Talk:Royal Navy/Archive 1

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would this be better at British Royal Navy? There are other royal navies... Vera Cruz

In a word, no. There is only one "Royal Navy". All others are "Royal somethingelse Navy". For example, Royal Australian Navy, Royal New Zealand Navy, and so on. Tannin

just wait until the micronations hear about this... Vera Cruz

:)

Uhmmmm... The Dutch Navy IS called the 'Royal Navy'. I suggest a new title, this one is at the very least ethnocentric. Nonickyet 2:41(CET) 9 aug 2005.

It's called the Royal Netherlands Navy. [1] Proteus (Talk) 10:31, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Actually on the link you give it is called the Koninklijke Marine which directly translates as Royal Navy, not Royal Netherlands Navy. Dabbler 11:02, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

It's called the Royal Netherlands Navy in English, as the English section of that site demonstrates perfectly clearly ("You arrived at the website of the Royal Netherlands Navy"), and that's the only thing that matters in the English Wikipedia. The English name is not always a direct translation of the name in the local language. Proteus (Talk) 11:22, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

I cant find any English version on the link you provided. However, even if it did refer to the Royal Netherlands Navy, the logic would still not hold. For example, when talking about The Queen, we all know the British queen is implied. But concluding that therefore, the wiki page on Queen should refer to Elisabeth is a poor choice imho. Nonickyet 14 Aug 2005 21:36(CET)

I'm afraid that is a very poor analogy in every respect.--80.47.56.33 11:14, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Here's another example: when listening to dutch radio, Radio Nederland Wereldomroep is in english always known as "Radio Netherlands" versus the literal translation "Radio Netherlands World". Consequently, "Royal Netherlands Navy" is the correct translation. As such, there is only one (1) "Royal Navy." - WorldbandDX 28th August

This is a valid criticism, but we can safely assume that on the English wiki the vast majority of searches for "Royal Navy" will refer to the British fleet. Simplicity would suggest keeping the article here, though it may be appropriate to link a "Royal Navy (disambiguation)" page at the top. Bastie 13:34, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Flagship

Is Nelson's HMS Victory the current flagship of the Navy? By this, I mean it is comparable with the reference to FS Charles De Gaulle as "the flagship of the French navy"? This Royal Navy link would suggest so, but other Wikipedia pages would suggest that ships like Ark Royal or Dreadnought have served as flagship, which would be inconsistent with Victory maintaining its flag status since Trafalgar. Perhaps, there are multiple fleets, or some other technicality? Could somebody clear this up? --MichaelWest 29 June 2005 13:58 (UTC)

A flagship is any ship in which an admiral is stationed or "flies his flag". The smallest ship in the Navy could be a flagship if that is where the admiral wants to operate from. HMS Victory is still in commission as the flagship of the admiral for the time being acting as Second Sea Lord in his role as Commander in Chief of the Royal Navy's Home Command (CINCNAVHOME). However, he does not actually work aboard the ship. Dabbler 29 June 2005 14:31 (UTC)

"Flagship" merely indicates the ship which flies the flag of an admiral commanding a particular naval force. Victory is the flagship of the whole RN, but if you take a look at Order of battle at Jutland for example, you can see that each battleship and battlecruiser squadron had its own flagship. -- Arwel 29 June 2005 14:33 (UTC)

It's incorrect to refer to the Victory as being the flagship of the whole RN (being, as it is, the flagship of the Home Command). If any ship had the claim to this status, it would be the flagship of the Admiral of the Red (pre-1864), or the flagship of the Admiral of the Fleet (1864-1996). Alternatively, one could consider any ship flying the flag of the Lord High Admiral (HMQ, since 1964) to the true flagship of the fleet. For example, HMY Britania flew this flag whenever the Queen was on board. --195.166.157.232 16:38, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

It is usually assumed that the current flagship of the British fleet is whichever is the 'active' aircraft carrier of Invincible (paid off), Illustrious and Ark Royal (in refit). So at this point in time would be HMS Illustrious. As a side note however, HMS Victory is one of the flagships as she is the flagship of the Second Sea Lord. JonEastham 14:33, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Alleged inhumanity

User:Patcat88 just added the following text:

"The Royal Navy also developed a reputation of savagry and inhumane practices such as frequent [[Flagellation|loging] and unconsenting, effectivly kidnapping Impressment. This reached its peak in the 1700s and early 1800s."

