Library Results | Royal Museums Greenwich

Liverpool and the slave trade / Anthony Tibbles. "During the course of more than four centuries, merchants in Liverpool were responsible for forcibly transporting over a million and a half Africans across the Atlantic to work as enslaved labourers on the plantations of the Caribbean as their ships carried a larger number of Africans than those of any other European port. White colonial owners used the enslaved Africans to produce sugar and other valuable tropical goods which were consumed at home in Britain. Liverpool and the slave trade is the first comprehensive account of the city's participation in the trade. It tells the story of the merchants and ships' captains who organised the trade and shows how they bought and sold Africans, how they treated the enslaved during the Atlantic voyage and how they and the wider community benefitted from the slave trade. It concludes with the efforts to end the trade and the legacy it has left in Liverpool and beyond. Drawing on the most recent research as well as extensive use of contemporary documents and personal testimonies and experiences to explore this history, Liverpool and the slave trade highlights an important part of the city's history which has for too long been rejected, forgotten or ignored."--Provided by publisher. 2018. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 326.1(427.2)

Atlas : a world of maps from the British Library /Tom Harper. "From the publication in 1595 of the first 'atlas' by Flemish cartographer Gerhard Mercator, the term has become a universally adopted title for books containing accurate, uniform, and evenly spread maps of all or some of the world. This is an atlas with a difference. Few of the maps in this book could reasonably be called 'accurate' in the modern sense and could almost certainly not be used to plan a journey. Yet this atlas can help us to travel in a way that regular atlases do not, because by looking at old maps and getting to know their stories we can be transported back to the times in which they were made.The generous, full-colour illustrations of each map in this book range from the Klencke Atlas to Hokusai's Map of China, from a 1682 pirate map of Guatemala to 20th-century cartographic postcards featuring maps of Australia. Atlas is the definitive printed showcase of the British Library's extensive and unparalleled map collection.About the Author: Tom Harper is Lead Curator of Antiquarian Maps at the British Library. His publications include the British Library exhibition catalogue Maps and the 20th Century: Drawing the Line, and A History of the Twentieth Century in 100 Maps, which he co-authored in 2014."--Provided by the publisher. 2018. • FOLIO • 1 copy available. 912.44(100)

John Brett : Pre-Raphaelite landscape painter /Christiana Payne ; and Charles Brett. "Drawing on a wealth of unpublished sketchbooks, journals and writings, this essential guide to John Brett (1831-1902) investigates the painter who was seen as the leader of the Pre-Raphaelite landscape school. As well as the familiar early works, including 'The Val d'Aosta' and 'The Stonebreaker', it provides rich information on his later, less-known coastal and marine paintings. Brett's turbulent friendship with John Ruskin is discussed, as are his relations with his beloved sister Rosa, and his partner Mary, with whom he had seven children. His fervent interest in astronomy, his love of the sea, and his lifelong pursuit of wealth and recognition are all examined in this reassessment, which concludes with a catalogue raisonne of his works, prepared by his descendent Charles Brett"--Provided by the publisher. 2010. • FOLIO • 1 copy available. 759.2

Making Maine : statehood and the War of 1812 /Joshua M. Smith. "After the Revolutionary War ended, the new American nation grappled with a question about its identity: Were the states sovereign entities or subordinates to a powerful federal government? The War of 1812 brought this vexing issue into sharp relief, as a national government intent on waging an unpopular war confronted a populace in Massachusetts that was vigorously opposed to it. Maine, which at the time was part of Massachusetts, served as the battleground in this political struggle. Joshua M. Smith recounts an innovative history of the war, focusing on how it specifically affected what was then called the District of Maine. Drawing on archival materials from the United States, Britain, and Canada, Smith exposes the bitter experience of Maine's citizens during that conflict as they endured multiple hardships, including starvation, burdensome taxation, smuggling, treason, and enemy occupation. War's inherent miseries, along with a changing relationship between regional and national identities, gave rise to a statehood movement that rejected a Boston-centric worldview in favor of a broadly American identity"-- [2022] • BOOK • 1 copy available. 974.1/03

