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Fighting instructions


samba_liten

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Form Line (Column).... Astern, Ahead of ship "Named"

 

Form Abreast.... To Port(Left), To Starboard(Right) of Ship "Named"

 

Form Line of Bearing..... To "Compass point" of ship "Named"  (eg Sailing North but in a line from NW to SE with ship "Named" NW position)

 

Column ....  Open order  (Sailing in column but less discipline to placement. eg in poor weather to avoid over-working ship & crew in keeping station)

 

Turn in succession (One at a time at the same place the first ship turned once reached) to heading "Number" degrees (Would actually use Compass sailing points NNE etc)

 

Turn together..... "Heading"   (All Ships turn simultaneously to new heading, ) (Happy to stand corrected on my terminology "together")

 

Reform.... select formation and new commands

 

Tack... To tack through the eye of the wind and form a new course with wind coming from other side of your bow

 

Wear... Turning without tacking (Not going through the eye of the wind)

 

Jybe... To turn bringing the wind from one side of your beam / quarter across your stern to the other. (This is when you duck to avoid being hit by the sail boom)

 

Hope this helps

 

A modern but still applicable reference in particular pages 30 - 34 for formations.

http://nato.radioscanner.ru/files/article66/1000.pdf

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if signalflags and any other act of comunication fails, a Captain cant do anything wrong if he places his ship next to the ones of the enemy.

 

another quote from Nelson that i like, might not exactly the words i typed but the core massage is the same.

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Does anyone have a copy of these? I'm particularly interested in the diagrams showing tactics and maneuvers for the line of battle.

 

I do have a copy of the RN fighting instructions covering the period from 1530 through 1815 or there-about, compiled by Julian Corbet. Unfortunately I was unable to attach it (the limit being 500kb and the book will only compress down to 600kb). But here's a direct link....

 

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/16695/16695-8.txt

 

You might want to have look at the signal book(s) as well to get an idea of what types of flag commands were available for squadron/fleet management. University of Rhode Island has a PDF copy of an original 1799 version on line here:

 

http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=sc_pubs

 

I might also recommend An Essay on Naval Tactics by John Clerk of Eldin which puts much of this into context. Clerk's work has been credited in some circles with the tactic of breaking the enemy line in order to double the rear (or windward) squadron(s), so successfully employed by Rodney at The Saintes, and by Nelson at Trafalgar (among others). A passable Google copy is available here: 

 

https://books.google.com/books?id=NfdeAAAAcAAJ&pg=PR1&lpg=PR1&dq=john+clerk+of+eldin+essay+on+naval+tactics&source=bl&ots=solCDv1rD0&sig=35uPFqwgO8eGksm5rRB9_lACLGU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=MIikVLboN8r4yQTcloCYAw&ved=0CD4Q6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=john%20clerk%20of%20eldin%20essay%20on%20naval%20tactics&f=false

 

JD

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Does anyone have a copy of these? I'm particularly interested in the diagrams showing tactics and maneuvers for the line of battle.

 

Oh there was one other thing I forgot to mention. It's regarding the diagrams you were asking about. You won't find that in Fighting Instructions or signal books. If I understand what you're looking for, you'll need to go to the histories instead. One of the best - and the source for the battle/maneuver diagrams you see in later editions of A T Mahan and Wm James -  is "The Royal Navy - a History from the Earliest Times to the Present"... or "to 1900", depending on which edition you're looking at... by William Laird Clowes. It's seven hefty volumes, but for students of naval history, it's a must have reference resource at the least... and a good cover to cover read if you have the time and patience. It was actually reprinted in paper back about 10 years ago, and may be available used at a reasonable price. Otherwise, your local library may have them or may be able to get them on inter-library loan.

 

Barring that, you might try the aforementioned A T Mahan (The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783 and The Influence of Sea Power upon The French Revolution And Empire... both of which are still in print and available on Amazon I think... which, as I said above, in later editions relies quite heavily on Clowes' work for diagrams of the principle battles of the period. And oh, by the way, these are two more must haves/must reads for any naval history buff... of any period. Of course you'll want to be sure to get the edition with the drawings and not the classic reprint.

 

Hope some of this helps...

 

JD

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Oh there was one other thing I forgot to mention. It's regarding the diagrams you were asking about. You won't find that in Fighting Instructions or signal books. If I understand what you're looking for, you'll need to go to the histories instead. One of the best - and the source for the battle/maneuver diagrams you see in later editions of A T Mahan and Wm James -  is "The Royal Navy - a History from the Earliest Times to the Present"... or "to 1900", depending on which edition you're looking at... by William Laird Clowes. It's seven hefty volumes, but for students of naval history, it's a must have reference resource at the least... and a good cover to cover read if you have the time and patience. It was actually reprinted in paper back about 10 years ago, and may be available used at a reasonable price. Otherwise, your local library may have them or may be able to get them on inter-library loan.