I don't think this is particularly relevant. "Inhumane practices" were the norm for armed forces of that time, and have been throughout history. It's only recently (i.e. the past couple of hundred years) that soldiers and sailors have not been punished severely for any minor offence. Also, "impressment" cannot really be called "effectively kidnapping", because it was done fully within the law, and with the full consent of the government. Perhaps some mention of press gangs should be made, but not in this POV way. Proteus 09:24, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC)

• I agree with Proteus here. I don't think the paragraph belongs and I certainly think it needs to be NPOVed at least Cjrother 15:07, 5 May 2004 (UTC).

• Yes, the social life needs to be described in context. The sailors did not mutiny over flogging or impressment, for instance. Stan 16:21, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

• I have changed the paragraph to hopefully NPOV it. Cjrother 21:58, 11 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The old myth about flogging is back. Life was harder then and what are unacceptable conditions now were relatively normal back then. While there were individual ships in which excessive brutality caused mutinies, these were very small in number. The great mutinies at Spithead and the Nore were more in the nature of an industrial strike against working conditions, as described. Dabbler 03:25, 15 February 2006 (UTC) We have to remember that on land the penalty for stealing a pair of gloves was death by hanging. Naval discipline was avtually relatively lenient and the food was plentiful, regular if not overly exciting. The myth of harsh discipline and poor conditions is modern. I am not denying that there was occasional abuse, but the great mutinies "were" a glorified pay dispute not a protest against harsh treatment. Dabbler 12:49, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Flogging in the royal navy was not a "myth" as you so blithely dismiss - torture is torture if it is practiced in 2000 BC or 3000 AD. Flogging was endemic in the royal navy it was not confined to a few ships. Men were not exactly queueing up to join the royal navy in the 18th century were they? Why else would they have resorted to press gangs and sending convicts and rebels to the fleet as judicial punishment.

Round robins, petions in circulation prior to the mutiny single out flogging and other tortures as a major grievance of the men (bear in mind they were not even protesting against the harsh "Articles of War" which laid down savage punishment for various derilictions of duty - just abuses of the articles) To call the mutines "more in the nature of an industrial strike against working conditions" is incredible - there was a war against revolutionary France at the time yet the mutineers threatened to blockade London, opened Fire on recaltriant ships and killed several royal marines in the course of the mutiny. --Damnbutter 12:56, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

The "myth" was that flogging was the only or primary cause of the great mutinies. Have you read any of the excellent naval histories of the period as opposed to fiction? Try NAM Rodger's the Wooden Walls in which he explores the pay and living conditions for seamen in the Georgian Navy very closely. I agree that brutality was the cause of some individual ship's companies mutinying, Hermione for example, but this was the exception rather than the rule. The round robins etc. below were addressing the pay treatment (the army had just got a significant pay raise) and the conditions. As for the press, that was required because the pay and conditions were not very good compared to merchant ships. There were a large number of "career" navy sailors. The mutiny at Spithead was settled without violence or punishment when the admiralty agreed to improve the conditions.

