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Documentary, BBC Empire of the Seas S01E02 The Golden Ocean
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00:00On a summer's day in 1690, a Sussex merchant called Samuel Jeek looked out towards the channel from his home here in Rye.
00:14What he saw filled him with dread. English warships fleeing pell-mell across the horizon.
00:24The country had been at war with France for two years and people in this town knew that just a few days before the Royal Navy had been badly defeated 25 miles up the coast off Beachy Head.
00:36So the sight of those English ships on the run could mean just one thing. The French were coming.
00:44With the Navy beaten, the English could do nothing to prevent a French invasion.
00:50The result was inevitable. Church bells rang out in panic.
00:56Jeek wrote about what happened next in his diary.
00:59A terrible alarm in the town of Rye of the French's coming to land.
01:04Their intentions were to fire and plunder the town.
01:08In desperation, people seized hold of their valuables and attempted to flee the town.
01:17This gate was the only way in and out of Rye and soon this narrow street was clogged with people clinging to their possessions.
01:24Their panic increased by the terrible sight that was now smouldering down on the beach below the town.
01:30If ever there was a vision to terrify the people of Rye, it must have been that of England's first line of defence in flames.
01:45Lying here on the beach within sight of Rye Harbour was the Anne, a 70-gun Royal Naval warship which had been terribly damaged in the fighting at Beachy Head.
01:55A hundred of her crew had been killed or wounded.
01:58Unable to sail on any further, her captain ran her aground on this very spot and then fearing that the French would capture her, he set her alight.
02:11Her remains are under my feet now.
02:14Sometimes when these sands shift, she re-emerges like a ghostly reminder of a forgotten moment in our history.
02:22A moment of terror, chaos and defeat.
02:27Rule Britannia? I don't think so.
02:32In 1690, there could have been no doubt in anyone's mind.
02:36France ruled the waves and England was at her mercy.
02:41For the English, this disaster was a turning point.
02:45They had no choice.
02:47If they were to survive, they would have to build a navy capable of resisting the greatest power in Europe.
02:56But to do that would require a national effort unlike anything that had been seen before.
03:01It would transform the country, revolutionise agriculture, lay the foundations of industry and most of all, unleash the power of money.
03:17And the rest of the athletes, the next day, on our hands.
03:22Before the engines go, have even more left to build a new colour of a new car.
03:27It's not the end of a new car.
03:28So, from 1750, we're going to do the same thing.
03:29My trip, on the middle of a new car, we're going to do the same thing.
03:32And we'll see how it works and I'll see you.
03:33For the English and I will see, how it's going.
03:34Let's see how it will be, we're going to do all the other thing.
03:37We'll see you next to the same 1650 in that.
03:38As you can see, we've got a strong connection with our mons.
03:40It's going to be fine now.
03:42It's going to be fine for the same reason.
03:44I've seen that I've seen this experience with.
03:45For this, it's going to be fine for sure.
03:47The Battle of Beachy Head in 1690 still ranks as one of the Royal Navy's most humiliating defeats.
03:53But then, in 1693, came an even more terrible loss.
03:59England was a nation of traders, utterly dependent on the wealth generated by her huge merchant fleet.
04:06A fleet which, unless it was properly protected, was terribly vulnerable to enemy attack.
04:11On the 30th of May 1693, 400 merchant ships gathered in a huge fleet and set out from England to the town of Smyrna in the eastern Mediterranean.
04:24This giant trade flotilla was described as the richest that ever went for Turkey.
04:32On board was a year's worth of trade.
04:35Wool, tin, spices and silver, the lifeblood of the economy, which had been accumulating in port for fear of being captured or destroyed at sea.
04:46The convoy was such a vital national interest that it was given an escort of 102 warships.
04:54The convoy moved down the channel and out into the Atlantic.
04:57But this route took them past Brest, home of the French Navy, which is where the accompanying English admirals were expecting trouble.
05:03Channel 08.
05:05So as they passed without incident and entered the Bay of Biscay, the English escort ships turned round and headed home, thinking the convoy would be safe.
05:13This was a disastrous decision.
05:15The French had found out about the convoy and the time of its departure, and they were preparing ships further down here to intercept it.
05:22As the convoy reached Lagos Bay, on the southern tip of Portugal, they found 93 French warships waiting for them.
05:35Almost 100 merchant vessels, carrying a year's worth of trade, were captured or destroyed.
05:47When news of the disaster reached England, it sent the business community into a paroxysm of despair.
06:01From his house here in Rye, the merchant Samuel Jeek wrote in his diary,
06:09news of the miscarriage of the Turkey fleet has put a great stop to trade.
06:15And this was an understatement.
06:16The losses suffered by the Smyrna convoy were as bad as those in the Great Fire of London of 1666.
06:22And there followed a wave of bankruptcies among insurers and merchants.
06:29The secretary to King William III said that he had never seen his majesty so sensibly affected with any accident as this.
06:38This commercial disaster, coming just three years after one of the Navy's worst military disasters, served as a brutal reminder.
06:46For England, a powerful Navy was not a luxury.
06:49It was a central pillar of state.
06:52Without it, the country was doomed.
06:56William desperately needed more ships, and to build them, money.
07:01But the treasury was empty.
07:04Then in 1694, a completely new kind of financial institution was created in London.
07:10One offering a unique investment opportunity.
07:14Anyone willing to put in at least £25 would receive a guaranteed return of 8%.
07:21The savvy merchant from Rye, Samuel Jeek, thought this sounded like a chance that was too good to miss, and he instructed his agent in London to invest £200.
07:34But then he decided to gather together all his spare cash and head into London himself.
07:39He wrote in his diary, I made myself ready for my journey carrying £100 with me, and at 7pm I took horse for London.
07:47Now, that was a 15-hour ride, so it's fair to suggest that by the time he met up with his agent the following afternoon in the city, Mr Jeek would have been quite saddle sore.
07:57So keen was Jeek to take advantage of the 8% interest being offered, that he even scraped together a further £200 while he was here in London, to take his total stake up to £500.
08:10£500 is a lot of money for anyone, even Jeek, but it turns out it was a pretty good investment.