Observing by hand / Omar W. Nasim. "Today we are all familiar with the iconic pictures of the nebulae produced by the Hubble Space Telescope's digital cameras. But there was a time, before the successful application of photography to the heavens, in which scientists had to rely on handmade drawings of these mysterious phenomena. Observing by Hand sheds entirely new light on the ways in which the production and reception of handdrawn images of the nebulae in the nineteenth century contributed to astronomical observation. Omar W. Nasim investigates hundreds of unpublished observing books and paper records from six nineteenth-century observers of the nebulae: Sir John Herschel; William Parsons, the third Earl of Rosse; William Lassell; Ebenezer Porter Mason; Ernst Wilhelm Leberecht Tempel; and George Phillips Bond. Nasim focuses on the ways in which these observers created and employed their drawings in data-driven procedures, from their choices of artistic materials and techniques to their practices and scientific observation. He examines the ways in which the act of drawing complemented the acts of seeing and knowing, as well as the ways that making pictures was connected to the production of scientific knowledge. An impeccably researched, carefully crafted, and beautifully illustrated piece of historical work, Observing by Hand will delight historians of science, art, and the book, as well as astronomers and philosophers."--Provided by the publisher. 2013 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 524.5/.7

Nelson's officers and midshipmen / by Gregory Fremont-Barnes ; illustrated by Steve Noon. "Filled with the promise of adventure and glory, the Royal Navy of the Napoleonic era enticed hundreds of young men to enlist as officers in its bitter struggle against the French fleet. With some as young as nine, these boys were confronted with the harsh realities of warfare at sea: cramped conditions, ruthless storms and fierce combat. In spite of their youth, these sailors showed enormous courage and valour in the face of battle, their bravery immortalised in the literary works of Patrick O'Brian, C. S. Forester and Alexander Kent. Drawing from letters, poems and personal accounts, this book uncovers the remarkable story of those boys who fought aboard His Majesty's mighty ships-of-the-line to defend their kingdom against the French."--Provided by the publisher. 2009. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.124(42)"1793/1815"

The principles of Arab navigation / edited by Anthony R. Constable and William Facey. "Throughout History, the Indian Ocean has been a zone of interaction between far-flung civilizations served by ports, and connected with the Mediterranean by the Gulf and Red Sea. The shows that were the vehicles of commercial and cultural exchange over this vast expanse of ocean ranged from small craft rarely venturing out of sight of land, to cargo vessels carrying navigators skilled in the art of deep sea sailing. These Arab, Persian and Indian seamen used the seasonal monsoon winds, and applied navigational techniques that relied on their ability to read the stars in the night sky - skills that had developed down the generations from time immemorial. This stellar navigation, based on measuring the altitude of the Pole Star to establish latitude and on the risings and settings of certain stars to find direction, grew into a complex art, belying the simplicity of the instruments used. Bringing together six scholars specializing in the maritime history and culture of the Arabs (Anthony R. Constable, William Facey, Yacoub Al-Hijji, Paul Lunde, Hassan Salih Shihab and Eric Staples), this book makes a new and vital contribution to the study of a nautical culture that has hitherto not received its due share of attention, and which is vital to an understanding of Indian Ocean history. Drawing on source material such as the guides by the renowned southern Arabian navigators Ahmad ibn Majid and Sulayman al-Mahri in the 15th and 16th centuries AD, as well as surviving logbooks of how captains in the early 20th, the volume covers the principal ideas, techniques, instruments and calculations used, deploying astronomy, geometry and mathematics to explain their methods. It includes an account of a practical attempt to apply these methods in 2010, on an adventurous voyage from Muscat to Singapore in a reconstructed early medieval dhow, and concludes with an analysis of sailing conditions in the Red Sea."--Provided by the publisher. 2013. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 527(267)"14/20"

