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This book looks at the transition of wooden sailing fleets to the modern steel navy. It details the technological breakthroughs that brought about this change - steampower, armour, artillery and torpedoes, and looks at their affect on naval strategy and tactics. Part of the ever-growing and prestigious Warfare and History series, this book is a must for enthusiasts of military history.
With striking parallels to recent confrontations in Iraq, this is the story of the first Western international coalition to suppress an aggressive Middle Eastern ruler. The challenger was Mehemet Ali Pasha, called the founder of modern Egypt. Convinced that the Europeans would never be able to unite against him, he sought, with charm, brilliance and bravado, to create a powerful Muslim counterweight to the encroaching West. Drawing on research on three continents, this timely book takes the reader into the heart of a crisis as France, Great Britain, the Ottoman government and the Pasha of Egypt maneuver to defend their interests in the Eastern Mediterranean. Here are the passionate debates among French and British politicians as they struggle to control the Pasha without provoking a European war. Here are the battlefields--from the Euphrates to Beirut--on which Mehemet Ali's modernizing forces created the facts that fed the crisis. Here are the Sultan's ministers at Istanbul, buffeted by the threats of European ambassadors. And here, in confrontation, is the fascinating Mehemet Ali Pasha, in constant conversation with those seeking to deflect him from his dangerous ambition. As France began the fortification of Paris, as Prussia contemplated the French threat of a war on the Rhine and as British warships flooded the Mediterranean, Mehemet Ali sat cross-legged on his sumptuous divan, looking from his palace out over his beautiful fleet at anchor in the bay of Alexandria, and challenged the western world.
From ancient times to World War II and the postwar period, Battleships charts the evolution of the vessel that ruled the seas—a vessel that, until the arrival of the aircraft carrier, would be the most expensive and complex human-made moving object in history. Battleships charts the dramatic evolution of this dominating war vessel. Coverage ranges from ancient galleys to the great ships of World War II to the present, with special emphasis on the ironclad era of the mid-19th century (which saw the greatest innovation over the shortest timespan in naval history) and the great 20th-century battleship race of the dreadnought era. Written by expert military historian Stanley Sandler, Battleships provides insightful examinations of the technological and tactical aspects of important warships from around the world and across time. It also looks at the political and social factors driving the decision to produce battleships in different countries. No other volume has ever captured so completely the impact of the battleship as a weapon of war and a symbol of power.
The National Maritime Museum in Greenwich houses the largest collection of scale ship models in the world, many of which are official, contemporary artefacts made by the craftsmen of the navy or the shipbuilders themselves, and ranging from the mid seventeenth century to the present day. As such they represent a three-dimensional archive of unique importance and authority. Treated as historical evidence, they offer more detail than even the best plans, and demonstrate exactly what the ships looked like in a way that even the finest marine painter could not achieve. This book is the first of a series which will take selections of the best models to tell the story of specific ship types – in this case, the evolution of the cruising ship under sail. Each volume reproduces a large number of model photos, all in full colour, and including many close-up and detail views. These are captioned in depth, but many are also annotated to focus attention on interesting or unusual features. Although pictorial in emphasis, the book weaves the pictures into an authoritative text, producing an unusual and attractive form of technical history. While the series will be of particular interest to ship modellers, all those with an interest in ship design and development will attracted to the in-depth analysis of these beautifully presented books.
Europe ruled the waves for most of the modern era and even when its navies were eclipsed in size by the US force, they continued to dominate world wars. In this unique history of Europe's naval forces, Larry Sondhaus charts the development of naval warfare from the transition to steam to recent actions in the Persian Gulf. Combining detailed technical information with an in-depth comparison of warfare and tactics across some of the key conflicts of the modern world, this is an absorbing account of European and British seapower, past and present.
