Julian S. Corbett - Fighting Instructions, 1530 1816

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It is not till the close of the West Indian Expedition of 1596, when,
after Hawkins and Drake were both dead, Colonel-General Sir Thomas
Baskerville, the commander of the landing force, was left in charge of
the retreating fleet, that we get any trace of a definite battle
formation. In his action off the Isla de Pinos he seems, so far as we
can read the obscure description, to have formed his fleet into two
divisions abreast, each in line ahead. The queen's ships are described
at least as engaging in succession according to previous directions
till all had had 'their course.' Henry Savile, whose intemperate and
enthusiastic defence of his commander was printed by Hakluyt, further
says: 'Our general was the foremost and so held his place until, by
order of fight, other ships were to have their turns according to his
former direction, who wisely and politicly had so ordered his vanguard
and rearward; and as the manner of it was altogether strange to the
Spaniard, so might they have been without hope of victory, if their
general had been a man of judgment in sea-fights.'

Here, then, if we may trust Savile, a definite battle order must have
been laid down beforehand on the new lines, and it is possible that in
the years which had elapsed since the Armada campaign the seamen had
been giving serious attention to a tactical system, which the absence
of naval actions prevented reaching any degree of development. Had
the idea been Baskerville's own it is very unlikely that the veteran
sea-captains on his council of war would have assented to its
adoption. At any rate we may assert that the idea of ships attacking
in succession so as to support one another without masking each
other's broadside fire (which is the essential germ of the true line
ahead) was in the air, and it is clearly on the principle that
underlay Baskerville's tactics that Ralegh's fighting instructions
were based twenty years later.[4]

These which are the first instructions known to have been issued to an
English fleet since Henry VIII's time were signed by Sir Walter Ralegh
on May 3, 1617, at Plymouth, on the eve of his sailing for his
ill-fated expedition to Guiana. Most of the articles are in the nature
of 'Articles of War' and 'Sailing Instructions' rather than 'Fighting
Instructions,' but the whole are printed below for their general
interest. A contemporary writer, quoted by Edwards in his _Life of
Ralegh_, says of them: 'There is no precedent of so godly, severe,
and martial government, fit to be written and engraven in every man's
soul that covets to do honour to his king and country in this or like
attempts.' But this cannot be taken quite literally. So far at least
as they relate to discipline, some of Ralegh's articles may be traced
back in the _Black Book of the Admiralty_ to the fourteenth
century, while the illogical arrangement of the whole points, as in
the case of the Additional Fighting Instructions of the eighteenth
century, to a gradual growth from precedent to precedent by the
accretion of expeditional orders added from time to time by individual
admirals. The process of formation may be well studied in Lord
Wimbledon's first orders, where Ralegh's special expeditional
additions will be found absorbed and adapted to the conditions of a
larger fleet. Moreover, there is evidence that, with the exception of
those articles which were designed in view of the special destination
of Ralegh's voyage, the whole of them were based on an early
Elizabethan precedent. For the history of English tactics the point
is of considerable importance, especially in view of his twenty-ninth
article, which lays down the method of attack when the weather-gage
has been secured. This has hitherto been believed to be new and
presumably Ralegh's own, in spite of the difficulty of believing that
a man entirely without experience of fleet actions at sea could have
hit upon so original and effective a tactical design. The evidence,
however, that Ralegh borrowed it from an earlier set of orders is
fairly clear.