Stitching the world : embroidered maps and women's geographical education /Judith A. Tyner. From the late eighteenth century until about 1840, schoolgirls in the British Isles and the United States created embroidered map samplers and even silk globes. Hundreds of British maps were made and although American examples are more rare, they form a significant collection of artefacts. Descriptions of these samplers stated that they were designed to teach needlework and geography. The focus of this book is not on stitches and techniques used in 'drafting' the maps, but rather why they were developed, how they diffused from the British Isles to the United States, and why they were made for such a brief time. There has been little serious study of these maps by cartographers and, moreover, historians of cartography have largely neglected the role of women in mapping. Children's maps have not been studied, although they might have much to offer about geographical teaching and perceptions of a period, and map samplers have been dismissed because they are the work of schoolgirls. Needlework historians, likewise, have not done in depth studies of map samplers until recently. Stitching the World is an interdisciplinary work drawing on cartography, needlework, and material culture. This book for the first time provides a critical analysis of these artefacts, showing that they offer significant insights into both eighteenth- and nineteenth-century geographic thought and cartography in the USA and the UK and into the development of female education. [2015] • BOOK • 1 copy available. 746.44/0433

Black May "This book is the story of the month in the spring of 1943, 'Black May' as the Germans called it, when the Allies finally and decisively gained the upper hand in the Battle of the Atlantic and it became clear that the submarine threat would be defeated. In the course of that month the Allies, confronted with the largest submarine force yet sent out into the Atlantic, sunk 41 U-boats and damaged another 37 and Admiral Doenitz was forced to withdraw the surviving boats from the fray. Most significant of all, one major convoy, ONS.5, which was targeted by several wolfpacks in rapid succession and should, in the light of past experience, have suffered severe losses, survived largely unscathed while the attacking wolfpacks were relentlessly hunted down by the escorting ships and aircraft. Michael Gannon describes the hundreds of separate engagements that took place in the course of the month in vivid detail, drawing upon archive records on both sides of the Atlantic as well as the personal recollections of those involved on both sides. [...] He also reproduces the transcripts of secretly recorded conversations between captured U-boat crewmen, which provide a fascinating insight into their attitudes and morale.[...]The courage and determination of the men who fought was crucial but the Allied victory was also the result of improvements in stategy, tactics and technology, including the introduction of centimetric radar and radio-direction finding gear, and all of these factors are examined and analysed here."--Provided by the publisher. 1998 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 623.827(43)"1943"

Encounters on the opposite coast : the Dutch East India Company and the Nayaka State of Madurai in the seventeenth century /by Markus P.M. Vink. "In Encounters of the Opposite Coast, Markus Vink provides a narrative of the first half century of cross-cultural interaction between the Dutch East India Company (VOC), one of the great northern European chartered companies, and Madurai, one of the 'great southern Nayakas' and successor-states of the Vijayanagara empire, in southeast India (c. 1645-1690). A shared interest in trade and at times converging political objectives formed the unstable foundations for a complex relationship fraught with tensions, a mixture of conflict and coexistence typical of the 'age of contained conflict.' Drawing extensively on archival materials, Markus Vink covers a topic neglected by both Company historians and their Indian counterparts and sheds important light on a 'black hole in South Indian history'"--Provided by the publisher. 2016 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 347.71DUTCH EAST INDIA

Of penguins and polar bears : a history of cold water cruising /Christopher Wright. "We have been cruising and exploring polar waters since the nineteenth century, but very little has been written about them. Drawing on expert research, Of Penguins and Polar Bears seeks to rectify this, and looks at activity in both the Antarctic and Arctic waters the homes of the penguins and the polar bears to provide insight into how the passenger trades developed in these regions. With over a hundred stunning pictures, this is a must-have gazetteer for anyone thinking about cruising the Earth's 'last frontier'. From William Bradford's cruise to Greenland in a seal-hunting boat in 1869 to the newest builds of the twenty-first century, let Arctic expert Christopher Wright take you on a journey through lands less travelled."--Provided by the publisher. 2020. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 910.911

Dressed to kill : British naval uniform, masculinity and contemporary fashions, 1748-1857 /Amy Miller. "A unique exploration of naval identity, period fashion and masculinity. Dressed to kill is a unique and detailed analysis of naval uniform and its historical, social and economic contexts in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This fully updated and expanded second edition examines the significance of male fashion and uniform in the forging of a national, hierarchical and gendered identity. By drawing upon extensive archival research, Amy Miller provides a greater explanation of the political and social changes that impacted not only what the Royal Navy wore, but why. Parliamentary records, newspapers and museum archives give a greater contextualisation of the relationship that naval uniform represented - that of a confluence of politics and economics, fashion and popular culture. Beautifully illustrated throughout, this second edition of Dressed to Kill includes an extensive catalogue of uniforms from the rich collection of the National Maritime Museum and a selection of patterns that examine the construction of the garments."--Provided by the publisher. 2021. • BOOK • 2 copies available.