 

Barring that, you might try the aforementioned A T Mahan (The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783 and The Influence of Sea Power upon The French Revolution And Empire... both of which are still in print and available on Amazon I think... which, as I said above, in later editions relies quite heavily on Clowes' work for diagrams of the principle battles of the period. And oh, by the way, these are two more must haves/must reads for any naval history buff... of any period. Of course you'll want to be sure to get the edition with the drawings and not the classic reprint.

 

Hope some of this helps...

 

JD

 

 

Thanks to all.

 

Here's a little contribution of my own, regarding the text mentioned in the quote above.

 

https://archive.org/details/royalnavyhistory01clow

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Thanks to all.

 

Here's a little contribution of my own, regarding the text mentioned in the quote above.

 

https://archive.org/details/royalnavyhistory01clow

 

 

Very nice! Thank you. I've been looking for a good e copy for a long time.

 

I located and downloaded all 7 volumes in PDF (original photo-copy rather than OCR, which can't handle the lead letters for each chapter and omits entirely the battle diagrams the OP wanted). Here are the direct links in case anyone is having trouble finding them.

 

Thanks again to samba_liten for finding these.

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory01clow_0/royalnavyhistory01clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory02clow_0/royalnavyhistory02clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory03clow_0/royalnavyhistory03clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory04clow_0/royalnavyhistory04clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory05clow_0/royalnavyhistory05clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory06clow_0/royalnavyhistory06clow_0.pdf

 

https://archive.org/download/royalnavyhistory07clow_0/royalnavyhistory07clow_0.pdf

 

JD

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Wow this place (linked above) is a treasure trove. They also have William James' Naval History of Great Britain (6 volumes)....

 

AND...

 

I am ecstatic to find an English language translation of "A Treatise on Naval Tactics" by Paul Hoste.

 

https://ia902205.us.archive.org/21/items/atreatiseonnava00hostgoog/atreatiseonnava00hostgoog.pdf

 

I've been looking for this for years!

 

JD

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The best laid battle plans quite frequently fall to pieces after the first maneuver is made. Hold line when instructed and when it all goes to hell use good judgement and be aware of your surroundings :)

 

 

You raise a good point. In fact this is why I've always maintained that Age of Sail wargames that model battle scenarios starting at or just before contact are missing or ignoring 80% of what determines victory or defeat.

 

IMHO, these missing factors fall into three categories:

 

1. Training, Experience and Morale

 

2. Operational Combinations

 

3. Maneuver to contact

 

The first is obvious and requires a layer, perhaps abstracted, above ships and guns and tactics and weather conditions. Some games have tried to simulate this with crew quality factors, which are typically fixed to an historical perspective. In other words, there is no opportunity for a player, over time, to recognize the deficiency and make whatever trade-offs are felt to be necessary and proper to address it.

 

The second, simply stated, is the ability to put the right assets in the right place at the right time... and, of course, to frustrate an opponent's attempts to do the same. Nelson's pursuit of Villeneuve, across the Atlantic to the West Indies and back, and the separate blockade of Ganteaume's fleet at Brest, as an example of the latter, is what ultimately frustrated Napoleon's plans to gain naval superiority in the channel and launch his invasion against England. On a tactical level, where most games of this genre live, it led directly to the (relatively) smaller and more manageable actions (such as Cape Finisterre) preceding and including Trafalgar, where the defeat (in detail) of the Franco-Spanish forces was a foregone conclusion.

 

Yes, hindsight is wonderful, but it doesn't alter the influence of contributing factors or the historical outcomes.

 

The third is where the fleets maneuver, sometimes for days, to gain a favorable position prior to the actual engagement. We are all familiar I'm sure with the concept of the "weather gauge", but in a squadron or fleet context, the ability to accept or decline combat (the purpose of achieving that particular tactical position) is only one of the considerations. The affects of wind and sea on the ability of a line to utilize it's full armament is another (ships holding the lee gauge in heavy weather were oft times able to use their lower deck armament while those with the weather gauge were not). And still another reason to desire the lee gauge has to do with objectives. The goal was not always destruction of the opponent's assets in the immediate vicinity.

 

Due to these factors I would argue, that historically, in many or most cases, fleet actions were already won and lost before the first shot was fired.

 

JD

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