08:20That exciting new financial institution that launched in 1694 still exists.
08:26It's called the Bank of England.
08:28The funds required to build a new navy were vast, but the Bank of England delivered.
08:37In just 12 days, it raised £1.2 million, and on August 1st, 1694, it made its first loan to the government.
08:46The national debt was born, and the Royal Navy was saved.
08:50England would build now and pay later.
08:53This is a list of all the original investors in the Bank of England, known as subscribers at the time.
09:01At the top of each page here is the date, and their names, neatly written out here with their occupations next to them.
09:07Right here at the bottom of this page is Samuel Jeek of Ryan Sussex, a merchant.
09:14This is a remarkable document, because it allows us to get a kind of investor profile of this extraordinary new venture.
09:20At the very top of the list, appropriately enough, are their majesties, the king and queen who invested £10,000.
09:28But there's lots of other people from the very pinnacle of society as well.
09:32Men like Edward Russell, the first lord of the admiralty, invested £2,000.
09:36But it wasn't just the bigwigs that subscribed.
09:41There are nine people listed here as being in domestic service.
09:45And here I've found Thomas Day of London, who's a blacksmith, and he's invested £100,
09:52while over the page, Joseph Cake, is a bricklayer.
09:57The national debt created a virtuous circle of funding.
10:03The government borrowed money from the people, which it spent on the navy, which protected trade,
10:08which brought in taxes, which allowed the government to pay the people back.
10:12It was a financial revolution, which uniquely would allow England to spend its way to greatness.
10:23More than half of that first loan, over £600,000, went on building up the navy.
10:29And that huge injection of cash, the first of many, had a transforming effect on whole areas of the economy all over the country.
10:39The north-east of England soon had Europe's largest ironworks,
10:44thanks to the navy's spending spree and one enterprising industrialist called Ambrose Crowley.
10:52Iron ran in Ambrose Crowley's blood.
10:54His father and grandfather had both had a steady business in the Midlands, in the iron trade.
11:00But young Ambrose Crowley III wanted more.
11:03He wanted to expand, and he realised that to do so, he'd have to up sticks and move closer to his most precious raw material.
11:10Not iron, but coal.
11:13And that's why he ended up here, on the south bank of the time.
11:17He set up a series of blacksmith's shops up there, about a mile away,
11:21and brought the goods down here, to the river, where they could be shipped south.
11:29South was where England's shipyards were embarked on a massive building programme.
11:34And it was this that made Ambrose Crowley's ironwork so successful,
11:38because wooden ships need lots of iron nails.
11:43And in those days, every single one had to be made by hand.
11:47Blacksmith Mark Fern still uses exactly the same techniques.
11:55This is the traditional set-up, isn't it?
11:57It is.
11:58The double-acting bellows.
12:00And every time you press that down, it's feeding air into the fire.
12:04And how hot is that, do you reckon?
12:06About 1,300, you can see.
12:071,300 degrees centigrade.
12:09Great.
12:09It's hard to believe that a packet of nails that we buy in the shop
12:14were actually made individually like this.
12:16Isn't it remarkable?
12:23Right, so here we go.
12:29And then we're going to be ready to put it in the heading tool.
12:33And then you see that.
12:37Wow.
12:39And then beat your head onto it.
12:44Into the quench bucket.
12:47That should.
12:50That's not a bad nail.
12:52Well, do you reckon I could have a go?
12:54I reckon you could.
12:58There you go.
12:59Piece of iron, Dan.
12:59Piece of iron.
13:00Yes, OK.
13:01Get ready for one nail.
13:02Yes, indeed.
13:03So, first of all, I'll give it some of this.
13:07OK, how about that?
13:08That's looking good.
13:09By 1700, the industrialist Ambrose Crowley
13:12was providing 40% of all the Navy's iron orders.
13:19He created a factory system
13:21with hundreds of workshops like this one
13:23and built iron mills and steel furnaces alongside.
13:27It turned what had been a cottage industry
13:30into mass production.
13:33Into the heading tool.
13:34Right, huh?
13:35After the financial revolution,
13:37here were the first shoots of the industrial revolution.
13:41And driving it all was the Navy.
13:43In only a decade, English dockyards built over 150 new naval ships.
13:50But since England was at war,
13:52many of those ships were, of course,
13:53destroyed or captured by the enemy.
13:56Nevertheless, by the end of the decade,
13:58the English Navy numbered 176 warships.
14:02And each of them contained over five tonnes of iron nails.
14:09My first nail.
14:10And you should be able to knock that out.
14:13Look at that.
14:14In fact, it's just sliding out.
14:16Hey!
14:17How good is that?
14:18Look at that.
14:19Congratulations.
14:20Your first nail.
14:21That's fantastic.
14:22I can imagine that going through a piece of planking
14:26onto the hull of a ship.
14:34Of course, the Navy didn't just need nails.
14:38Each new ship typically contained the wood of more than 2,000 trees,
14:43over 7,000 square yards of canvas
14:45and 10 miles of rope weighing 19 tonnes.
14:50The sailing ship was the most complex man-made machine on Earth.
14:55A glorious piece of wooden architecture driven entirely by the wind.
15:00But it relied most of all on manpower.
15:04In 10 years, the number of men serving in the Royal Navy quadrupled to over 44,000.
15:10That's more people than lived in any city outside London.
15:14And feeding them all transformed England's agriculture.
15:19The Navy was the single largest consumer of produce in the country.
15:23And it awarded huge contracts to a handful of suppliers
15:27who bought up vast quantities of food from small farmers all over the country.
15:33Agricultural output went up by a third.
15:36But because this was a competitive market, prices stayed low.
15:40Once again, the Navy's insatiable demand was driving the economy forward.
15:46It had become the engine of English commerce, a national enterprise.
15:50It took the work of thousands on land to build the ships of the Royal Navy and keep them supplied.
16:05But once at sea, survival depended most of all on the skill, fortitude and raw strength of the crew.
16:12And to fuel all those men required by the Navy, there was actually quite a generous allocation of food.
16:20The central part of the diet was, of course, meat.