Amongst the _Stowe MSS._ in the British Museum there is a small
quarto treatise (No. 426) entitled 'Observations and overtures for a
sea fight upon our own coasts, and what kind of order and discipline
is fitted to be used in martialling and directing our navies against
the preparations of such Spanish Armadas or others as shall at any
time come to assail us.' From internal evidence and directly from
another copy of it in the _Lansdown MSS._ (No. 213), we know it
to be the work of 'William Gorges, gentleman.' He is to be identified
as a son of Sir William Gorges, for he tells us he was afloat with his
father in the Dreadnought as early as 1578, when Sir William was
admiral on the Irish station with a squadron ordered to intercept the
filibustering expedition which Sir Thomas Stucley was about to attempt
under the auspices of Pope Gregory XIII. Sir William was a cousin of
Ralegh's and brother to Sir Arthur Gorges, who was Ralegh's captain in
the Azores expedition of 1597, and who in Ralegh's interest wrote the
account of the campaign which Purchas printed. Though William, the
son, freely quotes the experiences of the Armada campaign of 1588, he
is not known to have ever held a naval command, and he calls himself
'unexperienced.' We may take it therefore that his treatise was mainly
inspired by Ralegh, to whom indeed a large part of it is sometimes
attributed. This question, however, is of small importance. The gist
of the matter is a set of fleet orders which he has appended as a
precedent at the end of his treatise, and it is on these orders that
Ralegh's are clearly based. They commence with fourteen articles,
consisting mainly of sailing instructions, similar to those which
occur later in Ralegh's set. The fifteenth deals with fighting and
bloodshed among the crews, and the sixteenth enjoins morning and
evening prayer, with a psalm at setting the watch, and further
provides that any man absenting himself from divine service without
good cause shall suffer the 'bilboes,' with bread and water for twelve
hours. The whole of this drastic provision for improving the seamen's
morals has been struck out by a hurried and less clerkly hand, and in
the margin is substituted another article practically word for word
the same as that which Ralegh adopted as his first article. The same
hand has also erased the whole numbering of the articles up to No. 16,
and has noted that the new article on prayers is to come first.[5]
The articles which follow correspond closely both in order and
expression to Ralegh's, ending with No. 36, where Ralegh's special
articles relating to landing in Guiana begin. Ralegh's important
twenty-ninth article dealing with the method of attack is practically
identical with that of Gorges. Ralegh, however, has several articles
which are not in Gorges's set, and wherever the two sets are not word
for word the same, Ralegh's is the fuller, having been to all
appearances expanded from Gorges's precedent. This, coupled with the
fact that other corrections beside those of the prayer article are
embodied in Ralegh's articles, leaves practically no doubt that
Gorges's set was the earlier and the precedent upon which Ralegh's was
based.

An apparent difficulty in the date of Gorges's treatise need not
detain us. It was dedicated on March 16, 1618-9, to Buckingham, the
new lord high admiral, but it bears indication of having been written
earlier, and in any case the date of the dedication is no guide to the
date of the orders in the Appendix.

The important question is, how much earlier than Ralegh's are these
orders of Gorges's treatise? Can we approximately fix their date?
Certainly not with any degree of precision, but nevertheless we are
not quite without light. To begin with there is the harsh punishment
for not attending prayers, which is thoroughly characteristic of Tudor
times. Then there is an article, which Ralegh omits, relating to the
use of 'musket-arrows.' Gorges's article runs: 'If musket-arrows be
used, to have great regard that they use not but half the ordinary
charge of powder, otherwise more powder will make the arrow fly
double.' Now these arrows we know to have been in high favour for
their power of penetrating musket-proof defences about the time of the
Armada. They were a purely English device, and were taken by Richard
Hawkins upon his voyage to the South Sea in 1593. He highly commends
them, but nevertheless they appear to have fallen out of fashion, and
no trace of their use in Jacobean times has been found.[6]

A still more suggestive indication exists in the heading which is
prefixed to Gorges's Appendix. It runs as follows:--'A form of orders
and directions to be given by an admiral in conducting a fleet through
the Narrow Seas for the better keeping together or relieving one
another upon any occasion of distress or separation by weather or by
giving chase. For the understanding whereof suppose that a fleet of
his majesty's consisting of twenty or thirty sail were bound for
serving on the west part of Ireland, as Kinsale haven for example.'
The words 'his majesty' show the Appendix was penned under James I;
but why did Gorges select this curious example for explaining his
orders? We can only remember that it was exactly upon such an occasion
that he had served with his father in 1578. There is therefore at
least a possibility that the orders in question may be a copy or an
adaptation of some which Sir William Gorges had issued ten years
before the Armada. Certainly no situation had arisen since Elizabeth's
death to put such an idea into the writer's head, and the points of
rendezvous mentioned in Gorges's first article are exactly those which
Sir William would naturally have given.

