J D Davies - Historian and Author

The website and blog of naval historian and bestselling author J D Davies

Battle of Beachy Head

The Top Ten

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I’m not tweeting very much at the moment, as I’m largely keeping my head down and working on my new Tudor project, but the other day, I had a bit of a brainwave, and tweeted a ‘top ten’ of the most popular posts ever (in terms of visitor numbers) on this blog. This seemed to go down very well among the Twitterati, with lots of positive reaction. I realise, though, that a lot of you aren’t on Twitter, and besides, giving the ‘countdown’ here means that I can say a bit more about each of the posts than I could with 140 characters. So, in the spirit of Top of the Pops (unless it was presented by him, obviously, or featured songs by him…), here we go, pop pickers!

I decided to split my top ten into two fives, one for guest bloggers, one for my own posts. So starting with the guest blogger chart –

So moving on to the chart of my own posts:

  • At number 5, and with a major ‘assist’ from Richard Endsor, it’s a pretty astonishing historical find – quite possibly the fingerprint of Samuel Pepys!
  • In at number 4, a post from back in 2012, looking forward to the temporary return of the Royal Charles sternpiece from the Rijksmuseum for the National Maritime Museum’s Royal River exhibition.
  • Number 3 is probably my personal favourite among all the blog posts I’ve written over the years – my lament for the death of the ‘naval pub‘, broadly defined. Since I originally posted it, another nail’s been hammered into the coffin of the species with the closure of the Lord Nelson at Burnham Thorpe. Hopefully this will be temporary, but could there be a more potent metaphor for the decline of…well, pretty much everything, really?
  • At number 2, the first post in my long series about the sorry saga of Carmarthenshire Archives – if you’re feeling particularly masochistic, read the three subsequent posts entitled ‘J’Accuse’ too, but for the rather more optimistic current situation, have a look here.
  • And at number 1…cue drumroll…my post from four years ago, ‘A Journalist’s Guide to Writing About the Royal Navy‘, inspired by the consistently dreadful coverage of naval matters in the national media, and which went about as viral as niche naval blogs get. As some of the below-the-line comments proved, though, one should always be careful before sticking one’s head above the parapet in such instances, and I was rightly taken to task for some of my own inexactitudes of terminology!

As I said on Twitter at the weekend, a big thank you to everybody who’s followed this blog since it started back in August 2011. It’s good to know that so many people seem to find things to interest them among my rants and ramblings, so I hope to keep calm and carry on shedding light on some of the more remote corners of naval history and seventeenth century history, and on the process of writing about them, for the foreseeable future!

The Warship Anne

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This week, I’m delighted to welcome Richard Endsor as my guest blogger! Richard will be known to many of you as the leading authority on the design and construction of seventeenth century British warships. His book The Restoration Warship, focusing on the Third Rate Lenox of 1677, has justly become a classic, and has, indeed, inspired an ongoing campaign to build a modern replica of that great ship at Deptford, on the site of the dockyard where the original was built. He has a new ‘big book’ coming soon, as he explains at the end of this post, but he’s also found the time to produce a new work about the Lenox‘s sister ship Anne, the remains of which, exposed at particularly low tides at Pett Level on the Sussex coast, constitute the largest survival of King Charles II’s navy. I’ve visited the site myself and have blogged about it more than once on this website – have a look here and here. So now, over to Richard to explain more about his new book on the Anne!

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Inspired by David Davies’s recent blog about his new book, Kings of the Sea, I asked him if he would be so kind and gracious enough to allow me to do a similar bit of blatant self-promotion for my own new book about the seventeenth century navy. Although we have long been friends with a similar interest, we are in no way rivals. He will, in his new book, brilliantly grasp the overall view of the Navy as if he were himself, a long serving Lord of the Admiralty. [Note: I’ve paid him absolutely nothing for this bit, honestly – D] I on the other hand, am down in the dirty dockyard worrying about scarphing of futtocks and how ships were built. Our previous non-fiction works, Pepys’s Navy and Restoration Warship, which came out at about the same time a few years ago, complemented each other.

