Library Results | Royal Museums Greenwich

LGBT Victorians : sexuality and gender in the nineteenth-century archives /Simon Joyce. "We think of those whose primary self-definition is in terms of sexuality (lesbians, gay men, bisexuals) and those for whom it is gender identity (intersex and transgender people, genderqueers) as simultaneously in coalition and distinct from each other. Re-examining how the Victorians considered such identity categories to have produced and shaped each other can ground a more durable basis for strengthening our present LGBTQ+ coalition. LGBT Victorians reconsiders the significance of sexology and efforts to retrospectively discover transgender people in historical archives, particularly in the gap between what the nineteenth century termed the sodomite and hermaphrodite. It highlights a broad range of individuals (including Anne Lister, and the defendants in the "Fanny and Stella" trial of the 1870s), key thinkers and activists (including Karl-Heinrich Ulrichs and Edward Carpenter), and writers such as Walt Whitman and John Addington Symonds to map the complicated landscape of gender and sexuality in the Victorian period."-- 2022. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 306.7609/034

Shaping the Royal Navy : Technology, authority and naval architecture, c.1830-1906 /Don Leggett. "The nineteenth-century Royal Navy was transformed from a fleet of sailing wooden walls into a steam powered machine. Britain's warships were her first line of defence, and their transformation dominated political, engineering and scientific discussions. They were the products of engineering ingenuity, political controversies, naval ideologies and the fight for authority in nineteenth-century Britain. Shaping the Royal Navy provides the first cultural history of technology, authority and the Royal Navy in the years of Pax Britannica. It places the story firmly within the currents of British history to reconstruct the controversial and high-profile nature of naval architecture. The technological transformation of the Navy dominated the British government and engineering communities. This book explores its history, revealing how ship design became a modern science, the ways that actors competed for authority within the British state and why the nature of naval power changed."--Provided by the publisher. 2015. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.49(42)

War in the Chesapeake : the British campaigns to control the Bay, 1813-14 /Charles Patrick Neimeyer. "In the early nineteenth century, the United States of America was far from united. The United States faced internal strife over the extent of governance and the rights of individual states. The United States' relationship with their former colonial power was also uncertain. Britain impressed American sailors and supported Native Americans' actions in the northwest and on the Canadian border. In the summer of 1812, President James Madison chose to go to war against Britain. In the early nineteenth century, the United States of America was far from united. The United States faced internal strife over the extent of governance and the rights of individual states. The United States' relationship with their former colonial power was also uncertain. Britain impressed American sailors and supported Native Americans' actions in the northwest and on the Canadian border. In the summer of 1812, President James Madison chose to go to war against Britain. War in the Chesapeake illustrates the causes for the War of 1812, the political impacts of the war on America, and the war effort in the Chesapeake Bay."--Provided by the publisher. 2015 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.49"1813/1814"(42:73)

Nowherelands : an atlas of vanished countries, 1840-1975 /Bjorn Berge ; translated ... by Lucy Moffatt. "A multitude of countries that once existed have since been erased from the map. Varying vastly in size and shape, location and longevity, the fifty 'nowherelands' in this book are united by one fact: all of them endured long enough to issue their own stamps. Some of their names, such as Biafra or New Brunswick, will be relatively familiar. Others, such as Labuan, Tannu Tuva, and Inini, are far less recognizable. But all of these lost nations have stories to tell, whether they were as short-lived as Eastern Karelia, which lasted only a few weeks during the Soviet-Finnish War of 1922, or as long-lasting as the Orange Free State, a Boer Republic that celebrated fifty years as an independent state in the late 1800s. Their broad spectrum reflects the entire history of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, with its ideologies, imperialism, waves of immigration, and conflicts both major and minor. The motifs and symbols chosen for stamps have always served as a form of national self-presentation, an expression of the aims and ambitions of the ruling authorities. Drawing on fiction and eye-witness accounts as well as historical sources, Bjorn Berge's witty text casts an unconventional eye on these lesser-known nations. Nowherelands is a different kind of history book that will intrigue anyone keen to understand what makes a nation a nation."--Provided by the publisher. 2017. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 912.44

Astronomical observations made at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, from the year MDCCLXV to the year MDCCLXXIV Maskelyne, Nevil, 1776-1811. • RARE-FOLIO • 4 copies available. 52.092:094

The journals of Captain James Cook on his voyages of discovery / James Cook, ed. by J.C. Beaglehole. 1999. • OVERSIZE • 6 copies available. 910.4(100)"1768/1780":92Cook