16:23Salted so that it survived for long ocean voyages.
16:27This is the weekly ration.
16:29Six pounds of meat.
16:30Four pounds of beef.
16:31Two pounds of pork.
16:32Now, the beef was typically eaten in some kind of stew with suet, apparently.
16:37If you think salty boot leather, that's about right.
16:57Perhaps the most famous part of the sailing Navy's diet was the key staple, standing in for bread, the ship's biscuit.
17:04A subtle combination of flour, water and salt, baked for hours until it was rock hard.
17:19It's like a particularly disgusting and tasteless version of rye bread.
17:23An added complication was that this became a home of little weevils, almost like tiny worms that used to live in them and feed off them.
17:31Now, some people liked to bang them until the weevils fell out and you could get rid of them.
17:36Others used to go to a dark corner, simply eat the biscuit, weevils and all.
17:41What this diet does show is that the Navy's high command understood just how much physical effort was required to sail a ship effectively.
17:54Sailors were constantly climbing up and down masts and adjusting sails with no protection from the elements.
18:00And in battle, there were cannons weighing three tons each to manoeuvre.
18:06Little wonder, then, that the Navy's rations provided sailors with 5,000 calories a day.
18:12That's twice the recommended intake for an active man today.
18:16Oh, this feels a little bit precarious up here.
18:18It takes a special kind of head for heights to spend your time as a topman up in the mast heads.
18:26And from up here, of course, you also get a much better view.
18:28So they're the ones with the sharpest eyesight.
18:30They could spot enemy sails when they saw them on the horizon.
18:35One bad thing about being up here, though, is that the movement on deck is magnified quite a lot.
18:40But up here, we go through quite a big angle when you rock around.
18:51Sailors in this period were a breed apart.
18:54The average age would have been about 27, but they'd have looked much older,
18:58their faces lined and weathered from a lifetime at sea.
19:02Their hands would have been calloused and scarred,
19:04and their vocabulary was almost indecipherable to landlubbers.
19:08A mixture of swearing and nautical terms.
19:13Line down.
19:15Most noticeable of all was their peculiar rolling gait,
19:19more suitable for the pitching deck of a ship than walking on dry land.
19:23And all of this made them very recognisable to the naval press gangs
19:27who patrolled the ports, looking for experienced recruits.
19:34That was quite tiring.
19:35And the amazing part about that process is that every time the wind changes in strength,
19:39you've got to go back up there and alter the sails.
19:42There are some written accounts that tell us what life was like for ordinary sailors.
19:54One of the most remarkable is by Edward Barlow.
19:58He first went to sea at the age of 13.
20:01He came ashore for the last time in 1703 at the age of 61.
20:05A total of 48 years at sea, which was an amazing feat of survival.
20:13Throughout that time, he kept an incredible illustrated diary, and I've got it here.
20:18And it paints his life at sea in the most vivid terms and leaves you in no doubt as to how tough it was.
20:23He says often we were called up before we had slept half an hour
20:28and forced to go into the main top or foretop to take in our topsails, half awake and half asleep.
20:35There we must haul and pull to make fast the sail,
20:38seeing nothing but the air above us and the water beneath us.
20:41And that's so raging as though every wave would make a grave for us.
20:45The Royal Navy, rebuilt and renewed with borrowed money,
20:53was able to avenge the defeats of the early 1690s.
20:56It even captured Gibraltar and Menorca, two important bases in the Mediterranean.
21:03The English Navy was now a global weapon.
21:07Its ships opening up the wealth of the world to the merchant fleet thousands of miles across the ocean.
21:13And no part of the world was more important than the one that had first fired the dreams of England's mariners.
21:25The island of Jamaica was the largest English colony in the Caribbean,
21:30the most hotly contested and dangerous region in the world.
21:34In the autumn of 1708, a 23-year-old naval captain called Edward Vernon
21:39arrived here in Port Royal, the nerve centre of the Navy's operations.
21:52Vernon's father was an MP and he disapproved of his son's career choice.
21:56But such was the draw of the sea on the minds of young men in that period
22:00that Edward had always had his heart set on joining the Royal Navy.
22:04He was just the kind of aggressive, bold commander that would thrive in an environment like this,
22:10where courage and initiative were key requirements.
22:15Vernon served in the Caribbean for four years,
22:18during which time the country was at war with France and Spain.
22:23It was the job of men like him to defend the merchant fleet
22:26on which England's prosperity depended.
22:29The Caribbean was the centre of world trade because of what was grown here.
22:38So this is raw sugarcane juice made from pressing the sugarcane.
22:43I'm going to have a bit of a taste.
22:47Oh, that's disgusting.
22:48That just tastes of mud, grass and sugar,
22:51which is not wholly surprising because that's basically what it is.
22:54But of course, when this is boiled down and crystallised,
22:57you get sugar imported into Europe in vast quantities
23:00to liven up the rather dull European diet,
23:03added to things like pastries, but also other imports like tea and coffee.
23:08Over here we have another drink made from sugarcane,
23:10and that, of course, is rum.
23:13Much more recognisable.
23:14It becomes synonymous with the Navy in this period.
23:16A favoured drink of sailors.
23:24That's much more drinkable, but still a bit rough.
23:27This became synonymous with Edward Vernon,
23:30because Vernon returns out here to the Caribbean as a senior commander,
23:34and he discovers that rum has become a staple
23:36among the Royal Navy ship's companies out here.
23:39They drink half a pint per man per day,
23:42so they're in danger of getting quite drunk
23:43and falling out of the mast and rigging when they go aloft.
23:46So he insists that the rum ration is mixed with water.
23:50Now, because his nickname is Old Grogham,
23:52thanks to a coat he used to wear made out of material called Grogham,
23:56this new mixture of rum and water that's introduced on his watch
24:00is known as Grog.
24:09Sugarcane was cultivated by slaves,
24:12as was the tobacco which was grown in the American colonies.
24:16The slave trade was a lucrative sideline.
24:20But the English did not have a monopoly on all these commodities.
24:24The Caribbean was a pressure cooker of competing nations,
24:27all jostling over a few small islands.