In the series of wars that raged between France and Britain from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries,seapower was of absolute vital importance. Not only was each nation's navy a key to victory, but was a prerequisite for imperial dominance. These ongoing struggles for overseas colonies and commercial dominance required efficient navies which in turn insured the economic strength for the existence of these fleets as instruments of state power. This new book, by the distinguished historian Jonathan Dull, looks inside the workings of both the Royal and the French navies of this tumultuous era, and compares the key elements of the rival fleets. Through this balanced comparison, Dull argues that Great Britain's final triumph in a series of wars with France was primarily the result of superior financial and economic power. This accessible and highly readable account navigates the intricacies of the British and French wars in a way which will both enlighten the scholar and fascinate the general reader. Naval warfare is brought to life but also explained within the framework of diplomatic and international history. An important new work.
Between 1815 and 1850 the Royal Navy built the most powerful, durable and effective battlefleet of that particular period. This book examines its strategy, tactics, design history, construction and maintenance.
The final instalment of N.A.M. Rodger's definitive, authoritative trilogy on Britain's naval history At the end of the French and Napoleonic wars, British sea-power was at its apogee. But by 1840, as one contemporary commentator put it, the Admiralty was full of ‘intellects becalmed in the smoke of Trafalgar’. How the Royal Navy reformed and reinvigorated itself in the course of the nineteenth century is just one thread in this magnificent book, which refuses to accept standard assumptions and analyses. All the great actions are here, from Navarino in 1827 (won by a daringly disobedient Admiral Codrington) to Jutland, D-Day, the Battle of the Atlantic and the battles in the Pacific in 1944/45 in concert with the US Navy. The development and strategic significance of submarine and navy air forces is superbly described, as are the rapid evolution of ships (from classic Nelsonic type, to hybrid steam/sail ships, then armour-clad and the fully armoured Dreadnoughts and beyond) and weapons. The social history of officers and men – and sometimes women – always a key part of the author’s work, is not neglected. Rodger sets all this in the essential context of politics and geo-strategy. The character and importance of leading admirals – Beatty, Fisher, Cunningham – is assessed, together with the roles of other less famous but no less consequential figures. Based on a lifetime’s learning, it is the culmination of one of the most significant British historical works in recent decades. Naval specialists will find much that is new here, and will be invigorated by the originality of Rodger’s judgements; but everyone who is interested in the one of the central threads in British history will find it rewarding.
By the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the seven home dockyards of the British Royal Navy employed a workforce of nearly 16,000 men and some women. On account of their size, dockyards add much to our understanding of developing social processes as they pioneered systems of recruitment, training and supervision of large-scale workforces. From 1815-1865 the make-up of those workforces changed with metal working skills replacing wood working skills as dockyards fully harnessed the use of steam and made the conversion from constructing ships of timber to those of iron. The impact on industrial relations and on the environment of the yards was enormous. Concentrating on the yard at Chatham, the book examines how the day-to-day running of a major centre of industrial production changed during this period of transition. The Admiralty decision to build at Chatham the Achilles, the first iron ship to be constructed in a royal dockyard, placed that yard at the forefront of technological change. Had Chatham failed to complete the task satisfactorily, the future of the royal dockyards might have been very different.
How one British admiral changed the course of naval history Cockburn and the British Navy in Transition documents the long and varied career of Admiral Sir George Cockburn, who presided over much of the British Navy's transition from sail to steam while maintaining the interests and professionalism of the officer corps. Cockburn's life and times encompassed service under Admiral Horatio Nelson during the French Revolutionary War; diplomacy and combined operations during the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812 with the United States; and administrative, political, and technological changes during the first half of the nineteenth century. Cockburn emerged from the Napoleonic Wars as the best-known British admiral, renowned for his part in the attack on Washington in 1814 and for escorting Napoleon to St. Helena. But his greatest impact was from 1818 to 1846 at the Admiralty Office, where he steered the British Navy through some of the most disruptive political and technological changes it has ever faced. Cockburn's attitude towards the development of more seaworthy sailing warships and his key role in the introduction of the screw propeller are also examined--inovations that coincided with the decline of flogging, impressment, and personal patronage in the management of the British Navy. Though Cockburn was often regarded as a reactionary, Roger Morriss reveals the liberalism that enlightened his policies in the Navy. By providing unique insight into a highly influential figure and into the many facets of admiralty administration, this book makes a valuable contribution to naval history.