The struggle for the South Atlantic : the Armada of the Strait, 1581-84 /edited by Carla Rahn Philips. "This book contains the annotated translation of an account of Spain's Armada of the Strait, which traveled to Brazil and the Strait of Magellan under Don Diego Flores de Valdâes in 1581-84. Pedro de Rada, the official scribe of the armada, kept a detailed, neutral chronicle of the venture which remained in private hands until 1999 but is now held in the Henry E. Huntington Library in San Marino, California. It is published here for the first time. The voyage came at a crucial juncture in global politics, when Philip II of Spain had claimed the throne of Portugal and its empire, and Francis Drake's daring peacetime raids had challenged the dominance of Spain and Portugal in the Americas."--Provided by publisher. [2016] • BOOK • 1 copy available. 061.22HAKLUYT

The catholique planisphaer which Mr Blagrave calleth the mathematical jewel : briefly and plainly discribed in five books : the first shewing the making of the instrument, the rest shewing the manifold use of it, 1. for representing several projections of the sphere, 2. for resolving all spherical triangles, 3. for resolving all problems of the sphere, astronomical, astrological, and geographical, 4. for making all sorts of dials both without doors and within ; upon any walls, cielings, or floores, be they never so irregular, where-so-ever the direct or reflected beams of the sun may come : all which are to be done by this instrument with wonderous ease and delight : a treatise very usefull for marriners and for all ingenious men who love the arts mathematical ; hereunto is added a brief description of the cros-staf and a catalogue of eclipses observed by the same I.P / by John Palmer. Palmer, John, 1658. • RARE-BOOK • 1 copy available. txt

Here begins the dark sea : Venice, a Medieval monk, and the creation of the most accurate map of the world /Meredith F. Small. "In 1459 a Venetian monk named Fra Mauro completed an astonishing map of the world. Seven feet in diameter, Fra Mauro's mappamundi is the oldest and most complete Medieval map to survive into modernity. And in its time, this groundbreaking mappamundi provided the most detailed description of the known world, incorporating accurate observation, and geographic reality, urging viewers to see water and land as they really existed. Fra Mauro's map was the first in history to show that a ship could circumnavigate Africa, and that the Indian "Sea" was in fact an ocean, enabling international trade to expand across the globe. Acclaimed anthropologist Meredith F. Small reveals how Fra Mauro's mappamundi made cartography into a science rather than a practice based on religion and ancient myths. Here Begins the Dark Sea brings Fra Mauro's masterpiece to life as a work of art and a window into Venetian society and culture. In telling the story of this cornerstone of modern cartography, Small takes the reader on a fascinating journey as she explores the human urge to find our way. Here Begins the Dark Sea is a riveting testament to the undeniable impact Fra Mauro and his mappamundi have had over the past five centuries and still holds relevance today." -- 2023. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 912.09

Islanders : the Pacific in the age of empire /Nicholas Thomas. "This compelling book explores the lived experience of empire in the Pacific, the last region to be contacted and colonized by Europeans following the great voyages of Captain Cook. Unlike conventional accounts that emphasize confrontation and the destruction of indigenous cultures, Islanders reveals there was gain as well as loss, survival as well as suffering, and invention as well as exploitation. Empowered by imaginative research in obscure archives and collections, Thomas rediscovers a rich and surprising history of encounters, not only between Islanders and Europeans, but among Islanders, brought together in new ways by explorers, missionaries, and colonists. He tells the story of the making of empire, not through an impersonal survey, but through vivid stories of the lives of men and women - some visionary, some vicious, and some just eccentric - and through sensuous evocation of seascapes and landscapes of the Pacific. A fascinating re-creation of an Oceanic world, Islanders offers a new paradigm, not only for histories of the Pacific, but for understandings of cultural contact everywhere." 2010. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.4(96)

Surviving slavery in the British Caribbean / Randy M. Browne. "Atlantic slave societies were notorious deathtraps. In Surviving Slavery in the British Caribbean, Randy M. Browne looks past the familiar numbers of life and death and into a human drama in which enslaved Africans and their descendants struggled to survive against their enslavers, their environment, and sometimes one another. Grounded in the nineteenth-century British colony of Berbice, one of the Atlantic world's best-documented slave societies and the last frontier of slavery in the British Caribbean, Browne argues that the central problem for most enslaved people was not how to resist or escape slavery but simply how to stay alive. Guided by the voices of hundreds of enslaved people preserved in an extraordinary set of legal records, Browne reveals a world of Caribbean slavery that is both brutal and breathtakingly intimate. Field laborers invoked abolitionist-inspired legal reforms to protest brutal floggings, spiritual healers conducted secretive nighttime rituals, anxious drivers weighed the competing pressures of managers and the condition of their fellow slaves in the fields, and women fought back against abusive masters and husbands. Browne shows that at the core of enslaved people's complicated relationships with their enslavers and one another was the struggle to live in a world of death."--Provided by the publisher 2017 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 326.4