24:30The Dutch, the French and the Spanish were all here,
24:34each of them greedily protecting their own interests,
24:36but also looking for opportunities to conquer new territories.
24:43And then there were the pirates.
24:46It's not hard to see what attracted those men to the Caribbean.
24:49It was the job of officers like Edward Vernon
24:52to hunt them down and provide a violent deterrent.
24:57Many of those pirates were, of course, state-sponsored,
25:00known as privateers,
25:01because they carried licences issued to them
25:04by the French and Spanish governments
25:06to prey on British shipping.
25:08Not that the British government was above using the profit motive, either.
25:12In 1708, the year that Vernon arrived out here in the Caribbean,
25:15Parliament passed the Prize Act.
25:18This gave the captain, officers and ships' company
25:20of any Royal Navy ship
25:22a portion of the value of any enemy vessel they captured.
25:26At a time when a Royal Navy captain
25:30typically earned about £20 a month
25:32and an ordinary seaman less than a pound a month,
25:36these prizes represented a significant salary bonus.
25:41While he was out here, Vernon took full advantage.
25:44He captured several prizes.
25:46One was a Spanish ship laden with tobacco,
25:49another was French with 400 slaves on board.
25:51He brought them back in here to Port Royal to have them valued,
25:54and then, as captain, he was entitled to a quarter share.
25:59It was the most brutal form of incentive.
26:03Patriotism was now bolstered by prize money.
26:07Vernon embodied the naval revolution,
26:09rich, confident and supremely professional.
26:13He was the product of a navy and a country
26:16that had come a long way since those dark early years
26:19of King William's reign in the 1690s.
26:24After 25 years of almost continual warfare,
26:32the strategy laid down by William III finally paid off.
26:36France and Spain couldn't match the vast resources
26:39being poured into the Royal Navy,
26:41and after a series of defeats in 1713, they made peace.
26:47On this side of the channel, it felt like time to celebrate.
26:50This is the painted hall of the old Royal Naval Hospital in Greenwich,
27:12and the magnificent ceiling tells you everything you need to know
27:17about how the British saw themselves at the start of the 18th century.
27:21And I use the word British deliberately,
27:34because after 1707, England and Scotland were joined together by act of union
27:38to form the Kingdom of Great Britain.
27:41And this is the image of that new nation,
27:44rich, confident and filled with a sense of destiny.
27:48The central character is William, sitting in all his majesty,
27:56bringing peace and harmony to Europe.
27:58And if you notice, he's sitting on the defeated figure of the King of France,
28:03the terrible Louis XIV.
28:04The overwhelming theme is, of course, naval,
28:11and at the end of the painting here,
28:14you see this vast British man-of-war towering out of the water
28:20with its cannons run out ready for battle.
28:22The decks of the ship are crowded with the spoils of victory,
28:27stuff, booty stolen off the French and Spanish.
28:30But, fascinatingly, the ship is resting on the shoulders
28:34of a figure representing the city of London,
28:37all that financial wealth that she generated.
28:40And she, in turn, is above figures representing the great rivers of England,
28:45Isis and a man representing the Thames
28:47and even the Tyne bringing an offering of coal.
28:51The message couldn't be clearer.
28:53This vast, awesome military machine
28:55is totally dependent on the wealth created by the city of London.
29:03In 1726, just as the finishing touches were being put to this hall,
29:07the French philosopher Voltaire visited Britain
29:09and was very struck by what he described as the grandeur of state.
29:12He wrote,
29:13Voltaire saw instantly that commerce and naval power were linked.
29:40It was a formula for success
29:45that was tied up with the creation of the Bank of England
29:48and now Britain was reaping the rewards.
29:54Britain in the 1720s was a changed country.
30:00Thanks to the navy,
30:02she had resisted the combined might of the French and Spanish alliance.
30:06But the coming of peace brought an end to 25 years of naval expansion.
30:17With no enemies to engage at sea,
30:20a generation of aggressive naval commanders took their fight to Westminster,
30:25where they argued the British ship of state
30:27should stick to its natural course,
30:31war.
30:31In 1722,
30:36the country held a general election
30:37and former Commodore Edward Vernon
30:40became MP for Penryn in Cornwall.
30:44Vernon was a fiery patriot
30:46and what really got him going
30:48was the Caribbean.
30:50During his 21 years in the Royal Navy,
30:52he'd served out there twice,
30:53the second time as Commander-in-Chief
30:55of His Majesty's ships in Jamaica.
30:57And while there,
30:59he'd seen ports stuffed with ships
31:02carrying the produce of Spain's American empire.
31:05And he'd seen how the Spanish navy
31:07were all too keen to run away from a fight.
31:11Vernon was convinced
31:12that this was the soft underbelly of the Spanish empire.
31:16Attack their settlements in America,
31:17he wrote,
31:18and Spain will fall.
31:20And if Spain fell,
31:22that would have dire consequences
31:24for her close ally, France,
31:26who, of course,
31:27was Britain's greatest rival.
31:29So actually,
31:30Britain would get two victories
31:31for the price of one.
31:33It all sounded like a great idea,
31:35but there was a problem.
31:38During the 1720s and 30s,
31:40the government's policy
31:42was to avoid war.
31:44But at the same time,
31:46British traders in the Caribbean
31:47were aggressively encroaching
31:49into the Spanish empire.
31:52And they had the backing
31:52of merchants
31:53and former naval officers at home.
31:56Then, in 1738,
31:58something extraordinary happened.
32:00A merchant captain called Robert Jenkins
32:02appeared here before Parliament.
32:05He was told Parliament that day
32:06was political dynamite.
32:09He said that the ear had been chopped off
32:11by a Spanish naval officer
32:13while he'd been minding his own business
32:15peaceably off the coast of Cuba.
32:17It unleashed a wave of xenophobia
32:20through Parliament and the public.
32:22And no-one's voice was louder
32:24than Edward Vernon.
32:26Jenkins' mutilation
32:27was Vernon's gain.
32:30He strode into the Admiralty
32:31and demanded to be given command
32:33in the Caribbean.
32:34And Vernon got his wish.