My new book, The Warship Anne, will similarly complement Kings of the Sea. Work started on it a couple of months after a conference “All about the Anne” was held in July last year at St Clement’s Church, Hastings. Needless to say, David Davies attended and was a sparkling speaker at the event. [Nor for this bit – D] The Warship Anne book is 160 pages long and 250mm square, or nearly 10 inches in old fogies’ terms. It contains about images 150 images, all in full colour of which about 100 were created by me.  I completed the book in only nine months and my publisher, Bloomsbury, with whom it has been such a pleasure to work with, reckon they will have it on the bookstands by 25 February next year. Please don’t gasp in admiration at this remarkable productivity as I have been researching and painting the Anne over a period of some 25 years. I am involved in the Anne as the technical historian for the Warship Anne Trust which owns her, a subsidiary of the Nautical Museum’s Trust. The Trust also runs the Shipwreck Museum in Hastings. The book was written to publicise the surviving remains of the ship as widely as possible. I am so grateful to Bloomsbury who have helped a great deal by keeping the retail price down to only £25 a copy.

The Anne is sometimes visible at low tide at Pett Level, near Hastings and is one of the most important shipwrecks along the southern coast of England. The whole of the lower hull survives intact, as shown in the second image, and is the most substantial known remaining shipwreck from the Navy of Charles II and Samuel Pepys. She was lost in 1690 after the Battle of Beachy Head, while defending the country from invasion. Sadly, her remains and the men who died aboard her are now largely forgotten. The battle prevented a French invasion which, had it been successful, would have dramatically and permanently changed English and European history.  The exiled Catholic King James II would have been restored to the throne, his Catholic faith almost certainly imposed and the country dominated by the French.

Although the importance of Beachy Head ranks alongside the Armada Campaign and the Battle of Trafalgar, it was not a glorious victory to celebrate and be remembered. In fact the outnumbered English and Dutch allies were forced into ignominious retreat during which the dismasted Anne was run ashore between Rye and Hastings.  She became the only English loss when she was burnt to prevent capture.

My book follows the history of the Anne in chronological order. The first chapter deals with the events that led up to her building in 1678 as part of a new fleet of 30 ships. A fleet that would see the start of the British Navy’s domination the world’s oceans until the end of the days of sail. The ships were built a few years after the end of the third Dutch war. A war that was pursued by King Charles after the Dutch made their famous raid on Chatham dockyard at the end of the second Dutch war. The Dutch raid on Chatham followed the less famous English attack on the Dutch merchant fleet in the Vlie, known as Holmes’s bonfire. If you’re Dutch, it might be best if you skip the rest of this chapter as I found, to my surprise, that the damage done by Holmes’s bonfire was much greater than the damage done by the Dutch raid on Chatham. Not only that, but it caused the enraged Charles II to join the French and pursue the third Dutch war to the ruin of the Dutch economy. I reckon the Chatham raid was the Dutch ‘Pearl Harbor’ and it turned out to be as much a disaster for them as it was for the Japanese. A controversial view I know, but I examined the losses in terms of the well documented value of ships, something which appears not to have been done before.

In the second chapter, Phineas Pett II who built the Anne, offers himself as a character whom a fiction author would have difficulty inventing. [We’ll see! – D] A likeable rogue who lets his perceived success go to his head to the annoyance of all those about him: except King Charles, with whom he has much in common. He receives an amusing come-uppance came at the hands of Mrs Elizabeth Brooker to whom his wife owed money. Just as interesting is the building of the Anne. The delays and difficulty Pett had in finding keel pieces were found in the extensive historic record as were many, many other details of the ship’s construction. The most rewarding discovery for me, was recently finding and being able to interpret the actual recorded lines of a sister ship of the Anne, built by Pett to the same draught. From them a reconstructed draught of the Anne was made, which is of course included in the book.  Also printed across two pages is an image of the contemporary model of another sister ship, probably the Elizabeth. The image is photographic but all the distortions of perspective have been removed so that it is a true draught. Also included are the ship’s recorded hull lines traced from the models frames. The book also includes the complete draughts of another of the 30 ships made by Thomas Fagge in about 1680.