The sun : one thousand years of scientific imagery /Katy Barrett and Harry Cliff. "Dazzling, beautiful, powerful, mysterious - the Sun has fascinated people throghout history. This book charts our changing understanding of the Sun through a rich collection of scientific imagery: from a 10th-century manuscript drawing of an Earth-centred universe, to awe-inspiring close-ups of our turbulent star taken by orbiting spacecraft. Each image tells a story of evolving knowledge and techniques as well as the personal dedication of the theologians, artists and astronomers who made them."--Provided by the publisher. 2018. • BOOK • 2 copies available. 523.7

Condemned : the transported men, women and children who built Britain's empire /Graham Seal. "A tremendously powerful account, told through individual stories, of how forced migration was fundamental to the British empire. The cruel system of transportation has a long history. In the early 1600s, Elizabeth Wynn was imprisoned for robbery, marked as colonialist property and shipped overseas. In the eighteenth century, petty thieves like Charlotte Badger were sent to outposts in Australia and America and there put to work. Even as recently as the 1940s, 'superfluous' or unwanted children such as four-year-old Marcelle O'Brien were sent to institutions in Australia, where they were vulnerable to abuse. Drawing on first-hand accoutns, letters and official documents, Graham Seal uncovers the traumatic struggles of individuals shipped around the empire. He shows how the earliest large-scale kidnapping and transportation of children to the American colonies was quickly bolstered with shipments of the poor, criminal and rebellious to different continents. From Asia to Africa, this global trade in forced labour allowed Britain to build its colonies while turning a considerable profit. Over the course of 400 years, Britain transported over 376,000 unwanted citizens beyond its shores. Revelatory and often moving, Condemned brings to light the true extent of this brutal element in the history of the British empire."--Provided by the publisher. 2021. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 364.6/80941

Strangling the axis : the fight for control of the Mediterranean during the Second World War /Richard Hammond. "This is a major reassessment of the causes of Allied victory in the Second World War in the Mediterranean region. Drawing on a unique range of multinational source material, Richard Hammond demonstrates how the Allies' ability to gain control of the key routes across the sea and sink large quantities of enemy shipping denied the Axis forces in North Africa crucial supplies and proved vital to securing ultimate victory there. Furthermore, the sheer scale of attrition to Axis shipping outstripped their industrial capacity to compensate, leading to the collapse of the Axis position across key territories maintained by seaborne supply, such as Sardinia, Corsica and the Aegean islands. As such, Hammond demonstrates how the anti-shipping campaign in the Mediterranean was the fulcrum about which strategy in the theatre pivoted, and the vital enabling factor ultimately leading to Allied victory in the region."-- 2020. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 940.54/293

Broadcasting empire : the BBC and the British world, 1922-1970 /Simon J. Potter. Broadcasting was born just as the British empire reached its greatest territorial extent, and matured while that empire began to unravel. Radio and television offered contemporaries the beguiling prospect that new technologies of mass communication might compensate for British imperial decline. In Broadcasting Empire, Simon J. Potter shows how, from the 1920s, the BBC used broadcasting to unite audiences at home with the British settler diaspora in Canada, Australia, NewZealand, and South Africa. High culture, royal ceremonial, sport, and even comedy were harnessed to this end, particularly on the BBC Empire Service, the predecessor of today's World Service. Belatedly, during the 1950s, the BBC also began to consider the role of broadcasting in Africa and Asia, as a means toencourage 'development' and to combat resistance to continued colonial rule. However, during the 1960s, as decolonization entered its final, accelerated phase, the BBC staged its own imperial retreat.This is the first full-length, scholarly study to examine both the home and overseas aspects of the BBC's imperial mission. Drawing on new archival evidence, it demonstrates how the BBC's domestic and imperial roles, while seemingly distinct, in fact exerted a powerful influence over one another. Broadcasting Empire makes an important contribution to our understanding of the transnational history of broadcasting, emphasising geopolitical rivalries and tensions between British andAmerican attempts to exert influence on the world's radio and television systems. 2012. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 941-44:654.19