32:3630 years after he first sailed to Jamaica,
32:46Edward Vernon returned,
32:48this time as a vice-admiral.
32:52He arrived in Port Royal
32:53on 12th October 1739
32:55and began his preparations.
32:57A week later,
33:01the British government
33:02finally made up its mind
33:03and declared war against Spain.
33:06Vernon was now given official licence
33:08to commit all hostilities
33:11against the Spaniards
33:12in such manner
33:13as you shall judge most proper.
33:20Britain's belligerent naval officers
33:22and her merchant class
33:23had got their war,
33:25the war of Jenkins' ear.
33:28And it began when Vernon launched an attack
33:31on the Spanish colonial base
33:32at Portobello.
33:34On November the 21st,
33:38Vernon sailed into Portobello
33:39with six Royal Navy warships.
33:42They opened up a massive bombardment
33:44against the Spanish defenders.
33:48The lead ship fired 400 shots
33:51in just 25 minutes.
33:54The Spanish were powerless to resist,
33:55partly because much of their gunpowder
33:57was damp.
33:59When Vernon's men stormed ashore,
34:01only 40 of the original 300
34:04Spaniards were able to resist.
34:07They surrendered within 24 hours.
34:12Britain rejoiced.
34:14The Navy had delivered on its promise,
34:17projecting British force
34:19thousands of miles away from home.
34:22And Admiral Vernon,
34:23the scourge of Spain,
34:25was a hero,
34:26heir to Drake
34:27and the embodiment
34:28of a new imperial mission.
34:32A Scottish poet,
34:33James Thompson,
34:34really caught the national mood
34:35of celebration
34:36by penning a poem
34:38that became wildly popular.
34:40It contained the lines,
34:42To thee belongs the rural rain,
34:45and thy cities
34:46shall with commerce shine.
34:48And in case you haven't guessed
34:49what it is yet,
34:50a few lines later comes,
34:52Rule Britannia,
34:53rule the waves.
34:54Britons,
34:55never will be slaves.
34:57These words have become part of our cultural DNA.
35:01Liberty, commerce and mastery of the seas
35:04all rolled inextricably together.
35:07It was a defining moment
35:09in the creation of Britishness.
35:11Buoyed by his success,
35:20Vernon decided to attack Cartagena,
35:23the largest and richest city
35:24in Spanish America.
35:26He took a massive force
35:27of 8,500 troops
35:29and 124 ships.
35:32The public at home
35:33anticipated another easy victory.
35:35But Vernon
35:37had overreached himself.
35:40The attack was an uncoordinated disaster
35:42and soon stalled.
35:44Exposed to the extremes
35:45of the Caribbean climate
35:47and running low on water,
35:48the British were killed
35:49in horrifying numbers,
35:51not by the Spanish,
35:53but by disease.
35:55Worse still,
35:56Vernon was out of range
35:57of reinforcements,
35:58and so after almost
35:59six weeks of fighting,
36:01he was forced to withdraw.
36:02Cartagena was a wake-up call
36:07to a nation drunk on patriotism.
36:10There were limits, after all,
36:11to what the Navy could achieve.
36:13The problem wasn't so much
36:14ships and men,
36:15it was organisation.
36:17If Britain wants to realise
36:19her dream of global domination,
36:21then the Navy's internal structures,
36:23running things like logistics
36:24and strategic thinking,
36:26had to be of the same quality
36:27as her awesomely powerful ships
36:29and her tough sailors.
36:32The man who would take on
36:37that challenge
36:38was another veteran
36:39of the Caribbean,
36:41Captain George Anson.
36:44Following Vernon's victory
36:45at Portobello,
36:47Anson had been ordered
36:48to take a squadron
36:49of six warships
36:49to attack the Spanish
36:51in the Pacific,
36:52but his mission
36:53quickly turned into a nightmare.
36:58Anson's route may look like
36:59the trail of a drunken spider,
37:01but as he attempted
37:02to round Cape Horn,
37:04his squadron was so battered
37:05by storms
37:06that he lost half his ships
37:07and after so long at sea,
37:09a third of his men
37:10had succumbed to scurvy,
37:12typhus and dysentery.
37:15Yet by the time he arrived
37:16back here in Britain
37:17in 1744,
37:19he'd become a national hero.
37:21Why?
37:22Because on his way home,
37:23as he'd passed the Philippines,
37:25he'd managed to capture
37:26a Spanish galleon,
37:28the Nuestra Señora
37:29de Covadonga.
37:31And in her hold
37:32was over 1,000 kilos
37:34of virgin silver
37:35and more than
37:37one million pieces of eight
37:38solid silver coins.
37:41She was one of the most
37:42valuable prizes
37:43ever captured
37:44by a British ship.
37:45The public had a new hero
37:48to cheer
37:49and the treasure
37:50was paraded
37:50in 32 wagons
37:52through the streets
37:53of London.
37:55To cap it all off,
37:56just six months later,
37:58at the age of 47,
37:59Anson was appointed
38:00to the board
38:01of the Admiralty.
38:04George Anson arrived here
38:06just after Christmas,
38:071744,
38:09with a reputation
38:09as a man of action.
38:12And he was shocked
38:13by the bureaucratic lethargy
38:15he found.
38:16The organisation needed
38:17a shake-up
38:18from top
38:18to bottom.
38:33So this is it,
38:35the Admiralty boardroom,
38:37the beating heart
38:38of Anson's Navy.
38:40I'll tell you what,
38:40it feels like a long way
38:42from the pitching quarterdeck
38:43of a man of war
38:44going around Cape Horn.
38:46But in a way,
38:47of course,
38:47Anson's experiences
38:48on that epic circumnavigation
38:50had prepared him well
38:52for one of these seats
38:53at this table.
38:54On that voyage,
38:55he hadn't just been
38:56the commander
38:57of a naval squadron.
38:58He'd had to become
38:59a shipwright,
39:00a teacher,
39:01a judge,
39:01even a diplomat.
39:02And of course,
39:03he'd seen the terrible effects
39:05of diseases like scurvy
39:06at first hand.
39:09Anson was the most
39:10experienced sailor
39:11in the Navy.
