe's victory, bought at the cost of his life, ensured that English, not French, would become the dominant language in North America. Ironically, by crippling French ambitions on this continent Wolfe paved the way for American independence from Britain. Already renowned for bold leadership, Wolfe's death at the very moment of victory at Quebec cemented his heroic status on both sides of the Atlantic. He became an icon of patriotic self-sacrifice, immortalised in epic paintings and verse. During the past half century, however, Wolfe's reputation has undergone sustained assault by revisionist historians who see him as a bloodthirsty and self-righteous mediocrity, famous for one singularly lucky - though crucial - victory. Was there more to James Wolfe than a celebrated death? Stephen Brumwell's internationally praised biography seeks to answer that question, drawing on extensive research to offer a boldly argued reassessment of a soldier whose short but dramatic life changed the course of world history." --Provided by the publisher. Ã2006. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 92WOLFE

Island of the blue foxes : disaster and triumph on the world's greatest scientific expedition /Stephen R. Brown. "The immense eighteenth-century scientific journey, variously known as the Second Kamchatka Expedition or the Great Northern Expedition, from St. Petersburg across Siberia to the coast of North America, involved over 3,000 people and cost Peter the Great over one-sixth of his empire's annual revenue. Led by the legendary Danish captain Vitus Bering, the ten-year voyage, which included scientists, artists, mariners, soldiers, and laborers, discovered Alaska, opened the Pacific fur trade, and, thanks to the brilliant naturalist Georg Steller, discovered dozens of New World plants and animals. The story of the expedition is a tale not only of adventure and historic achievement, but also of shipwreck, endurance, and "one of the most tragic and ghastly trials of suffering in the annals of maritime and arctic history.""--Provided by the publisher. 2017. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.4(573)"17"

Curious encounters : voyaging, collecting, and making knowledge in the long eighteenth century /edited by Adriana Craciun and Mary Terrall. "With contributions from historians, literary critics, and geographers, Curious Encounters uncovers a rich history of global voyaging, collecting, and scientific exploration in the long eighteenth century. Leaving behind grand narratives of discovery, these essays collectively restore a degree of symmetry and contingency to our understanding of encounters between European and Indigenous people. To do this the essays consider diverse agents of historical change, both human and inanimate: commodities, curiosities, texts, animals, and specimens moved through their own global circuits of knowledge and power. The voyages and collections rediscovered here do not move from a European center to a distant periphery, nor do they position European authorities as the central agents of this early era of globalization. Long distance voyagers from Greenland to the Ottoman Empire crossed paths with French, British, Polynesian, and Spanish travelers across the world, trading objects and knowledge for diverse ends. The dynamic contact zones of these curious encounters include the ice floes of the Arctic, the sociable spaces of the tea table, the hybrid material texts and objects in imperial archives, and the collections belonging to key figures of the Enlightenment, including Sir Hans Sloane and James Petiver."-- 2019. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.4(100)"17"

The English East India Company's silk enterprise in Bengal, 1750-1850 : economy, empire and business /Karolina Hutkovâa. "This book examines the silk-processing activities of the English East India Company in Bengal and presents the Company as a manufacturer rather than a trading body or political agent. Silk was one of the first globally traded commodities; its luxury status and potential to create tax revenues and employ the poor gave it a strategic importance in many economies in Eurasia. The silk industry was also an important sector in Britain; yet, as raw silk could not be produced domestically, the British government encouraged companies to source supplies from its colonies and the territories under its influence. Such projects proved to be challenging; the most successful was the English East India Company's venture in Bengal, where the Company invested over 1 million into developing raw silk production to meet the demands of British weavers. A key component was the transfer of silk technologies from the West to the East - one of the first in this direction rather than vice versa. The outcome of this enterprise was influenced by the business and management capacities of the Company and by British and, eventually, imperial policies, with serious consequences for the Indian economy. The book ultimately presents a case of manufacturing failure, but one resulting from British imperial policies rather than colonial economies."--Provided by the publisher 2019. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 382:677.3

Turner's modern world / David Blayney Brown, Amy Concannon, James Finch And Sam Smiles. "Published to accompany a landmark exhibition of the art of J.M.W. Turner, this publication will highlight Turner's contemporary imagery, the most exceptional and distinctive aspect of his work throughout his career. Rather than making any claims for Turner's protomodernist credentials, it will explore what constituted modernity, and what it meant to be a modern artist, in his lifetime. Turner's career spanned revolution and the Napoleonic War, Empire, the explosion of finance capitalism, the transition from sail to steam and from manpower to mechanisation, political reform and scientific and cultural advances that transformed society and shaped the modern world. While historians have long recognised that the industrial and political revolutions of the late eighteenth century inaugurated farreaching change and modernisation, these were often ignored by artists as they did not fit into established categories of pictorial representation. This exhibition and its accompanying publication will show Turner updating the language of art and transforming his style and practice to produce revelatory, definitive interpretations of modern subjects."--Provided by the publisher. 2020. • FOLIO • 1 copy available. 700.941