The mutiny at the Nore was lead by more political leaders who did had revolutionary motives and exploited the seamen's grievances. Again this was not necessarily what the common sailor wanted. Dabbler 14:10, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Have I read facts as opposed to fiction? Try these for size;

Admiralty Documents in the Public Record Office -Petitions to the Admiralty 1793-97 Ref; Ad. 1/5125

Petions from the crews of;

HMS Winchelsea

""We are knockt about so that we do not no what to do. Every man in her would sooner be sot at like a taregaite by musketree than remain any longer in her"

"HMS Shannon

"the ill treatment which we have and do receive...is more than..English man can cleaverly bear, for we are born free but now we are slaves"

HMS Nymphe

“Flogging is carried on to extremes….the number that has been flogged for trifling offences would be too tedious to mention at present”

HMS Pompée

“..to crush the spirit of tyranny and oppression so much practiced and delighted in, contrary to the spirit or intent of any laws of our country”

HMS Glory

“..behaved tyrannically to the people with ordering them to be beat in a most cruel manner…beating, blacking, tarring and putting the peoples heads in bags to the mortification of the whole ship’s company”

HMS Minotaur

“It is impossible to insert in this sheet the many acts of cruelty”

These represent a mere fraction of the complaints of brutality inflicted upon the average sailor in the Royal Navy at this time and do not represent "occasional abuse". Or do you regard the Public Records Office as the Office of Legends and Fiction?--Damnbutter 17:03, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Presentism is a mode of historical analysis in which present-day ideas and perspectives are anachronistically introduced into depictions or interpretations of the past. Most modern historians seek to avoid presentism in their work because they believe it creates a distorted understanding of their subject matter.Jacknife737 21:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Age

An anon has added a comment that the Army is "technically older". Is it? I was under the impression that the RN has existed from the time of Alfred the Great, while there wasn't a standing "Army" for a long time after that, as forces were just raised on an ad hoc basis whenever the King wanted troops. I'm ready to be corrected, though... Proteus (Talk) 20:45, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

As I understand it from British Army, today's Army is the descendant of Cromwell's creation, thus relatively new. The RN doesn't really have a documented continuous existence from Alfred's time, but there's not a single point where the monarch said "we must create a navy", so Alfred is as good a starting point as any. The Oxford history of the Navy discusses all this, but alas it's back at the library now. The "technically older" is likely to be confusing, it should be deleted or expanded. Stan 21:15, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This is taken from the Royal Navy Web site distinguishing various forces that may be considered a national navy: When the King Charles II came to the throne in 1660 he inherited a huge fleet of 154 ships. This was a permanent professional national force and the beginning of the Royal Navy as we know it today. Charles II was also the first king to maintain a permanent standing army, thus making the modern forces pretty equivalent in age. Since no national army exisdted until Cromwell and a Navy Royal was definately developed from earlier foundations by Henry VIII I would think the RN can be conisidered more ancient before even going back to Alfred. Hence I have docked the sentence Dainamo 13:24, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Offline I'm working on a more comprehensive history article, and it will address some of these issues in more depth. The RN website is poorly worded, because it makes it unclear as to whether Charles inherited the "permanent professional national force" or if he created it from the 154 ships. I think it's hard for moderns to really grasp the idea that entire wars were fought with less planning and preparation that goes into a Saturday pick-up football game... Stan 18:13, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

It was my belief that the Royal navy was the largest navy in the world until mid-way into the 2nd World War, not the end of the 1st world war as this article states. I'm sure if you look at a reliable ship list, this will proove it.

Thanks -Andrew

The Naval Treaties (can't remember fofhand if it was London or Washington) of the 1920s established ratios for the fleets of the Great Powers, the RN and USN were a 1:1 ratio at the top. The US Naval expansion bill of 1916 was designed to bring the US Navy to parity or beyond vis a vis the RN. But the RN was tied for the status of largest until the end of the second world war.

Only one?

The article contains this sentence:

In 1692-1940, the Royal Navy suffered only one major defeat, the Battle of the Chesapeake against France

I know one can debate endlessly what counts as "major" or even as a "defeat", but surely this sentence is exaggerating the case; consider the Battle of Lake Erie, the Battle of Lake Champlain, the Battle of Coronel, the Battle of the Dardanelles. Gdr 18:34, 2004 Oct 24 (UTC)

I think in this context it means a "strategic" defeat. The British lost in the American war of independence (partly as a result). Other battles like the Dardanelles may have been tactical setbacks, but the wars were eventually won. Wiki-Ed 16:38, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)

But if so, then what were the strategic defeats in 1692 and 1940? The Royal Navy was on the winning side in the War of the Grand Alliance and World War II. Gdr 19:39, 2004 Dec 23 (UTC)

Supremacy

What happened in 1692 and 1940? I would have thought the piece needs a sentence or two of explanation here.