Chapter three and four takes the reader through the history of the Anne up until 1688. After launch, she and all the other new ships suffered from decay and repairs were made led by a commission under Samuel Pepys. There followed a voyage in 1687 when she acted as the flagship of a small fleet taking a German princess to Lisbon to marry the King of Portugal. From there she went on into the Mediterranean to confirm peace treaties with the Barbary States and negotiate the release of slaves. With the serious business finished, she visited the Grand Harbour, Malta, a view of which is shown on the book cover painting. During her voyage all sorts of stories emerge: King James’s fascination with Anne’s troublesome experimental pumps, special moveable steps made for the queen to leave Anne with dignity, John Shaw from the Pearl being tried aboard for murder, and a girl slave named Sarah Hawkins freed and her name entered into the Anne’s pay book. The most significant series of events for the ship was the continuing failure of her rotten masts and rigging. Some of the most important ropes stretched and became an inch thinner in circumference. The tops of the masts split for which special iron hoops had to be made to strengthen them. Pepys was ultimately responsible as his commission had supposedly repaired the ship. It resulted in a bitter dispute between him and Cloudesley Shovel, the Anne’s captain, which reveals how devious Pepys could be. He set up his own enquiry, which unsurprisingly found that no ship could be better fitted out.

The following chapter, chapter five, concerns the Battle of Beachy Head. It is painful to read of the damage inflicted on both the French and English ships near the head of the Blue squadron where the Anne was stationed.  Exposed and outnumbered, she was gradually shot to pieces until her masts were lost. Twenty nine men were killed while awful wounds were inflicted on 41 others. Even after all this time, some of the sadness suffered by the men’s families can still be felt. Barbra Cunningham from Jarrow was pregnant when her husband, Thomas, joined the Anne as an Able Seaman. He was killed in the battle before Barbra gave birth. Barbra named her baby daughter Thomasin, in honour of her dead father.

I was lucky in that so much documentation remains concerning the guns of the Anne. Magnificent brass guns were given to her when she went to the Mediterranean with a reduced armament of 62 guns. The 70 iron guns used at Beachy Head are also recorded and I have produced many drawings showing them and their gun carriages, as well as drawings showing where the guns were mounted. Two guns survive today that probably served aboard her.

Finally, the last chapter deals with the Anne today, the archaeology and the hopes for preserving her. I also cover the extent of her remains and ownership by the Warship Anne Trust. Lengthy appendices give details of all the timbers used in ships of her type, together with the transcription of a contract for building a similar ship.

With The Warship Anne book completed, I have returned to my long term project. This is The Master Shipwright’s Secrets, a work dealing with the practices used by the master shipwrights when designing ships. The book is very nearly finished and with any luck, will also be out next year.

Dutch Ships at the Battle of Beachy Head as Related to the Normans Bay Wreck

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This week, I’m delighted to welcome an illustrious trio of guest bloggers – my friends and colleagues in the field of Restoration naval history, Frank Fox, Peter Le Fevre and Richard Endsor. Frank, the author of The Four Days Battle of 1666 and Great Ships: The Battlefleet of King Charles II, recently posted here about important new evidence regarding the ship lists of the Battle of Beachy Head, 1690. Dr Peter Le Fevre, the co-editor of Precursors of Nelson and British Admirals of the Eighteenth Century: the Contemporaries of Nelson, has been working for well over three decades on the Battle of Beachy Head and the controversial British commander in the battle, Arthur Herbert, Earl of Torrington. Richard Endsor is the author of The Restoration Warship, and the acknowledged authority on late Stuart naval shipbuilding. In this post, they examine the identity of the important shipwreck known as ‘the Normans Bay wreck’. Gentlemen, the floor is yours! *** Many thanks to J D Davies for making his site available. In 2005 divers freeing a lobster pot discovered a wreck about a mile offshore at Normans Bay near Pevensey on the coast of the English Channel.  At first it was thought to be the English warship Resolution which drove ashore in the Great Storm of 1703.  But the Resolution ended up close to the beach (the crew got ashore safely despite heavy surf), and gun-founder Major John Fuller recovered many guns from the wreck – 40 by May 1705 [thanks to ordnance historian Charles Trollope for this, citing the National Archives of England and Wales (NA), WO 51/70, Ordnance Office bill book, fo.10].  Archaeologists, however, have charted 43 guns at the Normans Bay site (as of 2007) with others undoubtedly buried, which makes too many for the 70-gun Resolution [Wessex Archaeology, Norman’s Bay Wreck, East Sussex, Designated Site Assessment, Archaeological Report (Salisbury, November 2007, Ref. 53111.03zz), p. 12 and fig. 2].  Also, tree-ring analysis has shown that the frames were German oak cut after 1658 [Nigel Nayling, The Norman’s Bay Wreck, East Sussex, Tree-Ring Analysis of Ship Timbers, English Heritage Research Department Report Series 25-2008].  This suggests that the ship was Dutch, perhaps one of men-of-war lost after the Battle of Beachy Head in 1690.  Unfortunately, modern English-language sources give few details of these vessels and their misfortunes.  We have sought to remedy this deficit using British, French, and Dutch printed primary sources, and British manuscript sources.  The results offer a plausible candidate for the identity of the Normans Bay wreck.