On evidence so inconclusive no certainty can be attained. All we can
say is that Gorges's Appendix points to a possibility that Ralegh's
remarkable twenty-ninth article may have been as old as the middle of
Elizabeth's reign, and that the reason why it has not survived in the
writings of any of the great Elizabethan admirals is either that the
tactics it enjoins were regarded as a secret of the seamen's 'mystery'
or were too trite or commonplace to need enunciation. At any rate in
the face of the Gorges precedent it cannot be said, without
reservation, that this rudimentary form of line ahead or attack in
succession was invented by Ralegh, or that it was not known to the men
who fought the Armada.

Amongst other articles of special interest, as showing how firmly the
English naval tradition was already fixed, should be noticed the
twenty-fifth, relating to seamen gunners, the twenty-sixth, forbidding
action at more than point-blank range, and above all the fifth and
sixth, aimed at obliterating all distinction between soldiers and
sailors aboard ship, and at securing that unity of service between the
land and sea forces which has been the peculiar distinction of the
national instinct for war.

As to the tactical principle upon which the Elizabethan form of attack
was based, it must be noted that was to demoralise the enemy--to drive
him into 'utter confusion.' The point is important, for this
conception of tactics held its place till it was ultimately supplanted
by the idea of concentrating on part of his fleet.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Hakluyt printed several sets of instructions issued to armed fleets
intended for discovery, viz.: 1. Those drawn by Sebastian Cabota for Sir
Hugh Willoughby's voyage in 1553. 2. Those for the first voyage of
Anthony Jenkinson, 1557, which refers to other standing orders. 3. Those
issued by the lords of the Council for Edward Fenton in 1582, the 20th
article of which directs him to draw up orders 'for their better
government both at sea and land.' But none of these contain any fighting
instructions.

[2] Boteler's MS. was not published till 1685, when the publisher
dedicated it to Samuel Pepys. The date at which it was written can only
be inferred from internal evidence. At p. 47 he refers to 'his Majesty's
late augmentation of seamen's pay in general.' Such an augmentation took
place in 1625 and 1626. He also refers to the 'late king' and to the
colony of St. Christopher's, which was settled in 1623, but not to that
of New Providence, settled in 1629. He served in the Cadiz Expedition of
1625, but does not mention it or any event of the rest of the war. The
battle order, however, which he recommends closely resembles that
proposed by Sir E. Cecil (_post_, p. 65). The probability is, then, that
his work was begun at the end of James I's reign, and was part of the
large output of military literature to which the imminent prospect of
war with Spain gave rise at that time.

[3] See _Drake and the Tudor Navy_, ii. Appendix B.

[4] See Article 1 of the Instructions of 1816, _post_, p. 342.

[5] In all previous English instructions the prayer article had come
towards the end. In the Spanish service it came first, and it was thence
probably that Ralegh got his idea.

[6] Laughton, _Defeat of the Armada_, i. 126; _Account, &c_.
(_Exchequer, Queen's Remembrancer_), lxiv. 9, April 9, 1588; Hawkins's
_Observations_ (Hakl. Soc), Sec. lxvi.

_SIR WALTER RALEGH_, 1617.[1]

[+State Papers Domestic xcii. f. 9+.]

_Orders to be observed by the commanders of the fleet and land
companies under the charge and conduct of Sir Walter Ralegh, Knight,
bound for the south parts of America or elsewhere_.

_Given at Plymouth in Devon, the 3rd of May, 1617_.

First. Because no action nor enterprise can prosper, be it by sea or
by land, without the favour and assistance of Almighty God, the Lord
and strength of hosts and armies, you shall not fail to cause divine
service to be read in your ship morning and evening, in the morning
before dinner, and in the evening before supper, or at least (if there
be interruption by foul weather) once in the day, praising God every
night with the singing of a psalm at the setting of the watch.

2. You shall take especial care that God be not blasphemed in your
ship, but that after admonition given, if the offenders do not reform
themselves, you shall cause them of the meaner sort to be ducked at
yard-arm; and the better sort to be fined out of their adventure. By
which course if no amendment be found, you shall acquaint me withal,
delivering me the names of the offenders. For if it be threatened in
the Scriptures that the curse shall not depart from the house of the
swearer, much less shall it depart from the ship of the swearer.

3. Thirdly, no man shall refuse to obey his officer in all that he is
commanded for the benefit of the journey. No man being in health shall
refuse to watch his turn as he shall be directed, the sailors by the
master and boatswain, the landsmen by their captain, lieutenant, or
other officers.