The postcard age : selections from the Leonard A. Lauder Collection /Lynda Klich and Benjamin Weiss. In the decades around 1900, postcards were Twitter, email, Flickr and Facebook, all wrapped into one. A postcard craze swept the world, and billions of cards were bought, mailed and pasted into albums. Many famous artists turned to the new medium, but one of the great pleasures and enigmas of postcards is how some of the most beautiful and interesting examples were made by artists whose names we barely know. Drawing on the riches of the Leonard A. Lauder Postcard Collection (probably the finest and most comprehensive collection of its type), this gorgeous book traces the historical and cultural themes--enthralling, exciting, and sometimes disturbing--of the modern age. The first general publication on the postcard as an artistic medium since the mid-1970s, The Postcard Age is organized thematically, with chapters devoted to urban life, the changing role of women, sports, celebrity, new technologies, the stylish collectors' cards of Art Nouveau and World War I. The result is at once a vivid picture of the concerns and pastimes of the turn of the century and a sampler from the Lauder's vast archives. 2012. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 069(744)(089.7)

British sailor of the first world war. "In 1914 Great Britain's navy was the largest and most powerful the world had ever seen - but what was the everyday experience of those who served in it? This fully illustrated book looks at the British sailor's life during the First World War, from the Falkland Islands to the East African coast and the North Sea. Meals in the stokers' mess and the admiral's cabin; the claustrophobic terrors of the engine room or submarine; the long separations from loved ones that were the shared experience of all ranks; the perils faced by Royal Naval Air Service pilots - drawing on previously unpublished materials from the National Maritime Museum collections, this is an authoritative and vivid account of lives lived in quite extraordinary circumstances."--Provided by the publisher. 2015. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 355.124(42)"1914/1918"

The Kaiser's pirates : hunting Germany's raiding cruisers in World War I /Nick Hewitt. "The Kaiser's Pirates is a dramatic and little-known story of World War I, when the actions of a few men shaped the fate of nations. By 1914 Germany had ships and sailors scattered across the globe, protecting its overseas colonies and 'showing the flag' of its new Imperial Navy. After war broke out on August 4 there was no hope that they could reach home. Instead, they were ordered to attack Britain's vital trade routes for as long as possible. Under the leadership of a few brilliant, audacious men, they unleashed a series of raids that threatened Britain's war effort and challenged the power and prestige of the Royal Navy. The next year saw a battle of wits which stretched across the globe, drawing in ships and men from six empires. By the end, the 'Kaiser's Pirates' were no more, and Britain once again ruled the waves. Including vivid descriptions of the battles of Coronel and the Falklands and the actions of the Emden, the Goeben and the Breslau, the Karsrèuhe and the Kèonigsberg, The Kaiser's Pirates tells a fascinating narrative that ranges across the Atlantic, the Indian Ocean, the Pacific, and the Caribbean."--Provided by the publisher. 2014. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 940.459(43)

Worldly consumers : the demand for maps in Renaissance Italy /Genevieve Carlton. "Though the practical value of maps during the sixteenth century is well documented, their personal and cultural importance has been relatively underexamined. In Worldly Consumers, Genevieve Carlton explores the growing availability of maps to private consumers during the Italian Renaissance and shows how map acquisition and display became central tools for constructing personal identity and impressing one's peers. Drawing on a variety of sixteenth-century sources, including household inventories, epigrams, dedications, catalogs, travel books, and advice manuals, Worldly Consumers studies how individuals displayed different maps in their homes as deliberate acts of self-fashioning. One citizen decorated with maps of Bruges, Holland, Flanders, and Amsterdam to remind visitors of his military prowess, for example, while another hung maps of cities where his ancestors fought or governed, in homage to his auspicious family history. Renaissance Italians turned domestic spaces into a microcosm of larger geographical places to craft cosmopolitan, erudite identities for themselves, creating a new class of consumers who drew cultural capital from maps of the time."--Provided by the publisher. 2015 • BOOK • 1 copy available. 655.11(45)

