The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea-Power and Other Studies by Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: Sea-Power and Other Studies

Author: Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge

Release Date: January 12, 2004 [EBook #10694]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEA-POWER AND OTHER STUDIES ***

Produced by Robert J. Hall

SEA-POWER AND OTHER STUDIES

BY ADMIRAL SIR CYPRIAN BRIDGE, G.C.B.

PREFACE

The essays collected in this volume are republished in the hope that they may be of some use to those who are interested in naval history. The aim has been to direct attention to certain historical occurrences and conditions which the author ventures to think have been often misunderstood. An endeavour has been made to show the continuity of the operation of sea-power throughout history, and the importance of recognising this at the present day.

In some cases specially relating to our navy at different periods a revision of the more commonly accepted conclusions—formed, it is believed, on imperfect knowledge—is asked for.

It is also hoped that the intimate connection between naval history in the strict sense and military history in the strict sense has been made apparent, and likewise the fact that both are in reality branches of the general history of a nation and not something altogether distinct from and outside it.

In a collection of essays on kindred subjects some repetitions are inevitable, but it is believed that they will be found present only to a moderate extent in the following pages.

My nephew, Mr. J. S. C. Bridge, has very kindly seen the book through the press.

June 1910.

CONTENTS

I. SEA-POWER. II. THE COMMAND OF THE SEA. III. WAR AND ITS CHIEF LESSONS. IV. THE HISTORICAL RELATIONS BETWEEN THE NAVY AND THE MERCHANT SERVICE. V. FACTS AND FANCIES ABOUT THE PRESS-GANG. VI. PROJECTED INVASIONS OF THE BRITISH ISLES. VII. OVER-SEA RAIDS AND RAIDS ON LAND. VIII. QUEEN ELIZABETH AND HER SEAMEN. IX. NELSON: THE CENTENARY OF TRAFALGAR. X. THE SHARE OF THE FLEET IN THE DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE. XI. NAVAL STRATEGY AND TACTICS AT THE TIME OF TRAFALGAR. XII. THE SUPPLY AND COMMUNICATIONS OF A FLEET. INDEX.

Ten of the essays included in this volume first appeared in the _Encyclopoedia_Britannica_, the Times, the _Morning_Post_, the _National_Review_, the _Nineteenth_Century_and_After_, the _Cornhill_Magazine_, and the _Naval_Annual_. The proprietors of those publications have courteously given me permission to republish them here.

Special mention must be made of my obligation to the proprietors of the _Encyclopoedia_Britannica_ for allowing me to reproduce the essays on 'Sea-Power' and 'The Command of the Sea.' They are the owners of the copyright of both essays, and their courtesy to me is the more marked because they are about to republish them themselves in the forthcoming edition of the Encyclopoedia.

The paper on 'Naval Strategy and Tactics at the Time of Trafalgar'
was read at the Institute of Naval Architects, and that on 'The
Supply and Communications of a Fleet' at the Hong-Kong United
Service Institution.

I

SEA-POWER[1]

[Footnote 1: Written in 1899. (_Encyclopoedia_Britannica_.)]

Sea-power is a term used to indicate two distinct, though cognate things. The affinity of these two and the indiscriminate manner in which the term has been applied to each have tended to obscure its real significance. The obscurity has been deepened by the frequency with which the term has been confounded with the old phrase, 'Sovereignty of the sea,' and the still current expression, 'Command of the sea.' A discussion—etymological, or even archæological in character—of the term must be undertaken as an introduction to the explanation of its now generally accepted meaning. It is one of those compound words in which a Teutonic and a Latin (or Romance) element are combined, and which are easily formed and become widely current when the sea is concerned. Of such are 'sea-coast,' 'sea-forces' (the 'land- and sea-forces' used to be a common designation of what we now call the 'Army and Navy'), 'sea-service,' 'sea-serpent,' and 'sea-officer' (now superseded by 'naval officer'). The term in one form is as old as the fifteenth century. Edward III, in commemoration of the naval victory of Sluys, coined gold 'nobles' which bore on one side his effigy 'crowned, standing in a large ship, holding in one hand a sword and in the other a shield.' An anonymous poet, who wrote in the reign of Henry VI, says of this coin:

  For four things our noble showeth to me,
  King, ship, and sword, and _power_of_the_sea_.

Even in its present form the term is not of very recent date. Grote [2] speaks of 'the conversion of Athens from a land-power into a sea-power.' In a lecture published in 1883, but probably delivered earlier, the late Sir J. R. Seeley says that 'commerce was swept out of the Mediterranean by the besom of the Turkish sea-power.'[3] The term also occurs in vol. xviii. of the 'Encyclopædia Britannica,' published in 1885. At p. 574 of that volume (art. Persia) we are told that Themistocles was 'the founder of the Attic sea-power.' The sense in which the term is used differs in these extracts. In the first it means what we generally call a 'naval power'—that is to say, a state having a considerable navy in contradistinction to a 'military power,' a state with a considerable army but only a relatively small navy. In the last two extracts it means all the elements of the naval strength of the state referred to; and this is the meaning that is now generally, and is likely to be exclusively, attached to the term owing to the brilliant way in which it has been elucidated by Captain A. T. Mahan of the United States Navy in a series of remarkable works.[4] The double use of the term is common in German, though in that language both parts of the compound now in use are Teutonic. One instance out of many may be cited from the historian Adolf Holm.[5] He says[6] that Athens, being in possession of a good naval port, could become '_eine_bedeutende_ Seemacht,' i.e. an important naval power. He also says[7] that Gelon of Syracuse, besides a large army (Heer), had 'eine _bedeutende_Seemacht_,' meaning a considerable navy. The term, in the first of the two senses, is old in German, as appears from the following, extracted from Zedler's 'Grosses Universal Lexicon,' vol. xxxvi:[8] 'Seemachten, Seepotenzen, Latin. summae _potestates_mari_potentes_.' 'Seepotenzen' is probably quite obsolete now. It is interesting as showing that German no more abhors Teuto-Latin or Teuto-Romance compounds than English. We may note, as a proof of the indeterminate meaning of the expression until his own epoch-making works had appeared, that Mahan himself in his earliest book used it in both senses. He says,[9] 'The Spanish Netherlands ceased to be a sea-power.' He alludes[10] to the development of a nation as a 'sea-power,' and[11] to the inferiority of the Confederate States 'as a sea-power.' Also,[12] he remarks of the war of the Spanish Succession that