4. You shall make in every ship two captains of the watch, who shall
make choice of two soldiers every night to search between the decks
that no fire or candlelight be carried about the ship after the watch
be set, nor that any candle be burning in any cabin without a lantern;
and that neither, but whilst they are to make themselves unready. For
there is no danger so inevitable as the ship firing, which may also as
well happen by taking of tobacco between the decks, and therefore [it
is] forbidden to all men but aloft the upper deck.

5. You shall cause all your landsmen to learn the names and places of
the ropes, that they may assist the sailors in their labour upon the
decks, though they cannot go up to the tops and yards.

*6. You shall train and instruct your sailors, so many as shall be
found fit, as you do your landsmen, and register their names in the
list of your companies, making no difference of professions, but that
all be esteemed sailors and all soldiers, for your troops will be very
weak when you come to land without the assistance of your seafaring
men.

7. You shall not give chase nor send abroad any ship but by order from
the general, and if you come near any ship in your course, if she be
belonging to any prince or state in league or amity with his majesty,
you shall not take anything from them by force, upon pain to be
punished as pirates; although in manifest extremity you may (agreeing
for the price) relieve yourselves with things necessary, giving bonds
for the same. Provided that it be not to the disfurnishing of any such
ship, whereby the owner or merchant be endangered for the ship or
goods.

*8. You shall every night fall astern the general's ship, and follow
his light, receiving instructions in the morning what course to
hold. And if you shall at any time be separated by foul weather, you
shall receive billets sealed up, the first to be opened on this side
the North Cape,[2] if there be cause, the second to be opened beyond
the South Cape,[3] the third after you shall pass 23 degrees, and the
fourth from the height of Cape Verd.[4]

9. If you discover any sail at sea, either to windward or to leeward
of the admiral, or if any two or three of our fleet shall discover any
such like sail which the admiral cannot discern, if she be a great
ship and but one, you shall strike your main topsail and hoist it
again so often as you judge the ship to be hundred tons of burthen; or
if you judge her to be 200 tons to strike and hoist twice; if 300 tons
thrice, and answerable to your opinion of her greatness.

*10. If you discover a small ship, you shall do the like with your
fore topsail; but if you discover many great ships you shall not only
strike your main topsail often, but put out your ensign in the
maintop. And if such fleet or ship go large before the wind, you shall
also after your sign given go large and stand as any of the fleet
doth: I mean no longer than that you may judge that the admiral and
the rest have seen your sign and you so standing. And if you went
large at the time of the discovery you shall hale of your sheets for a
little time, and then go large again that the rest may know that you
go large to show us that the ship or fleet discovered keeps that
course.

*11. So shall you do if the ship or fleet discovered have her tacks
aboard, namely, if you had also your tacks aboard at the time of the
discovery, you shall bear up for a little time, and after hale your
sheets again to show us what course the ship or fleet holds.

*12. If you discover any ship or fleet by night, if the ship or fleet
be to windward of you, and you to windward of the admiral, you shall
presently bear up to give us knowledge. But if you think that (did you
not bear up) you might speak with her, then you shall keep your
luff,[5] and shoot off a piece of ordnance to give us knowledge
thereby.

13. For a general rule: Let none presume to shoot off a piece of
ordnance but in discovery of a ship or fleet by night, or by being in
danger of an enemy, or in danger of fire, or in danger of sinking,
that it may be unto us all a most certain intelligence of some matter
of importance.

*14. And you shall make us know the difference by this: if you give
chase and being near a ship you shall shoot to make her strike, we
shall all see and know that you shoot to that end if it be by day; if
by night, we shall then know that you have seen a ship or fleet none
of our company; and if you suspect we do not hear the first piece then
you may shoot a second, but not otherwise, and you must take almost a
quarter of an hour between your two pieces.

*15. If you be in danger of a leak--I mean in present danger--you
shall shoot off two pieces presently one after another, and if in
danger of fire, three pieces presently one after another; but if there
be time between we will know by your second piece that you doubt that
we do not hear your first piece, and therefore you shoot a second, to
wit by night, and give time between.

16. There is no man that shall strike any officer be he captain,
lieutenant, ensign, sergeant, corporal of the field,[6]
quartermaster, &c.

