Photo. S. Cribb.
Nelson’s historic flagship, the Victory, of 100 guns, was built in 1765. Her immediate predecessor of the same name was launched in 1735, being the finest first-rate of her time, until she was lost in a terrible storm off the Alderney Race, every one of the 1000 souls on board perishing with her. The illustration of Nelson’s Victory in Fig. 67 was taken recently in Portsmouth Harbour where this fine old ship still swings to the tide. Her length is (measured on the gun-deck) 186 feet, beam 52 feet, depth of hold 21 feet 6 inches, whilst her tonnage is 2162, or slightly larger than the Royal George previously mentioned. The reader will notice the Jack flying in the place previously referred to. Very interesting to us who have traced its development is the stage at which the bow has arrived. Gone is the towering forecastle, though the name still survives as designating the fore-part of even small cabined craft. Even the diminished rake of the seventeenth century from bow to stern has disappeared too. In order that the reader may also obtain some idea of the stern, and the three lanterns which would have been part of the ship’s inventory when she set out for the Mediterranean on her last voyage with Nelson, the illustration in Fig. 68 may be worthy of notice. It is only quite recently that the Admiralty have added these replicas, which look not a little incongruous as they tower above submarines and torpedo-boats churning up the water below. The flags flying in Fig. 67 were intended to represent Nelson’s immortal signal. It was quite recently discovered, however, that the wrong signals had been flown on Trafalgar Day each year, for the code of a far too modern date was relied upon. This mistake has been rectified, and the correct flags are now flown on October 21.
Photo. S. Cribb.
Fig. 69. Corvette, 340 Tons, of about 1780.
The illustration in Fig. 69 represents a corvette of about the year 1780. Corvettes were vessels having far less freeboard and without the high quarter-deck. They were ship-rigged and carried less than twenty guns. Those carried on the ship before us would be six-pounders. Her crew would number 125, her tonnage would be 340, her length on the gun-deck, 101 feet, length of keel, 85·5 feet, beam 28 feet, depth of hold 12·5 feet. As to her canvas carried, the triangular headsails with the two spritsails will be seen. In addition to her courses, she carries topsails, topgallants, and royals on the fore and main masts. The converted lateen has already been referred to, but it should be noticed that while she has on the mizzen a topsail, topgallant and royal, and also a cross-jack yard, yet no sail is set on the latter, as it is to-day on a full-rigged ship. This yard had been in use since the beginning of the seventeenth century, and it was not until 1840 that a Yankee skipper took it into his head to introduce the sail which is known as the cro’jack. The French, since from this spar no sail was set, called it the “barren yard”—vergue sec.[106] It was during this century that the frigate proper as a fast cruiser was introduced into the English Navy. Still stirred to energy by the activity displayed by the French, the dimensions of English ships were constantly being increased during the last years of the eighteenth century. The capture, in 1792, of the fine three-master Commerce de Marseilles, with a tonnage of 2747, and a length of over 200 feet, came as a welcome prize to our fleet which had nothing to equal her in respect either of size or armament. Again the design embodied in her was carefully studied by our experts, and before the close of the century two important improvements were made in English men-of-war. The first was to cease placing the lower battery so low down to the water. The reader will readily see that if the enemy were to leeward—as in all probability he should be—our lower ports must necessarily be kept closed unless there were only such a faint draught of wind as scarcely caused the ship to heel over. The French were thus at a great advantage in being able to fire from every one of their guns down to the lowest tier. The second improvement consisted in giving our newer ships a length far greater in proportion to the beam.