Sailing ships

by E. Keble Chatterton

The rigging, the sail furled to the yard, and the two braces are so clearly shown as to need no comment. But two other points are of considerable interest to us. Firstly, notice that the rudder, on the starboard side, is almost identical with that of the Gogstad ship. From the hull projects a bracket to support the rudder, while above, the tiller or clavus fits in at right angles and comes inboard to the helmsman. Secondly, notice that the two men forward are getting up the anchor and that the cable leads aft to a winch—probably a great wooden drum like that found on the Dutch schuyts of to-day—for the two men in the stern are clearly shown working away with their handspikes, which would fit into the windlass drum in the manner the reader will notice any day he likes to take a stroll and look at the Dutch craft lying off Billingsgate. In a few moments the ship will be under way, for one of the crew has been sent aloft to unfurl the sail. The fighting-top is not shown on this seal, but that is possibly accounted for by the fact that the artist was cramped for space. Winchelsea, or as Hakluyt speaks of it, “Frigmare Ventus”—and not inaptly so-called, as those who have been caught in the nasty chilly squalls off this ancient shore will agree—was one of the original five Cinque Ports before the others were added, and in the time of Edward I. had to provide ten ships, though during the reign of the third Edward this was increased to twenty-one with five hundred and ninety-six mariners.

Fig. 38. Seal of Hastings (Thirteenth Century).

Fig. 38 has been drawn from the seal of Hastings in the British Museum. The date is the thirteenth century, and although no forecastle is shown, the erection in the stern scarcely requires any further comment. The high stem and stern are seen again, and what is of considerable interest, the three rows of reef-points. This seal depicts an incident in one of the many engagements that took place about this time along the coast between Beachy Head and the North Foreland. Both ships, it will be noticed, are sailing, and one has rammed his enemy and cut his ship down to the water. An unfortunate warrior is seen swimming in the foreground of the picture. On the banners at bow and stern of the victorious ship are shown the arms of the Cinque Ports. All three warriors are seen clad in mail.

The seal of Dover, another of the Cinque Ports, of the date of 1284, bears out the general characteristics we have been discussing. The castles at bow, stern and top of mast: the trumpeters—this time at the bows: the two men getting in the cable: the one man going aloft to unfurl the sail—these details are all depicted. Both Dover and Sandwich seals contain a bowsprit after the manner of that seen in the Roman merchant ship moored alongside the quay in Fig. 21. It is therefore probable that a small square sail was used occasionally at this time for tilting the ship’s head off the wind.

Fig. 39. Thirteenth-century English Ship.

The model by Mr. Frank H. Mason, R.B.A., reproduced in Fig. 39, was in the Franco-British Exhibition and is now in the South Kensington Museum. It may perhaps assist the reader to obtain a more living picture of the ships of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The castles will be at once recognised. Frequently the sail was decorated as shown. The detachable “bonnet,” still used by the sailors of Scandinavia and Norfolk, can just be seen below the decoration. The steering oar, or rudder, is attached to the starboard side, but the reader can just see the handle coming up. The massive wooden fenders were both to strengthen the ship and for a protection when going alongside an enemy. Since so frequently the same ship that was used for fishing or trading was also employed as a battleship or even pirate, the unwieldy, top-heavy castles were made so as to allow of them being removed in times of peace. The ship before us probably represents one of the larger, esnecca type, and the snake’s head coming inboard from the stern-post is very noticeable.

From the masthead of the commander-in-chief’s ship by day flew a banner, and by night a lantern hung in order to direct the sailing of the fleet. The officers of the Cinque Ports were ordered to cut adrift the banner of a hostile commander in an engagement, so that the whole of the enemy’s fleet might be thrown into confusion. Before the close of Henry II.’s reign another crusade was undertaken, but the ships of the Southern sea seem to have reached to larger dimensions by now. There is a record of a ship built in Venice for France in the year 1268. She was 110 feet long, 40 feet broad, and 11½ feet deep in the hold. She had also 6½ feet of head-room on her main deck. Her crew totalled 110 officers and men, and she was of about four or five hundred tons burthen.[49] The English ships had another opportunity of testing their sea-going qualities in the Mediterranean, for during a storm in the year 1270 the English squadron was the only part of the allied fleet that escaped without loss.

During Henry II.’s reign the magnet seems to have been first commonly used in navigation. From an old MS. in Corpus Christi College Cambridge we see the derivation of that anchor which is also freely used by balloons nowadays and which seamen find extremely useful when dragging for a lost anchor or cable—the grapnel with its several flukes projecting from a common centre. The MS. mentioned illustrates a sea-fight, and sailors are seen keeping the enemy’s galley close alongside by means of one of these anchors or grappling irons. The other anchors, as will have already been noticed by the reader in the illustration of the warship by Giotto’s pupil in Fig. 35, were stockless.