The Wapen van Utrecht, by Willem van de Velde the Elder (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)

The Battle of Beachy Head (or Béveziers as it is known to the Dutch and French) took place on 30 June 1690 (Old Style) about 18 n.m. SSW of the cape for which it is named.  A French fleet of 70 ships-of-the-line (plus smaller vessels) commanded by the Comte de Tourville bested an Anglo-Dutch fleet of 57 ships-of-the-line (again plus smaller vessels) under the Earl of Torrington, with the Dutch contingent commanded by Cornelis Evertsen.  Afterwards, the allies retreated eastwards towards the Thames, and many of the ship losses occurred over several days during the pursuit.  The British lost only the third-rate Anne, forced to run ashore near Rye and afterwards burned; but the Dutch lost ten ships, listed in a report from Evertsen which was printed in the Dutch newspapers Europische Mercurius (July 1690, pp. 45-46) and Hollandsche Mercurius (1690, pp. 207-208); his report included an eleventh ship which unexpectedly survived.  In the list below, admiralty affiliations, building dates, and dimensions are from A Vreugdenhil, Ships of the United Netherlands 1648-1702 (London, 1938), and from information kindly supplied by researcher James C Bender.  Dimensions are in Amsterdam feet of 283mm.  Lengths are external stem to sternpost measurements, and breadths are inside the plank.  The vessels lost were as follows: Suikermolen fireship, 4 guns (North Quarter, origin and dimensions unknown), Commandeur Abraham van Brakel.  Sunk in action 30 June by broadsides from the Marquis de Villette-Mursay’s flagship, Le Conquérant.  [Eugène Sue, Histoire de la Marine Française, (Paris, 1856), vol. iv, p. 106, Tourville to Seignelay, 1/11 July; Mémoires du Marquis de Villette (Paris, 1844), p. 102] Kroonvogel fireship, 6 (Amsterdam, 1666, 86 x 22), Commandeur Thameszoon.  Burned in action 30 June in an unsuccessful attack on the French centre squadron.  The name of Thameszoon’s vessel is not quite certain.  [Albemarle captain’s log, NA ADM 51/55; Milford master’s log, NA ADM 52/69] Friesland, 68 (Amsterdam, 1685, 145 x 38), Capt. Philips van der Goes. The Friesland was dismasted during the battle on 30 June.  When the allied fleet anchored late in the afternoon, the Friesland, having had her anchors shot away, drifted on the tidal current into the enemy fleet.  After an obstinate defence, she was taken by Le Souverain, flagship of chef d’escadre De Nesmond. The next morning the French took out the Friesland’s crew and set her afire.  This occurred about 18 nautical miles SSW of Beachy head.  [Memoirs Relating to the Lord Torrington, ed. J K Laughton (Camden Society, 1889), p. 46; Villette, Mémoires, p. 101; Albemarle captain’s log, NA ADM 51/55; Plymouth master’s log, NA ADM 52/88] Noord Holland or Noorderkwartier, 72 (North Quarter, 1688, dimensions unknown), Schout-bij-Nacht (Rear-Admiral) Jan Dick.  Dismasted during the action on 30 June, the ship was taken in tow by the English third-rate Stirling Castle.  At about 9 p.m. on 1 July, Lord Torrington, in accordance with a council-of-war earlier that day, ordered the Noord Holland sunk because she could not keep pace under tow.  The Stirling Castle took the crew aboard and scuttled the Dutch ship late on 1 July or the early hours of the 2nd, 12-15 n.m. SE of Beachy Head.  Dick, who had been killed in the action, was taken to England and buried near the North Foreland.  [Stirling Castle master’s log, NA ADM 52/109; Royal Sovereign‘s captain’s log, NA ADM 51/4320; Albemarle captain’s log, NA ADM 51/55; Hope captain’s log, NA ADM 51/4220; Evertsen’s journal, extract in J C M Warnsinck, De Vloot van den Koning-Stadhouder 1688-1690 (Amsterdam, 1934), pp. 110-111; Ibid., p. 121] Gekroonde Burg, 62 (Zeeland, 1682, 156 x ?), Vice-Admiral Karel van de Putte, commander of the Dutch rear division.  Disabled during the fighting on 30 June, the ship was taken under tow by the English third-rate Lenox that evening.  Late on 1 July, Lord Torrington, in accordance with a council-of-war earlier that day, ordered the lagging Gekroonde Burg destroyed to prevent her capture.  The Lenox, which received her orders about 11 p.m., took Van de Putte’s crew aboard, transferred them to her attending ketch Prosperous, and set the ship afire at 1 a.m. on the 2nd, with the fleet then 12-15 n.m. SE of Beachy Head.  The Gekroonde Burg blew up at 3 a.m.  [Lenox logs, NA ADM 51/3881, books 1 and 5 (all dates in the Lenox logs are off by one day, but corrected in the other sources here); Royal Sovereign captain’s log, NA ADM 51/4320; Albemarle captain’s log, NA ADM 51/55; Julian Prize captain’s log, NA ADM 51/494; Evertsen’s journal, Warnsinck, pp. 110-111]