There were no significant defeats for the Royal Navy in 1692 or 1940. I think the author may have had in mind the battle of Beachy Head (1690) and the sinking of Hood and the sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse in 1941. Gdr 22:33, 2004 Oct 28 (UTC)

1692 is too early - I think for "supremacy" you really want a date after Trafalgar. 1940 seems a wee bit too early as well. I would have thought the USN overtook the RN later in the war (1942?) after it properly started building up its forces. Wiki-Ed 16:54, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Bigness

Is the Royal Navy still larger than that of France? If so, is this likely to change in the near future, given the recent wave of spending cuts? Also, history seems to miss out entire First World War, 19th Century, etc. Ashley Pomeroy 09:29, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I take it the link to History of the Royal Navy wasn't prominent enough? :-) Stan 04:06, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

---

The Royal Navy is presently bigger than the French Navy but may not be bigger than the French Navy soon but it will remain much more powerful. Most of the escort fleet of the French Navy is made up of small frigates, corvettes and patrol boats whereas destroyers and frigates make up the Royal Navy escort fleet. And the RN will still have more aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines. SoLando 17:47, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

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Is the Royal Navy really bigger than that of Russia??

If one counts ships that are capable of getting under weigh, most likely. The Russian fleet is in pretty poor condition, apart (to a certain degree) from the strategic missile submarines.

---

I have edited the article stating that both the US and French navies are now bigger then the royal navy. For the US this is obvious but for the French my reasoning is that the French navy has more personal, ships and probably tonnage. Has a massive building program which will further increase its size in comparison to the Royal Navy in the future. Also the French navy has more modern ships and is generally more powerful espcially as it has a real aircraft carrier while the Royal Navy has ancient VSTOL escort carriers.

Also I believe the Russian navy is bigger then the Royal navy in terms of ships and personal however it is much less powerful in terms of capability thus the Royal Navy is the more powerful force.

Lord High Admiral - uniform

Does the Lord High Admiral (ie. the Sovereign, since 1964 anyway) have an official naval uniform with insignia, etc? I've never seen it, though surely there must be something the Lord High Admiral can wear which says "I am the Lord High Admiral"!

David.

I've found out myself - the answer is no, the Lord High Admiral would wear the same uniform as an Admiral of the Fleet.

"There has never been any insignia used to distinguish the Lord High Admiral, as the office was almost always in commission after the introduction of rank insignia. The Duke of Clarence, later King William IV, held the office 1827-28, but did not wear any distinctive insignia. He had already been Admiral of the Fleet, and continued to wear the appropriate insignia for this rank."

Source (see bottom)

Technical speaking, the position of "Lord High Admiral" is an office (one of the Great Offices of State), and not a rank. As such, it's not really correct to talk of it having a uniform in the same way as actual naval ranks --195.166.157.232 16:22, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Ranks

Why isn't there a section on naval ranks, like there is for the british army?--80.47.20.68 20:14, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Minor nitpick

The navy helped establish the United Kingdom as the dominant military and economic power of the 18th and 19th century, and was essential for maintaining the British Empire.