39:12He was the perfect man
39:13to lead a complete
39:14overhaul of the service.
39:18Incredible as it may sound,
39:20at the time,
39:21the Navy had no formal
39:22system of rank.
39:24It didn't even have
39:25a uniform.
39:26Anson introduced both.
39:28This is him in full dress.
39:31He also made the Navy
39:32more of a meritocracy.
39:34Officers were to be promoted
39:36on the basis of ability
39:37instead of time served.
39:41Anson literally rewrote
39:42the rulebook of the Royal Navy,
39:44the so-called Articles of War.
39:46This was partly in response
39:48to a manpower shortage.
39:49Increasing numbers
39:50of inexperienced men
39:51were being recruited
39:52as sailors.
39:53But he also wanted
39:54to stiffen the resolve
39:56of his officer corps.
39:57From now on,
39:58the penalty for negligence,
40:00disaffection,
40:01or cowardice
40:01would be death.
40:03Iron discipline
40:04and organisation
40:06would be the keys
40:07to success in Anson's Navy.
40:10Anson was not prepared
40:11to rely on the natural
40:13talent of a few good men.
40:15He wanted to ensure
40:16that the correct mindset
40:17and skills were perpetuated
40:19throughout the Navy.
40:21He was institutionalising
40:23the qualities needed
40:24to guarantee victory,
40:26and he was doing it
40:27with a clear enemy in mind.
40:30Over the previous
40:31three decades,
40:32France had been
40:33rebuilding her navy
40:35and massively expanding
40:36her trade and her empire
40:39in places like
40:40North America and India.
40:41By the middle of the century,
40:43the two great rivals,
40:44Britain and France,
40:46were evenly matched.
40:47Their relationship
40:48was a powder keg
40:49of competing interests.
40:51It was only a matter of time
40:52before someone lit the fuse.
40:54On the 8th of June,
41:091755,
41:11a French squadron
41:12was heading for Canada
41:14when, through the murk
41:15of a North Atlantic morning,
41:17they caught sight
41:17of Royal Naval ships.
41:20As the two fleets converged,
41:21a French captain
41:22shouted across
41:23to his opposite number
41:24on the British ship.
41:26Are we at peace
41:26or at war?
41:28The words came back,
41:30at peace,
41:31at peace,
41:31but it was followed
41:32seconds later
41:33by a crashing broadside.
41:41The British Admiral,
41:42Edward Boscawen,
41:44had loaded all his cannon
41:45with two cannonballs,
41:47and the French ships
41:48were pulverised.
41:49After this naked act
41:59of aggression,
42:00a formal declaration
42:01of war
42:02was an inevitability.
42:08The Seven Years' War,
42:10as it became known,
42:11was also the First World War.
42:13Wherever British
42:14or French flags flew
42:16from North America
42:17to the Caribbean,
42:18West Africa to India,
42:19the two sides
42:20launched themselves
42:21at each other.
42:23But perhaps surprisingly,
42:25the first real test
42:27for the Navy
42:27came in defending
42:28their own base
42:29in the Mediterranean.
42:31In the spring of 1756,
42:34Admiral John Bing
42:35set sail from England.
42:37He was to take
42:38a squadron of 13 warships
42:40to protect the island
42:41of Menorca.
42:42But by the time
42:43he arrived,
42:44he found the French
42:45which had already landed
42:46and had the British
42:47garrison under siege
42:48from land and sea.
42:50Despite enjoying
42:51a small advantage
42:52in terms of the number
42:53of ships,
42:54Bing decided not to risk
42:55a full-scale battle
42:56and retreated
42:57to Gibraltar.
42:58This meant
42:59the French captured
43:00Menorca.
43:01Back in Britain,
43:02the news of the loss
43:03of such an important
43:04naval base
43:05in the Mediterranean
43:06was greeted
43:07with outrage.
43:09Bing was ordered
43:10back to England
43:11to meet his fate.
43:13He was court-martialed,
43:14according to the new
43:15Articles of War
43:16and found guilty
43:18of failing to do
43:19his utmost
43:20to take or destroy
43:21the enemy's ships.
43:23The sentence
43:23was death.
43:28On the 14th of March,
43:301757,
43:31Admiral John Bing
43:33was executed
43:34on the quarterdeck
43:35of his own ship.
43:36He'd been allowed
43:37to direct
43:37his own firing squad.
43:40When he was ready
43:40for them to fire,
43:42he dropped
43:42a handkerchief.
43:43Once again,
43:47the great French
43:48philosopher Voltaire
43:49put it most succinctly.
43:51In this country,
43:52he wrote,
43:53it is wise to kill
43:53an admiral
43:54from time to time
43:55to encourage
43:56the others.
43:58Well,
43:58it worked.
43:59From then on,
44:00Royal Naval officers
44:01were aggressive
44:02to a fault.
44:05Relentless aggression
44:06became a hallmark
44:07of the Royal Navy,
44:09a psychological weapon
44:10just as important
44:11as the quality
44:12of its ships
44:12and guns.
44:14But victory
44:15in this war
44:16would require
44:16more than just aggression.
44:19The Navy
44:19needed a strategy.
44:26Back at the Admiralty,
44:27the First Lord,
44:28Anson,
44:28was wrestling
44:29with the challenges
44:30of fighting war
44:30on this global scale.
44:32Even though British
44:33naval expenditure
44:33was twice that of France,
44:35there still weren't
44:36enough ships
44:37to send in sufficient numbers
44:38to all the different
44:39theatres of war.
44:40And so instead,
44:41Anson seized
44:42on a very simple idea.
44:45It had first been conceived
44:46by Admiral Edward Vernon
44:48in a previous war.
44:49Now,
44:49Vernon's idea
44:50was keeping a fleet
44:52of battleships
44:52here to the southwest
44:54of the British Isles.
44:56Here,
44:56they could keep an eye
44:57on the French naval base
44:59at Brest,
45:00blockading the French ships
45:01in there,
45:02but also protect the trade
45:03coming back in here
45:04from North America
45:05and the Caribbean
45:05and up here
45:07from the Mediterranean.