Wapen van Utrecht, by van de Velde the elder National Maritime Museum)
Wapen van Utrecht, by van de Velde the elder National Maritime Museum)

Wapen van Utrecht or Stad Utrecht, 64 (Amsterdam, 1665, 147 x 37¼), Capt. Pieter Claassen Decker.  Her hull severely damaged in the action, the Wapen van Utrecht was left to leeward (west) of the retreating allied fleet and moving inshore. Schout-bij-Nacht Gillis Schey’s hardly less shattered Prinses Maria stayed with her and, late on 2 July, took aboard Decker’s crew.  According to Schey’s report, the Wapen van Utrecht ‘sank along the English coast’ the night of 2/3 July.  [Schey’s account of 7/17 July, Europische Mercurius, July 1690, p. 47; Evertsen’s journal, Warnsinck, p. 113] Maagd van Enkhuizen, 72 (North Quarter, 1688, 156 x 40), Capt. Jan van der Poel.  The Maagd van Enkhuizen was disabled during the action on 30 June.  Afterwards, the English fifth-rate Portsmouth towed a Dutch ship ‘of about 70 guns’.  This could only have been the Maagd van Enkhuizen, as all other damaged ships of this strength are otherwise accounted for.   The Portsmouth anchored off Hastings with her tow about 5 a.m. on 2 July and, on Van der Poel’s recommendation, cast off the tow.  The damaged vessel was observed from the English ship Suffolk to have run herself aground at Hastings before 9 a.m.   On the 3rd at 11 a.m., she was set afire to avoid capture, and blew up at 2 p.m.  [Portsmouth master’s log, NA ADM 52/87; Suffolk master’s log, NA ADM 52/110; Julian Prize captain’s log, NA ADM 51/494; Salamander captain’s log, NA ADM 51/3963] Elswout, 50 (Amsterdam, 1677, 136 x 36½), Capt. Adriaan Noortheij.  The Elswout was disabled during the battle.  Afterwards, the English fifth-rate Garland took in tow ‘a Dutch man of warr of 50 Guns’.  This was undoubtedly the Elswout, the only severely damaged 50-gun ship.   At 1 p.m. on 2 July, the Garland cast off the tow at Hastings, where the Elswout ran ashore.  She was set afire to prevent capture at 4 p.m. on the 3rd, and blew up at 6 p.m.  Captain Noortheij was reported by many sources to have been killed in action, but an English travel pass was issued in his name on 15 July.  [Garland captain’s log, NA ADM 51/384; Julian Prize captain’s log, NA ADM 51/494; NA SP 44/339, Warrants and Passes, p. 316] Tholen, 60 (Zeeland, 1688, 145 x ?), Capt. Cornelis Calis.  Disabled in the action, she reached a point near Hastings, probably under tow, and ran ashore at White Rock a mile west of the town on 2 July.  After resisting all French attacks on 3 July, she was burned to avoid capture at about noon on the 4th.  The identification of the Tholen as the ship burned at that time is made fairly certain by Tourville’s description of this last Dutch vessel destroyed as a ship of 60 guns.  The other large Dutch men-of-war burned at Hastings – both the previous day – are described by logs of English vessels noted above as ships of 50 and 70 guns, consistent with the Elswout and Maagd van Enkhuizen.  [Edgar master’s log, NA ADM 52/30; Hope captain’s log, NA ADM 51/4220; Sue, iv, p. 124, Tourville to Seignelay, 6/16 July; Historical Manuscripts Commission, The Manuscripts of Lord Kenyon (London, 1894), pp. 242-243, newsletter of Manchester, 5 July] Maagd van Enkhuizen fireship, 6 (North Quarter, origin and dimensions unknown), Commandeur Muijsevanger.  Though undamaged, she was beached at White Rock on 2 July on the orders of a more senior captain, presumably Calis of the Tholen.  She was abandoned by her crew some time on the 3rd and burned to prevent capture at about 8 p.m. that evening.  This fireship’s presence at White Rock makes little sense unless she had towed the Tholen there.  On 1 July, the English third-rate Edgar was ordered to tow a disabled Dutch man-of-war, but was unable to find the damaged vessel.  It seems likely that this was the Tholen, and that the Tholen’s captain appropriated the fireship for towing.  It would also have been reasonable to order the expendable fireship to accompany the Tholen ashore so she could assist again later if both survived the expected French attacks.  [Edgar master’s log, NA ADM 52/30; Hawk master’s log, NA ADM 51/3860; Warspite master’s log, NA ADM 52/122; HMC Kenyon MSS, p. 243] Another ship that Evertsen feared had been lost in fact survived.  The damaged 64-gun Maas under Captain Jan Snellen was probably the man-of-war initially towed by the English fifth-rate Milford, whose log ceases to mention this duty after the 1st.  On the 2nd, the fourth-rate Assurance, which had joined the fleet the day after the battle, took over towing what seems likely to have been the same vessel, only to have the hawser part in tacking.  Left on his own, Snellen sailed west making for Portsmouth, but was forced ashore early on the 3rd after being discovered by the French ship Le Saint-Louis.  The Maas went aground ‘before a little Harbour’ [Forbin, see below], perhaps the now-extinct fishing port of Holywell in modern Eastbourne.  Having mounted guns on the beach, Snellen drove off three attacks by French longboats, the water being too shallow for anything larger.  Because of the ship’s remote position – 7 leagues or 21 n.m. from Rye according to Tourville – the French declined further attempts on her after the 3rd in order to concentrate on easier prey at Hastings and Rye, and for the main pursuit to the east.  Later, Snellen refloated his ship, got his guns back aboard, and sailed to the Netherlands with only the foremast standing.  [Milford master’s log, NA ADM 52/69; Assurance master’s log, NA ADM 52/3; Sue, iv, p. 121, letter from Villette; Ibid., p. 124, Tourville to Seignelay, 6/16 July; Memoirs of the Count de Forbin (London, 1731), vol. i, pp. 278-279; Warnsinck, pp. 146-148, with extracts from Snellen’s letters]

