Wee taking into Our Royall consideration that it is meete for the Honour of Our owne Ships in Our Navie Royall and of such other Ships as are or shall be employed in Our immediate Service, that the same bee by their Flags distinguished from the ships of any other of Our Subjects, doe hereby straitly prohibite and forbid that none of Our Subjects, of any of Our Nations and Kingdomes, shall from hencefoorth presume to carry the Union Flagge in the Maine toppe, or other part of any of their Ships (that is) S. Georges Crosse and S. Andrews Crosse joyned together upon paine of Our high displeasure, but that the same Union Flagge bee still reserved as an ornament proper for Our owne Ships and Ships in Our immediate Service and Pay, and none other.
And likewise Our further will and pleasure is, that all the other Ships of Our Subjects of England or South Britaine bearing flags shall from hencefoorth carry the Red-Crosse, commonly called S. George his Crosse, as of olde time hath beene used; And also that all the other ships of Our Subjects of Scotland or North Britaine shall from hencefoorth carry the White Crosse commonly called S. Andrews Crosse, Whereby the severall Shipping may thereby bee distinguished and We thereby the better discerne the number and goodnesse of the same. Wherefore Wee will and straitly command all Our Subjects foorthwith to bee conformable and obedient to this Our Order, as they will answer the contrary at their perills.
Given at Our Court at Greenwich this fifth day of May in the tenth yeere of Our Reigne of England Scotland France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith &c.
The ostensible reason for this distinction in flags—to enable the "number and goodnesse" of the ships of the two nations to be more readily discerned—is obviously an afterthought[156]; a sugar coating to the pill. The customs officers of the various ports could, of course, have provided any information desired relative to the shipping, and were not dependent on the flags for their knowledge of the ships' nationalities. The point is of some interest as it marks a distinct step in the exaltation of the Navy Royal and its officers into a position of superiority over the mercantile marine.
It will also be observed that the proclamation of 1634 does not require the flags to be hoisted at the masthead as did that of 1606. Probably this was no accidental omission but was the outcome of the general introduction of the "Jack" on the bowsprit a year or two before. Flags had no doubt been occasionally carried on the bowsprit from the time when that spar was first invented, but the practice had been exceptional, at any rate in the English navy. An early instance was depicted in a contemporary picture in Cowdray Castle, since destroyed by fire, which represented "the encampment of the English forces near Portsmouth, together with a view of the English and French fleets at the commencement of the action between them on the 19th of July, 1545." In this picture, which fortunately was reproduced in an engraving by the Society of Antiquaries in 1780, the Lord Admiral's ship, the 'Henri Grace à Dieu,' was seen flying a royal standard on the bowsprit. Drake, also, had flown a striped flag in this position in that last voyage which ended for him in his death at sea in January, 1596[157]. Yet when Captain Young submitted his "Noates for Sea Service" to the Earl of Essex[158] he wrote as though the idea were unusual:
and that the cullers maye bee the better knowne from those of the enemies and yf they chance to have the like it shalbe then convenient that upon or misson flagge-staves or th ende of or bowlesprits and that theare bee but a smawle litle flagge with a red Crosse yt being but a litle bigger than a vaine of a great Catche[159].
As remarked by Admiral Sir Massie Blomfield[160], this "jack" is not shown in the "illustrations of the flagships of the Expedition of 1596 reproduced in the 'Naval Miscellany,'[161]" so that the suggestion was probably not received with favour.
There is no mention of, or provision for, "jacks" in the inventories which accompanied the report of the committee that inquired into the state of the navy in 1618. Sir Julian Corbett has pointed out[162] that the earliest instance of the use of the word "jack" to denote a flag occurs in the orders issued by Sir John Pennington to one of his captains on 3rd July, 1633. The original has not survived, but the copy[163] is in a contemporary hand and is corroborated by Pennington's Journal, now among the MSS. of Lord Muncaster.
In the summers of the years 1631, 1633 and 1634 Pennington was in command of a small squadron as Admiral of the Narrow Seas, charged especially with the duty of freeing the coast from pirates. He tells us in his journal[164], under the above date (3rd July, 1633):