Captain Elliot and the founding of Hong Kong : pearl of the orient /Jon Bursey. "On 26 January 1841 the British took possession of the island of Hong Kong. The Convention of Chuanbi was immediately repudiated by both the British and Chinese governments and their respective negotiators recalled. For the British this was Captain Charles Elliot, whose actions in China became mired in controversy for years to come. Who was Captain Elliot, and how did he find himself at the center of this debate? This book traces Elliot's career from his early life through his years in the Royal Navy before focusing on his role in the First Anglo-Chinese War and the founding of what became the Crown Colony of Hong Kong. Elliot has been demonized by China and for the most part poorly regarded by historians. This book shows him to have been a man ahead of his time whose views on slavery, armed conflict, the role of women and racial equality often placed him at variance with contemporary attitudes. Twenty years after the return of Hong Kong to China, his legacy is still with us."--Provided by the publisher. 2018. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 92ELLIOT:951.231.7

Convoys : the British struggle against Napoleonic Europe and America /Roger Knight "The first account of Britain's convoys during the Napoleonic Wars, revealing their vital role in victory. During the Napoleonic Wars thousands of merchant ships crisscrossed narrow seas and wide oceans, protected by Britain's warships. These were wars of attrition in which raw materials had to reach their shores continuously: timber and hemp from the Baltic, sulphur from Sicily, and saltpetre from Bengal. Britain's fate rested on the strength of its economy - and convoys played a decisive part in securing victory. Leading naval historian Roger Knight examines how convoys ensured the safeguarding of trade and transport of troops, allowing Britain to take the upper hand. Detailing the many hardships these ships faced, from the shortage of seaman to the vicissitudes of the weather, Knight sheds light on the innovation and seafaring skills that made convoys such an invaluable tool in Britain's arsenal. The convoy system laid the foundation for Britain's narrow victory over Napoleon and his allies in 1815 and, in doing so, established its naval and mercantile power at sea for a hundred years."--Provided by the publisher. 2022. • BOOK • 2 copies available. 355.691.3"1803/1815"

The Laird rams : Britain's ironclads built for the Confederacy, 1862-1923 /Andrew R. English. "Built in Birkenhead, England, from 1862-1865, the 'Laird rams' were two innovative armored warships intended for service with the Confederate Navy during the Civil War. The vessels represented a substantial threat to Union naval power, and offered the Confederacy a potential means to break the Union blockade of the Southern coastline. Historians rarely mention these sister warships - if referred at all, they are given short shrift. This book provides the first complete history of these once famous ironclads that never fired a shot in anger yet served at distant stations as defenders of the British Empire"-- 2021. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 359.8/352

Oceania under steam : sea transport and the cultures of colonialism, c. 1870-1914 /Frances Steel. "The age of steam was the age of Britain's global maritime dominance, the age of enormous ocean liners and human mastery over the seas. The world seemed to shrink as timetabled shipping mapped out faster, more efficient and more reliable transoceanic networks. But what did this transport revolution look like at the other end of the line, at the edge of empire in the South Pacific? Through the historical example of the largest and most important regional maritime enterprise - the Union Steam Ship Company of New Zealand - Frances Steel eloquently charts the diverse and often conflicting interests, itineraries and experiences of commercial and political elites, common seamen and stewardesses, and Islander dock workers and passengers. Drawing on a variety of sources, including shipping company archives, imperial conference proceedings, diaries, newspapers and photographs, this book will appeal to cultural historians and geographers of British imperialism, scholars of transport and mobility studies, and historians of New Zealand and the Pacific."--Provided by the publisher. 2011. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 656.61.74(42:9)

Namen - Bilder - Schatten : Treibgut der Wilhelminischen Marine bis 1918 in Baden und Wèurttemberg :Begleitband zur Sonderausstellung, 28. Juli bis 28. Oktober 2012 im Wehrgeschichtlichen Museum Rastatt /bearbeitet von Alexander Jordan und Winfried Mèonch ; unter Mitarbeit von Guntram Schulze-Wegener ; Herausgeber, Vereinigung der Freunde des Wehrgeschichtlichen Museums Schloss Rastatt e.V. [2012] • BOOK • 1 copy available.

Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli pirates : the forgotten war that changed American history /Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger. This is the little-known story of how a newly independent nation was challenged by four Muslim powers and what happened when America's third president decided to stand up to intimidation. When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1801, America faced a crisis. The new nation was deeply in debt and needed its economy to grow quickly, but its merchant ships were under attack. Pirates from North Africa's Barbary coast routinely captured American sailors and held them as slaves, demanding ransom and tribute payments far beyond what the new country could afford. Over the previous fifteen years, as a diplomat and then as secretary of state, Jefferson had tried to work with the Barbary states (Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers, and Morocco). Unfortunately, he found it impossible to negotiate with people who believed their religion justified the plunder and enslavement of non-Muslims. These rogue states would show no mercy -- at least not while easy money could be made by extorting America, France, England, and other powers. So President Jefferson decided to move beyond diplomacy. He sent the U.S. Navy's new warships and a detachment of marines to blockade Tripoli -- launching the Barbary Wars and beginning America's journey toward future superpower status. [2015]. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.49"1799/1805"(64:73)

Steam titans : Cunard, Collins, and the epic battle for commerce on the North Atlantic /William M. Fowler Jr. "'Steam Titan' tells the story of a transatlantic fight born of and powered by steam, a fight to wrest control of the globe's most lucrative trade route. It's the story of two men: Samuel Cunard and Edward Knight Collins, and two nations: Great Britain and the United States. Wielding the tools of technology, finance, and politics--and at the same time coping with the inevitable, sometimes crushing, perils of the sea--these opposing forces fought to capture control of a commercial lifeline that spanned the North Atlantic. Tracing the paths of ships, goods, people, information and money, historian William M. Fowler Jr. brings to life the spectacle of this generation-long struggle for supremacy, during which New York rose to take her place among the greatest ports and cities of the world, and recounts the tale of competition that was the opening act in the drama of economic globalization that is still unfolding today."--Provided by the publisher. 2017. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 629.123.2(261)

Scottish lighthouse pioneers : travels with the Stevensons in Orkney and Shetland /Paul A. Lynn. "In the 19th century, the Stevenson engineers pioneered marvellous lighthouses around the coasts of Scotland -- lighthouses which inspire with their architectural elegance, and speak of compassion for sailors and fishermen risking their lives in these notoriously dangerous waters. But what was it actually like to be a Scottish lighthouse engineer, and how did the professional activities interact with social and economic conditions in Scotland at the time? How did the Northern Lighthouse Board's Engineer (almost invariably a Stevenson) cope with weeks aboard a small lighthouse vessel, travelling around the rugged Scottish coastline on dangerous tours of inspection and interacting with local people in some of the remotest regions of Europe? The author reveals the fascinating story of the Stevensons as family members as well as engineers -- brilliant yet fallible, tough yet vulnerable, with private lives that are little known, even to lighthouse enthusiasts. It sets their work in a historical and social context, drawing heavily on eye-witness accounts by two of Scotland's most celebrated literary sons: Walter Scott, internationally famous poet and member of the Edinburgh establishment; and Robert Louis Stevenson, young family member and disenchanted engineering apprentice desperate to become an author. The reader is taken to the Orkney and Shetland Islands with descriptions of the chain of Stevenson lighthouses that illuminate a vital shipping route between the North Sea, Baltic, and North Atlantic. Finally we travel to Muckle Flugga, the northernmost outpost of the British Isles and last link in the chain, a vicious rock on which David and Thomas Stevenson dared to build their 'impossible lighthouse'."--Provided by the publisher. 2017 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 627.715(411.1/.2)

Nelson against Napoleon : from the Nile to Copenhagen, 1798-1801 /edited by Robert Gardiner. 1997. • FOLIO • 3 copies available. 940.27