24 pounder of the type to be expected on the Wapen van Utrecht, drawn by Captain Nico Brink
24 pounder of the type to be expected on the Wapen van Utrecht, drawn by Captain Nico Brinck

This accounting of Dutch losses shows that of the seven large men-of-war destroyed, the Friesland, Noord Holland, and Gekroonde Burg sank or burned many miles from land.  Three others ran ashore and were burned at or near Hastings.  The identity of these, already established above, are confirmed by travel passes to the Netherlands issued by the English government during mid-July to the captains and officers of the Maagd van Enkhuizen, Tholen, and Elswout [NA, SP 44/339, Warrants, pp. 307, 314, and 316].  The remaining major warship, the Wapen van Utrecht, thus becomes the only possibility for the Normans Bay wreck among the Dutch losses of this battle.  And indeed, Gillis Schey reported that the abandoned vessel went down ‘along the English coast’.  This indicates that she sank near land, but is hardly conclusive in that the description covers many miles of shoreline.  Another source, however, focuses rather more narrowly on her resting place.  On 30 August 1690, Queen Mary promulgated a warrant which began, ‘Whereas 3 Ships of Warr belonging to the States Generall of the United Provinces were burnt neare Hastings, & a 4th was sunk neare the Haven of Pemsey [Pevensey] after the late engagement with ye French Fleet’.  The document enjoined her ‘Loving Subjects’ to assist in every way the persons appointed by the Dutch ambassador to ‘fish up’ the guns and equipment of these ships [NA SP 44/339, Warrants, pp. 368-369].  It hardly needs saying that ‘near Pevensey’ accurately describes Normans Bay.  Also worth noting is that the Wapen van Utrecht, built 1665, is an excellent fit for the tree-ring dating.

6 pounder of the kind that might have been aboard the Wapen van Utrecht - Captain Nico Brink
6 pounder of the kind that might have been aboard the Wapen van Utrecht – Captain Nico Brinck

The best way to obtain more decisive evidence is to raise some of the guns and remove the concretions to reveal the underlying inscriptions.  In 1666 the Wapen van Utrecht had six brass 24-pounders, eighteen iron 18-pounders, six brass 12-pounders, sixteen iron 8-pounders, sixteen iron 3-pounders, and four brass ‘draakjes’ (small shrapnel guns) [H A Van Foreest and R E J Weber, De Vierdaagse Zeeslag 11-14 Juni 1666, Amsterdam 1984, p. 197].  By 1690 the armament of this veteran warship – Beachy Head was her seventh major battle – undoubtedly differed.  Dutch ordnance historian Nico Brinck [personal communication] suggests that the final outfit was probably all iron, and the little 3-pounders originally on the forecastle and quarterdeck would have been replaced by a larger calibre, perhaps 6-pounders.  He also notes that iron guns supplied for the Dutch fleet in this period usually came from the great De Geers foundry in Finspong, Sweden, less commonly from Huseby also in Sweden, and sometimes from German sources.  Guns often had a founder’s mark on the trunnions (‘F’ for Finspong, for instance), and if they were aboard the Wapen van Utrecht, most would show the crossed anchors and double ‘A’s of the Admiralty of Amsterdam on the first reinforce just forward of the touch-hole. Even if the Normans Bay wreck turns out not to be the Wapen van Utrecht, this blog has at least added detail to what has been known of the Battle of Beachy Head.    

The Fleets at the Battle of Beachy Head, 1690: Part 1

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I’m delighted to welcome Frank Fox as my guest blogger, both this week and next!

Frank’s name will be well known to many students and readers of naval history. A former Supply Officer in the US Navy, he is the author of two of the most important books about late 17th century naval history, Great Ships: The Battlefleet of King Charles II (1980) and The Four Days Battle of 1666 (2009, originally published as A Distant Storm in 1996). The latter describes the subject of the forthcoming Quinton novel, The Battle of All The Ages, and was one of my principal research sources for it. Frank is currently working on aspects of the Battle of Beachy Head, one of the most controversial engagements of the age of sail, and this week, he presents important new evidence about the French fleet at the battle. The revised listings of the Anglo-Dutch fleet will follow next week. So over to Frank!