Lusitania : the cultural history of a catastrophe /Willi Jasper ; translated by Stewart Spencer. "On May 7, 1915, the Lusitania, a large British luxury liner, was sunk by a German submarine off the Irish coast. Nearly 1,200 people, including 128 American citizens, lost their lives. The sinking of a civilian passenger vessel without warning was a scandal of international scale and helped precipitate the United States' decision to enter the conflict. It also led to the immediate vilification of Germany. Though the ship's sinking has preoccupied historians and the general public for over a century, until now the German side of the story has been largely untold. Drawing on varied German sources, historian Willi Jasper provides a comprehensive reappraisal of the sinking and its aftermath that focuses on the German reaction and psyche. The attack on the Lusitania, he argues, was not simply an escalation of violence but signaled a new ideological, moral, and religious dimension in the struggle between German Kultur and Western civilization."--Provided by the publisher. 2016. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 656.61.085.3LUSITANIA

The day begins at sunset : perceptions of time in the Islamic world /Barbara Freyer Stowasser. "The fullest account ever written of the fascinating nexus between Islam and Time, this is a major contribution to the wider history of ideas and religion. Night and day, and the twelve lunar months of the year, are'appointed times for the believing people'. Reading the sky for the prayers of the hour has thus for Muslims been a constant reminder of God's providence and power. In her absorbing and illuminating new book, the late Barbara Freyer Stowasser examines the various ways in which Islam has structured, ordered and measured Time. Drawing on examples from Judaism and Christianity, as well as the ancient world, the author shows that while systems of time facilitate the orderly function of vastly different civilizations, in Islam they have always been fundamental. Among other topics, she discusses the Muslim lunar calendar; the rise of the science of astronomy; the remarkable career of al-Biruni, greatest authority in Muslim perceptions of Time; and the impact of technologies like the astrolabe, Indian numerals and paper. The fullest account ever written of the fascinating nexus between Islam and Time, this is a major contribution to the wider history of ideas and religion."--Provided by the publisher. 2014. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 297

Great passenger ships that never were : damned by destiny revisited /David L. Williams and Richard P. de Kerbrech "GREAT PASSENGER SHIPS THAT NEVER WERE is a completely revised and updated version of Damned by Destiny (Teredo Books, 1982), a comprehensive account of the large passenger ships that, for one reason or another, never entered commercial service. Some never made it off the drawing board or out of the model shop, some met with disaster after launch and some were diverted to wartime service but didn't survive, never used for their original purpose. They were all the victims of circumstance, whether due to financial crises, timing or changing technology. Some of these liners and cruise vessels may have become the greatest passenger ships ever achieved. They would have surpassed the most famous, not only in speed and splendour but in size and appearance, besides setting trends that were subsequently adopted for ships that did enter service. With beautiful pictures and detailed diagrams this book is a true insight into what might have been."--Provided by the publisher 2019. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 629.123.3

Mr. Hilhouse of Bristol : shipbuilder for the Navy, 1749-1822 /Andrew Whitefield. "In this book Andrew Whitefield sets out to rediscover Hilhouse's career and answer the questions that first attracted him to the enigma of Hilhouse. How did he start as a first generation shipbuilder? How did he overcome the Navy's prejudice against merchants and reluctance to build at Bristol? Where was his famous Redclift yard? Why did the Navy cease to place orders? Drawing on hitherto unpublished primary sources and following tantalizing clues, he traces Hilhouse's family's origins, their involvement as Dissenters and Merchant Venturers in Bristol's Golden Age trading in sugar and risking all in privateering ventures. The book describes Hilhouse's shipbuilding career, not without setbacks, with details of his dockyard organization, dealings with the Navy and histories of his warships and also recounts the cultural side of his life and influential artistic friends. The story that emerges provides a fascinating portrait of a shipbuilder, artist and family man, during a vital period of Britain's maritime history and gives James Martin Hilhouse the recognition he deserves."-- 2010. • BOOK • 1 copy available. 92HILHOUSE:629.12(424.1)

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