Trim, the cartographer's cat : the ship's cat who helped Flinders map Australia /Matthew Flinders, Philippa Sandall and Gillian Dooley ; illustrations by Ad Long ; foreword by Julian Stockwin. Trim was the ship's cat who accompanied Matthew Flinders on his voyages to circumnavigate and map the coastline of Australia from 1801 to 1803. Trim, The Cartographer's Cat is a charming ode to the much-loved pet, which will warm the heart of any cat lover. The first part of the book reproduces Flinders' own whimsical tribute to Trim, written while in captivity in the early 1800s, with added "friendly footnotes" to provide some background to Flinders' numerous literary allusions and nautical terms. Next the book discusses where Flinders was when he wrote his tribute and why, and what his letters and journals from that time tell us about his "sporting, affectionate and useful companion." Finally, we learn what Trim's views on all of this might have been, in a fun and fanciful observation on his premature epitaph. Accompanying this jam-packed fascinating text are beautiful maps, historical photographs, quirky original illustrations by illustrator Ad Long and excerpts from Flinders' original script, showing his beautiful handwriting. This book will make a unique and treasured gift for Flinders fans and cat lovers around the world. 2019. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 919.4042092

Renaissance mad voyages : experiments in early modern English travel /Anthony Parr. "A vogue for travel a "stuntsa (TM) flourished in England between 1590 and the 1620s: playful imitations or burlesques of maritime enterprise and overland travel that collectively appear to be a response to particular innovations and developments in English culture. This study is the first full length scholarly work to focus on the curious phenomenon of a "madde voiagesa (TM), as the writer William Rowley called them. Anthony Parr shows that the mad voyage (as Rowley and others conceived it) had surprisingly deep and diverse roots in traditional travel practices, in courtly play and mercantile custom, and in literary culture. Looking in detail at several of the best-documented exploits, Parr situates them in the ferment of such ventures during the period in question; but also reaches back to explore their classical and mediaeval antecedents, and considers their role in creating a template for eccentric English adventure in later centuries. Renaissance Mad Voyages brings together literary and historical enquiry in order to address the implications of an interesting and neglected cultural trend. Parr's investigation of the rash of travel exploits in the period leads to extensive research on the origins of the wager on travel and its role in the expansion of English tourism and trading activity."--Provided by the publisher. [2015] • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.4(42)"1590/1620"

White debt : the Demerara uprising and Britain's legacy of slavery /Thomas Harding. "When Thomas Harding discovered that his mother's family had made money from plantations worked by enslaved people, what began as an interrogation into the choices of his ancestors soon became a quest to learn more about Britain's role in slavery. It was a history that he knew surprisingly little about - the myth that we are often taught in schools is that Britain's role in slavery was as the abolisher, but the reality is much more sinister. In White debt, Harding vividly brings to life the story of the uprising by enslaved people that took place in the British colony of Demerara (now Guyana) in the Caribbean in 1823. It started on a small sugar plantation called 'Success' and grew to become a key trigger in the abolition of slavery across the empire. We see the uprising through the eyes of four people: the enslaved man Jack Gladstone, the missionary John Smith, the colonist John Cheveley, and the politician and slaveholder John Gladstone, father of a future prime minister. Charting the lead-up to the uprising right through to the courtroom drama that came about as a consequence, through this one event we see the true impact of years of unimaginable cruelty and incredible courage writ large. Captivating, moving and meditative, White debt combines a searing personal quest with a deep investigation of a shared history that is little discussed amongst White people. It offers a powerful rebuttal of the national amnesia that masks the role of the British in this devastating period, and asks vital questions about the legacy we have been left with - cultural, political and moral - and whether future generations of those who benefited from slavery need to acknowledge and take responsibility for the White Debt"--Provided by the publisher. 2022. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 306.362094109033

Panorama of the Thames : a riverside view of Georgian London /John R. Inglis & Jill Sanders. "This historical gift book is a reincarnation of a guide to the river Thames first published 1829 by Samuel Leigh. The original was a concertina of 45 printed and hand-coloured sheets, glued together to form a magnificent 60ft depiction of the river's north and south banks or Middlesex and Surrey banks, as they were then from Westminster Bridge to Petersham Meadows in Richmond. Among the buildings that stood along this 30-mile stretch of river in those days were many that no longer exist including the Houses of Parliament before they burned down in 1834, or the factory owned by the father of Isambard Kingdom Brunel but others still stand today. A great deal of the original panorama shows just trees and foliage, so for this book it has been edited down to feature the most interesting sections. These are grouped into 19 villages, each with a short 200-word introduction. The buildings are captioned (in the present tense, for vivid appeal), and there is an AZ detailing landmarks and key buildings in each section. Written in collaboration with local experts and various local history societies, these descriptions are richly informative and include information on the waterway, the landscape, and the people who lived and worked on the banks of the river at the end of the Georgian era."--Provided by the publisher. 2015. • BOOK • 1 copy available. (411)7.047 ING

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