45:09But there was one key problem.
45:11Any fleet of ships
45:12being kept at sea
45:13for that long
45:13would inevitably come up
45:15against the two deadliest
45:16enemies of the sailor,
45:18malnutrition
45:18and disease.
45:2218th century naval rations
45:24were based around
45:25salted meat
45:26and sea biscuits.
45:28Any food that couldn't
45:28be dried or salted
45:30would quickly rot.
45:31So a balanced diet
45:33was almost impossible.
45:34And that's where
45:35the problems began.
45:38Even on the Navy's
45:39most modern warship,
45:40maintaining food supply,
45:42victualling as it's known,
45:43is still a prime consideration.
45:46On HMS Daring,
45:47it's the responsibility
45:48of Petty Officer
45:49Neil Moggridge.
45:51Come through this way.
45:54What's in here?
45:55This is the main freezer
45:57compartment.
45:59Right.
46:00Oh, it's freezing.
46:01This gets to about
46:03minus 22 in here,
46:04so quite cold.
46:06I can see some
46:07frozen chips down there.
46:08Is everything chips?
46:09No, no.
46:10We keep your basic
46:11meats on board,
46:13chicken,
46:14minced beef,
46:15you can see down here,
46:16stuff like gammon,
46:18bacon, sausages.
46:19You know,
46:19it's literally
46:20everything you go down
46:21to the supermarket for,
46:22you can pretty much
46:23find down here.
46:25So if we just steamed
46:26off into the horizon now,
46:27how many days
46:28could we last for
46:29with a full hold of food?
46:31What we call endurance
46:33on this ship
46:34is a maximum of 90 days,
46:36so the ship can actually
46:37stay at sea
46:38and sustain itself
46:40for 90 days
46:40on a balanced diet
46:41for the ship's company.
46:42But that must represent
46:43quite a lot of money,
46:44so what's a full hold cost?
46:46You're probably looking
46:46on a maximum endurance,
46:48probably between
46:50about 150,000 to 200,000
46:52pounds worth of food on board.
46:53So how much is that
46:54per sailor per day?
46:56At the moment,
46:57we get a massive
46:582.31 to feed
47:00per man per day.
47:04Keeping the crews
47:05well fed
47:06was the greatest challenge
47:07Admiral Anson faced
47:09back in the 1750s
47:10as he tried to maintain
47:12his western squadron at sea.
47:17If this had been
47:18an 18th century ship,
47:20within a few weeks
47:20of leaving harbour,
47:21these sailors
47:22would be reduced
47:23to eating rock-hard,
47:25stale biscuits
47:26crawling with weevils
47:27and water
47:28polluted with algae
47:29and bacteria.
47:30Within about six weeks,
47:31typically,
47:32diseases like dysentery,
47:33typhus and scurvy
47:35would spread.
47:36No-one knew
47:36what caused these diseases,
47:38but Anson did know
47:39that fresh produce
47:40seemed to prevent them.
47:42Therefore,
47:42in order for the western squadron
47:44to become an effective weapon,
47:45they had to work out
47:46a proper way
47:47of revittling it.
47:49This was the challenge
47:50that Anson set
47:51to the man
47:52he placed in command
47:53of the western squadron,
47:54the appropriately named
47:55Admiral Edward Hawke.
47:59Hawke had over 20 years
48:01of command experience
48:02in the navy
48:03and had earned
48:04a reputation
48:04for great tactical skill
48:06and single-minded aggression.
48:08He was the personification
48:09of the new navy.
48:11He was given 30 ships
48:14and 14,000 men.
48:17His orders
48:17were to position
48:18his squadron
48:19just outside
48:19the French naval base
48:20at Brest
48:21and to stay there.
48:25Realising the implications
48:26of this,
48:27Hawke set up
48:27a supply chain
48:28from Plymouth
48:29to deliver fresh fruit
48:30and vegetables
48:31and even live cattle
48:32directly to his squadron
48:34ship to ship.
48:37This beat scurvy
48:38for the first time,
48:40allowing Hawke
48:40to stay at sea
48:41almost indefinitely.
48:43It was a feat
48:44unimaginable
48:4480 years before.
48:50With the threat
48:51of disease eliminated,
48:53Hawke could concentrate
48:54on his mission
48:54and that was maintaining
48:55such a strong presence
48:57outside the French naval base
48:58that their fleet
48:59would not dare to leave.
49:01It was called
49:02close blockade
49:03and it was the first time
49:03in history
49:04it had ever been tried
49:05successfully on this scale.
49:07From May to November 1759,
49:09Hawke bottled up
49:11the French fleet
49:12in its harbour.
49:13It was a massive achievement
49:14and it had a decisive impact
49:16on the outcome
49:17of the war
49:18and all of it
49:19was done
49:19without Hawke's
49:20big battleships
49:21firing a shot in anger.
49:24Not only was the French navy
49:26rendered utterly powerless,
49:28their land forces
49:29in America
49:29and India
49:30were cut off
49:31from vital supplies
49:32and reinforcements.
49:33and as French forces
49:36around the world
49:37began to capitulate,
49:38in Britain
49:39the church bells
49:40rang in celebration.
49:42It became known
49:43as the Annus Mirabilis,
49:44the Year of Wonders.
49:49First to fall
49:50was Guadeloupe,
49:51the jewel
49:51in France's Caribbean crown.
49:53Then Quebec,
49:55capital of her vast
49:56North American empire,
49:57was captured
49:58by the British.
49:58At sea,
50:02the Gibraltar squadron
50:03attacked and destroyed
50:04the French Mediterranean fleet
50:06off the coast of Portugal.
50:08While in the east,
50:09the Royal Navy
50:10chased the French
50:11out of the Indian Ocean,
50:12allowing the British army
50:14to achieve victory on land.
50:19It was the greatest year
50:21in British military history
50:23and being Brits,
50:25they turned into
50:25a year of wild rejoicing.
50:28One author,
50:29Horace Walpole,
50:30wrote that the
50:31church bells
50:32were threadbare
50:33with the ringing
50:34of victories.