The word "military" refers specifically to armies not fleets, so the UK has never been the "dominant" military power. In the 18th and for much of the 19th century this status belonged to France, while Germany occupied it subsequently. Bastie 13:28, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Well that's just rubbish. Military involves all forms of armed force employed by a nation state. Your view is very continent-centric. Yes the UK had quite a small army compared to the likes of France and Germany during the 19th Century, but its navy ensured dominance in warfare - hence why France never conquered Britain and hence also why Britain was able to expand its empire during the Napoleonic Wars. David 11:35, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Not so fast with the rubbish. In British English at least, 'military' in its precise sense refers to soldiers and armies (Latin miles, soldier), as opposed to navies and air forces. Formal Government documents sometimes mention "Her Majesty's naval, military, and air forces", and the Military Secretary's remit is confined exclusively to the Army: his counterparts in the other services are the Naval Secretary and the Air Secretary.

In American usage, the word does indeed cover all the armed forces: this is influencing British usage, which increasingly refers to "the military" rather than "the armed forces" or "the services". The trend is exacerbated by the lack of another handy adjective to describe the services as a whole (the only one I can think of is "martial", which can have derogatory overtones), and by British usage's own historical anomalies (e.g., the Royal Navy used to call its executive or line officers the "Military Branch", as opposed to the "Civil Branch" of surgeons, pursers, shipwrights, etc.) Nevertheless, it is legitimate to distinguish between a military power and a naval one, though it may put you at risk of being labelled a pedant. — Franey 13:11, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Lists of Admirals et al.

There is List of Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, First Lord of the Admiralty and List of senior officers of the Royal Navy all of which have significant overlaps and even errors. I thought this was the best place to bring it to your attention but don't really know how best to merge these. Also the successession box for these admirals usually point to [[Admiralty] or somewhere else when they probably should point to one of these lists. MeltBanana 17:25, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

Sea Harrier Withdrawl

The BBC reports here http://news.bbc.co.uk/nolavconsole/ukfs_news/hi/bb_rm_fs.stm?&bbram=1&nol_storyid=4761130&news=1&bbwm=1 that the last Sea Harrier sorties have been flown from Illustrious and that the aircraft will be formally withdrawn. This will require the updating of the Sea Harrier page, and of course the main Royal Navy page as this makes reference to the carriers flying FA.2s. Emoscopes 20:50, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Too Many Images!

Please trim down the images in the article, there are far too many, and it causes formating problems as well as loading time issues. --Barberio 16:15, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd second this, many of the images achieve little except making the article larger, and are anyway available on the article of the relevant ship Emoscopes ^Talk 18:32, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, the picture of the carrier HMS Hermes is actually of the INS Viraat; you can see the Indian flag flying if you look closely. I'm pretty sure this photo was taken at the Indian Navy's Fleet Review a few years ago; I recall having seen this picture then. I don't know if it's accurate/appropriate to call this a photo of the Hermes, considering that the ship now sails under the Indian flag. Gokulmadhavan 21:32, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

There are still too many images, so I'm just going to trim ones at random. --Barberio 21:12, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

I took the opertunity to move the layout of the page around. Making sure that any lists stay at the bottom of the article. (And deleting one that had it's own article) --Barberio 22:26, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

No disambig?

Shouldn't there be some kind of Royal Navy (disambiguation) for other Royal Navies?--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 02:53, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Which other Royal Navies are there? --Barberio 22:25, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

See the first section on this discussion page, there are things like the Royal Australian Navy and also the Dutch Navy which is the Royal Netherlands Navy but also works as the Royal Navy when referred to in Dutch. JonEastham 14:38, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

In English other royal navies are all qualified with an additional adjective. The British one is not. Wiki-Ed 09:57, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Battle Honours

I am removing the words Battle Honours from the timeline of the Royal Navy provided here. The reason for this is that the Royal Navy awards official battle honours to ships in a very specific way, (which I am researching now, and will hopefully write an artice on in the near future). The battle honours awarded by the Royal Navy have very strict titles and awards, (see HMS Invincible for an example), and they do not correlate to the list here.--Jackyd101 07:48, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Insignia, Uniforms and Ship's Badges