Cayman's 1794 Wreck of the Ten Sail : peace, war, and peril in the Caribbean /Margaret E. Leshikar-Denton. "The story has been passed through generations for more than two centuries. Details vary depending on who is doing the telling, but all refer to this momentous maritime event as the Wreck of the Ten Sail. Sometimes misunderstood as the loss of a single ship, it was in fact the wreck of ten vessels at once, comprising one of the most dramatic maritime disasters in all of Caribbean naval history. Surviving historical documents and the remains of the wrecked ships in the sea confirm that the narrative is more than folklore. It is a legend based on a historical event in which HMS Convert, formerly L'Inconstante, a recent prize from the French, and 9 of her 58-ship merchant convoy sailing from Jamaica to Britain, wrecked on the jagged eastern reefs of Grand Cayman in 1794. The incident has historical significance far beyond the boundaries of the Cayman Islands. It is tied to British and French history during the French Revolution, when these and other European nations were competing for military and commercial dominance around the globe. The Wreck of the Ten Sail attests to the worldwide distribution of European war and trade at the close of the eighteenth century. In Cayman's 1794 Wreck of the Ten Sail: Peace, War, and Peril in the Caribbean, Margaret E. Leshikar-Denton focuses on the ships, the people, and the wreck itself to define their place in Caymanian, Caribbean, and European history. This well-researched volume weaves together rich oral folklore accounts, invaluable supporting documents found in archives in the United Kingdom, Jamaica, and France, and tangible evidence of the disaster from archaeological sites on the reefs of the East End."--Provided by the publisher. 2020. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.9163/65

How to survive in the Georgian navy : a sailor's guide /Bruno Pappalardo "Rigidly organised and harshly disciplined, the Georgian Royal Navy was an orderly and efficient fighting force which played a major role in Great Britain's wars of the 18th and early 19th centuries. This concise book explores what it was like to be a sailor in the Georgian Navy - focusing on the period from 1714 to 1820, this book examines the Navy within its wider historical, national, organisational and military context, and reveals exactly what it took to survive a life in its service. It looks at how a seaman could join the Royal Navy, including the notorious 'press gangs'; what was meant by 'learning the ropes'; and the severe punishments that could be levied for even minor misdemeanours as a result of the Articles of War. Military tactics, including manning the guns and tactics for fending off pirates are also revealed, as is the problem of maintaining a healthy diet at sea - and the steps that sailors themselves could take to avoid the dreaded scurvy. Covering other fascinating topics as wide-ranging as exploration, mutiny, storms, shipwrecks, and women on board ships, this 'Sailor's Guide' explores the lives of the Navy's officers and sailors, using extracts from contemporary documents and writings to reconstruct their experiences in vivid detail."--Provided by the publisher. 2019. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.124(036)

The great Anglo-Russian naval alliance of the eighteenth century and beyond / Philip MacDougall. "Naval co-operation between Britain and Russia continued throughout the eighteenth century, with Britain providing huge assistance to the growth of Russia's navy, and Russia making an essential but often overlooked contribution to Britain's maritime power in the period. From 1698 when Tsar Peter the Great served briefly as a trainee shipwright at Deptford dockyard Russia recruited British, often Scottish, shipwrights, engineers, naval officers and naval surgeons who both helped build up the Russian navy and who were also key advisers to the Russian navy at sea. At the same time, naval stores from Russia, especially after Britain lost the American colonies, were vital for the maintenance of Britain's fleet. Moreover, as this book argues, Russian naval power was much more formidable than is often realised, with the Russian navy active alongside the British fleet in the North Sea and winning decisive battles against the Ottoman navy in the Mediterranean, including the battles of ðCeðsme in 1770 and Navarino in 1827. Britain did well to have Russia as a naval ally rather than an enemy. This book provides a comprehensive overview of this important subject, at a time when Britain's relationship with Russia is of considerable concern."--Provided by the publisher. 2022. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 359.0094109033

A rough draught of a new model at sea, 1694 Savile, George 1700 • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. 094:355.6(42)"1694"

Observations on a pamphlet, touching the present condition of the Navy and victualling ... 1700 • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. 094:355.6(42)"1700"

British university observatories, 1772-1939 / Roger Hutchins. Hutchins, Roger, c2008. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 520.1:378.4(42)"1772/1939"

Geography rectified : or, a description of the world ... Morden, Robert 1700 • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. 094:914/919

Suite du neptune francois Fremont d'Ablancourt, Nicolas 1700 • ATLAS-OVER • 1 copy available. 094:912.44(26)"17"

Account of the "Traitâe sur le flux et râeflux de la mer," of Daniel Bernoulli : and A treatise on the attraction of ellipsoids /by J. W. Lubbock, Esq. F.R.S. Lubbock, J. W.-(John William), 1830. • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. 5:094

The worlds of unfree labour : from indentured servitude to slavery /edited by Colin A. Palmer. 1998. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 326.1

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