50:36But across the channel,
50:38the French
50:38had one card
50:39left to play.
50:40King Louis XV,
50:41with his empire
50:42in ruins,
50:43his trade destroyed
50:44and his treasury
50:45empty,
50:46ordered his breast fleet
50:48to collect an army
50:49and head to sea
50:50to invade Britain.
50:52His admiral,
50:53Conflans,
50:54hoped to avoid
50:55the Royal Navy,
50:56but if they did meet,
50:57he promised,
50:58I will fight them
50:59with all possible glory.
51:04The French navy's
51:05opportunity came in November
51:07when autumn gales
51:08scattered the British ships
51:10that were blockading Brest.
51:13Immediately,
51:13the French admiral,
51:14Conflans,
51:15took to sea.
51:16He headed south
51:17to pick up a fleet of ships
51:18with soldiers embarked
51:20and ready to launch an invasion.
51:21Admiral Hawke wasted no time
51:25in pursuing him,
51:26sensing an opportunity
51:27for the decisive clash
51:28he craved.
51:31He caught up with the French
51:32here
51:33in Quiberon Bay.
51:34That reef there
51:40with the rollers
51:41crashing onto it
51:42and all the white water
51:42around it
51:43is the reason
51:43the French thought
51:44they'd be safe
51:45because they were coming
51:45into this dangerous bay
51:47between two reefs.
51:50As you can see
51:50from the chart,
51:50there's an almost
51:51impenetrable barrier
51:52of rocks,
51:53islands
51:53and reefs.
51:56I've never seen
51:57Quiberon Bay before
51:57and it's absolutely fascinating.
51:59These incredibly
52:00jagged reefs here
52:01are absolutely terrifying.
52:03Terrifying for me
52:04but terrifying
52:04for the British ships
52:05who had no chance
52:06at this area.
52:07The British ships
52:08were charging
52:08into an unknown bay
52:10with the wind blowing
52:11on shore
52:12on a November twilight.
52:26I'm only about
52:26half my sails up today
52:27because it's so windy
52:28and if you put any more up
52:30it risks kind of
52:30ripping fittings
52:31out of the deck
52:32and actually doing
52:32huge damage to the ship.
52:37Only that incredible
52:38aggression
52:39of the kind
52:40that had been bred
52:41in the Royal Navy
52:42over the past decade
52:43and reinforced
52:44by the execution of Ving.
52:45I mean,
52:45that incredible aggression
52:47would have driven
52:47those men in here.
52:53And on that November night
52:54there was
52:55a full gale blowing
52:57from that direction.
52:59Hawke himself
53:08Hawke himself
53:09was so keen
53:10to get to grips
53:11with the French
53:11particularly the French
53:12Admiral
53:12the French flagship
53:13his opposite number.
53:14His captain warned him
53:15he said it's too dangerous
53:16it's too dark
53:17and we can't go in
53:18after those Frenchmen
53:19and Hawke said
53:20your duty was to tell me
53:21that it's not safe
53:22but your duty is also
53:23to obey my orders
53:24and lay me alongside
53:25that French flagship.
53:28Hawke was not going
53:28to make the same mistake
53:29that Ving had made
53:30he was not going
53:31to let these French
53:32get away
53:32after six months
53:33of tedious blockading
53:35he now had his chance
53:36to destroy the flower
53:37of the French fleet.
53:38He came alongside
53:49and he waited so close
53:51that his men
53:51could reach out
53:52and touch the French ship
53:53with their hands
53:54and he fired a giant
53:55broadside into them
53:56tons of lead
53:59pounding into a French ship
54:00at point blank range
54:01the wood shattered
54:03sending splinters
54:04a yard long
54:05cartwheeling through the air
54:06scything people down
54:07and soon this sea
54:09was covered in wreckage
54:10masts
54:11survivors clinging
54:12to the masts
54:12dead bodies
54:13a scene of total anarchy.
54:20The French lost five ships
54:21and two and a half thousand men
54:24the British only lost two ships
54:26the battle fought
54:30in these waters
54:31is one of the most
54:31decisive in British history
54:33it annihilated French naval power
54:35and it removed any chance
54:36France had
54:37of getting back
54:38her colonies
54:39the Royal Navy
54:40in this storm-tossed bay
54:42fought and won a battle
54:44for global supremacy
54:46The story of Britain's transformation
55:02inside 80 years
55:03is a remarkable one
55:05in 1690
55:07England had been
55:08the sick man of Europe
55:09broke
55:10and completely
55:11at the mercy
55:11of the French Navy
55:13but now in 1759
55:14the situation
55:16was completely reversed
55:17now for the first time
55:19in history
55:20one nation
55:21dominated the world's oceans
55:23Britannia
55:24really did rule the waves
55:26behind the vanguard
55:33of its now formidable
55:34naval forces
55:35Britain had become
55:36a commercial powerhouse
55:37boosted by an explosion
55:39in credit
55:39and overseas trade
55:41general salute
55:44raise it
55:46out
55:47at the same time
55:52mastery of the sea
55:53had helped secure
55:54the first footholds
55:55of empire
55:55around the globe
55:56the navy
56:05had delivered victory
56:06and Britain
56:07was prosperous
56:08afloat
56:09on a golden ocean
56:11but away from
56:24all the celebrations
56:25something else was going on
56:27unnoticed by most
56:28in 1690
56:30England had been part
56:31of an alliance
56:32of smaller nations
56:33together they had resisted
56:35the continental ambitions
56:36of the French king
56:37Louis XIV
56:37and they'd survived
56:39but by 1759
56:41what the British
56:42couldn't understand
56:43was that the rest of Europe
56:44now regarded them
56:45as as greater threat
56:47to liberty
56:47as Louis had been
56:4980 years before
56:50Britannia was triumphant
56:52but alone
56:54and you can see
57:01the next chapter
57:01of the story
57:02on Saturday night
57:03Empire of the Seas
57:04at half past seven
57:05last stop tonight
57:06on BBC HD
57:07is with Coldplay
57:08at the BBC
57:09and you can see
57:10the next chapter
57:11at the BBC
57:12at the BBC
57:13at the BBC
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