FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96  
97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   >>   >|  
age upon the Isle of Lundy, and other places.' The pinnaces were to work inshore of the admiral and to endeavour to entrap the piratical ships, and to this end he said, 'You are also for this present service to keep in your Jack at your boultsprit end and your pendant and your ordnance.' (_Sloane MSS._ 2682, f. 51.) The object of the order evidently was that they should conceal their character from the pirates, and at this time therefore the 'jack' carried at the end of the bowsprit and the pennant must have been the sign of a navy ship. Boteler however, who wrote his _Sea Dialogues_ about 1625, does not mention the jack in his remarks about flags (pp. 327-334). The etymology is uncertain. The new _Oxford Dictionary_ inclines to the simple explanation that 'jack' was used in this case in its common diminutive sense, and that 'jack-flag' was merely a small flag. [5] _I.e._ his cruisers. [6] In the Report of the Historical MSS. Commission it is stated that the position of the ships is shown in a diagram, but I have been unable to obtain access to the document. II MONCK, PRINCE RUPERT AND THE DUKE OF YORK INTRODUCTORY It has hitherto been universally supposed that the Dutch Wars of the Restoration were fought under the set of orders printed as an appendix to Granville Penn's _Memorials of Penn_. Mr. Penn believed them to belong to the year 1665, but recent research shows conclusively that these often-quoted orders, which have been the source of so much misapprehension, are really much later and represent not the ideas under which those wars were fought, but the experience that was gained from them. This new light is mainly derived from a hitherto unknown collection of naval manuscripts belonging to the Earl of Dartmouth, which he has generously placed at the disposal of the Society. The invaluable material they contain enables us to say with certainty that the orders which the Duke of York issued as lord high admiral and commander-in-chief at the outbreak of the war were nothing but a slight modification of those of 1654, with a few but not unimportant additions. Amongst the manuscripts, most of which relate to the first Lord Dartmouth's cousin and first commander, Sir Edward Spragge, is a 'Sea Book' that must have once belonged to that admiral. It is a kind of commonplace book, the greater part unused, in which Spragge appears to have begun to enter various important orders and other matter of nava
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96  
97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

orders

 

admiral

 

hitherto

 
commander
 
fought
 

Dartmouth

 
manuscripts
 

Spragge

 

source

 

quoted


conclusively
 

greater

 

commonplace

 

experience

 

gained

 
represent
 

misapprehension

 

recent

 

appendix

 
Granville

important

 
matter
 

printed

 

appears

 

belong

 

unused

 

Memorials

 
believed
 

research

 

derived


relate

 

issued

 

cousin

 

certainty

 

Amongst

 

slight

 

modification

 

unimportant

 

outbreak

 

additions


enables

 

belonged

 

belonging

 

collection

 

unknown

 

generously

 
material
 

Edward

 

invaluable

 

disposal