17. Nor the master of any ship, master's mate, or boatswain, or
quartermaster. I say no man shall strike or offer violence to any of
these but the supreme officer to the inferior, in time of service,
upon pain of death.

18. No private man shall strike another, upon pain of receiving such
punishment as a martial court[7] shall think him worthy of.

19. If any man steal any victuals, either by breaking into the hold or
otherwise, he shall receive the punishment as of a thief or murderer
of his fellows.

20. No man shall keep any feasting or drinking between meals, nor
drink any healths upon your ship's provisions.

21. Every captain by his purser, stewards, or other officers shall
take a weekly account how his victuals waste.

22. The steward shall not deliver any candle to any private man nor
for any private use.

23. Whosoever shall steal from his fellows either apparel or anything
else shall be punished as a thief.

24. In foul weather every man shall fit his sails to keep company with
the fleet, and not run so far ahead by day but that he may fall astern
the admiral by night.

25. In case we shall be set upon by sea, the captain shall appoint
sufficient company to assist the gunners; after which, if the fight
require it, in the cabins between the decks shall be taken down [and]
all beds and sacks employed for bulwarks.[8]

*The musketeers of every ship shall be divided under captains or other
officers, some for the forecastle, others for the waist, and others
for the poop, where they shall abide if they be not otherwise
directed.[9]

26. The gunners shall not shoot any great ordnance at other distance
than point blank.

27. An officer or two shall be appointed to take care that no loose
powder be carried between the decks, or near any linstock or match in
hand. You shall saw divers hogsheads in two parts, and filling them
with water set them aloft the decks. You shall divide your carpenters,
some in hold if any shot come between wind and water, and the rest
between the decks, with plates of leads, plugs, and all things
necessary laid by them. You shall also lay by your tubs of water
certain wet blankets to cast upon and choke any fire.[10]

28. The master and boatswain shall appoint a certain number of sailors
to every sail, and to every such company a master's mate, a
boatswain's mate or quartermaster; so as when every man knows his
charge and his place things may be done without noise or confusion,
and no man [is] to speak but the officers. As, for example, if the
master or his mate bid heave out the main topsail, the master's mate,
boatswain's mate or quartermaster which hath charge of that sail shall
with his company perform it, without calling out to others and without
rumour[11], and so for the foresail, fore topsail, spritsail and the
rest; the boatswain himself taking no particular charge of any sail,
but overlooking all and seeing every man to do his duty.

29. No man shall board his enemy's ship without order, because the
loss of a ship to us is of more importance than the loss of ten ships
to the enemy, as also by one man's boarding all our fleet may be
engaged; it being too great a dishonour to lose the least of our
fleet. But every ship, if we be under the lee of an enemy, shall
labour to recover the wind if the admiral endeavours it. But if we
find an enemy to be leewards of us, the whole fleet shall follow the
admiral, vice-admiral, or other leading ship within musket shot of the
enemy; giving so much liberty to the leading ship as after her
broadside delivered she may stay and trim her sails. Then is the
second ship to tack as the first ship and give the other side, keeping
the enemy under a perpetual shot. This you must do upon the windermost
ship or ships of an enemy, which you shall either batter in pieces, or
force him or them to bear up and so entangle them, and drive them foul
one of another to their utter confusion[12].

30. The musketeers, divided into quarters of the ship, shall not
deliver their shot but at such distance as their commanders shall
direct them.

31. If the admiral give chase and be headmost man, the next ship shall
take up his boat, if other order be not given. Or if any other ship be
appointed to give chase, the next ship (if the chasing ship have a
boat at her stern) shall take it.

32. If any make a ship to strike, he shall not enter her until the
admiral come up.

33. You shall take especial care for the keeping of your ships clean
between the decks, [and] to have your ordnance ready in order, and not
cloyed with chests and trunks.

34. Let those that have provision of victual deliver it to the
steward, and every man put his apparel in canvas cloak bags, except
some few chests which do not pester the ship.

35. Everyone that useth any weapon of fire, be it musket or other
piece, shall keep it clean, and if he be not able to amend it being
out of order, he shall presently acquaint his officer therewith, who
shall command the armourer to mend it.

36. No man shall play at cards or dice either for his apparel or arms
upon pain of being disarmed and made a swabber of the ship.

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