Hi everyone, I've added two new articles for insignia, they're now in the Royal Navy template. There's some good diagrams of rank/rate insignia on the Royal Navy's website, not too sure about the copyright issues for taking the pictures though. Maybe it would be worth expanding the articles to include uniforms and other insignia (I know I get confused by all the different branch badges and the titles that go with them - an article on this would be really helpful). Also, I've started adding ship's badges to the articles on individual ships - if you can find pictures of any more badges on the internet, it would be helpful if you could add them to the Category:Royal Navy Ship's Badges page and put them up on the corresponding ships' pages. Thanks, Sharkbait784 15:59, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

I have a number of publications of RN Ships' badges. (Badges and Battle Honours of H.M. Ships, Lt. Cdr. K. V. Burns D.S.M. R.N., Maritime Books, 1986 / The A to Z of Royal Naval Ships' Badges 1919 - 1989, vols' I & II, B. J. Wilkinson, T. P. Stopford, D. Taylor, Neptune Books, 1987 ). These state categorically that the official imprints of ships badges are Crown Copyright and property of the MoD. Wikipedia has been denied permission to use anything Crown Copyrighted by the Controller of Her Majesty's Stationary Office. I therefore think it is unlikely that such a project to collect ships badges and reproduce them on wikipedia would be legal, unless they were self made and / or we had permission to use a reproduction. Emoscopes ^Talk 17:29, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Admiralty and Royal Navy in the 21st century

There seems to be no mention of what tends here to be called "the Armiralty". I've added mention of its privatisation to the Royal Maritime Auxiliary Service page which seemed well out of date.

Also, since the Royal Navy in the 21st century page can be a useful expansion on the topic, why isn't it linked at the relevant section with a see main? ..dave souza, talk 08:26, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Second largest

I've removed the statement that the RN is the second largest nvy. It's been unsupported with a citation for a long time now and a simple comparison with the numbers of ships in the Russian Navy makes it exceptionally unlikely. This page compared with this page give clear reasons for thinking this is wrong - for example the Russian Navy has 61 submarines and 186 surface ships. The RN has around 100 ships and 14 subs. We'd need string evidence that the RN ships were so much bigger that they outgrossed the Russians by 2:1. DJ Clayworth 04:43, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Are those ships in decent repair (ie, able to get underweigh) or the total strength of the Russian Navy? An important distinction for that force.

The RN is the second biggest as 50% of Russias navy is mothballed. User:King konger

The size of the French and Greek navies are widely regarded to be larger than the UK, just comparing a simple list of French and British leaves a force of roughly 90 UK to 100 France. Unless of course it is being decided by tonnage, in which case a calculation needs to be done by someone as i'm unable to confirm either way. JonEastham 22:56, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

In my experience, Fleet size is always referred to in tonnage. I understand we are 2nd in the world currently. Red7

The above is correct. British naval tonnage is second only to the USA. Further, the British fleet is the world's second strongest regarding the ability to project power. One British carrier has more airpower than most national airforces...

"atrocities at Lake Erie"

The suggestion of "atrocities at Lake Erie" probably deserves a link, but actually no atrocites are mentioned on the Battle of Lake Erie page.

Slang Terms

Have added Citation needed tag to the text about the nicknames of the royal navy and sailors. I would suggest these names be looked into properly, especially the bit that talks about names used in Portsmouth. This is because I have been living in Portsmouth for 3 yrs and also work in the Naval base, along with having several friends who are part of the Royal Navy and have never heard any of these used. JonEastham 18:28, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Matelot is a very old term, the source of the slang may be dated, plus traditions change. GraemeLeggett 09:44, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

More appropriately referenced Rick Jolly, and removed the amazon sales link (WP:EL). Got to say I'm surprised to hear of someone working in the dockyard and never having heard Matelot, the Mob, Royal or Skate (although not in the context mentioned). I aded a fact tag to Skate as I've never seen that explanation.ALR 12:44, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

“Covey Crump” [2] (Commander A. Covey-Crump, RN) being the authority on Naval Slang - certain alteration edits have been made. Mousescribe 17:53, 10 July 2006 (UTC)