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Many thanks to J D Davies for making his site available.  The Battle of Beachy Head, fought on 30 June 1690 by the English calendar, was a victory achieved by a great French fleet over a rather smaller combined English and Dutch fleet.  While studying this engagement for its possible archaeological relevance for a shipwreck site on the British coast (for which more will soon be forthcoming here), I found that the published fleet lists for the battle are not fully satisfactory.  Whether from French, Dutch, or British sources, all are incomplete and some contain demonstrable mistakes.  The lists offered here present more detailed information, though unknowns still remain.

Contemporary illustration of the Battle of Beachy Head, 30 June 1690 (known to the French as Beveziers)
Contemporary illustration of the Battle of Beachy Head, 30 June 1690 (known to the French as Beveziers)

The French fleet, commanded by Vice-Admiral Anne Hilarion de Cotentin, Comte de Tourville, has been best known from a list in Léon Guérin, Histoire Maritime de France (1851), v. 3, pp. 449-453.  This was accepted by the most frequently cited British authority, William Laird Clowes, The Royal Navy, A History from the Earliest Times to the Present (1898), v. 2, p. 335.  Regrettably, Guérin and Clowes omit two ships, reverse the stations of two others as compared with other lists, give improbable numbers of guns for two vessels, and do not indicate the stations of fireships and light frigates.  A less known list in Eugène Sue, Histoire de la Marine Française (1856), v. 4, pp. 557-558, shows the complete order of battle including stations of the fireships and light frigates.  Sue does not give men and guns, but these appear in other sources.  First, there is a list in the Dutch newspaper Hollandsche Mercurius from July 1690, pp. 195-197.  It was drawn up a little before the final order of battle was adopted, and thus gives a different order of fighting and includes several vessels which were eventually left behind with a squadron of galleys.  It does, however, offer plausible armament figures.  Second, a panoramic drawing of the battle in the French archives is reproduced in Charles De La Roncière, Histoire de la Marine Française (1900), v. 6, following p. 72.  It marks each ship with a number corresponding to a keyed handwritten fleet list including men and guns.  Unlike other sources, this one gives what appear in many cases to be actual numbers of men aboard instead of merely rounded complements.  For better or worse, they are accordingly used in the list below.  A few are hard to read due to unlucky ink blots, hence the occasional question mark.  Guérin allots all fireships 30 men, which uniformity seems unlikely, but there is no other source.

Many authorities have remarked on the baffling inconsistencies in numbers of guns listed for the French ships in the various sources for this battle.  As these appear unresolvable, I have given the highest and lowest numbers of guns for each vessel as they appear in Hollandsche Mercurius, Guérin, and the drawing in La Roncière.  Wildly inaccurate figures for two ships reported by Guérin (80 guns for the third-rate Le Marquis and only 58 for the first-rate La Couronne) have been disregarded, as have two clear mistakes in Hollandsche Mercurius (only 46 guns for the second-rate Le Pompeux and 80 guns for the third-rate Le Hardy).  The results agree well with the armament ranges in Pierre Le Conte, Lists of Men-of-War 1650-1700, Part II, French Ships, 1648-1700 (Society for Nautical Research Occasional Publication no. 5, 1935).  The only vessel for which the variation still seemed excessive is Château-Renault’s flagship Le Dauphin-Royal, for which the armament in the three sources is given as 90, 100, and 110 guns.  The largest figure (from Guérin) is questionable in that Tourville insisted on mounting rather fewer than the specified 110 guns in his own Le Soleil-Royal, which was considerably larger and vastly more strongly manned than Château-Renault’s ship.  And, a report printed in Guérin, v. 3, pp. 313-316, written from the fleet five days after the battle by Cartigny, Commissionaire and Inspecteur Général de la Marine, gives the armament of Le Dauphin-Royal as 100 guns.  For the present, it must be left for French researchers to settle this matter.

The line included seventy ships.  Excluded from the line were five light frigates and eighteen fireships. The fleet was organized into three squadrons of three divisions each, but the available sources do not show the boundaries between divisions.  The French flags are recorded in an English source:  a meticulous listing in the log of Captain Sir Francis Wheeler of the English ship Albemarle (The National Archives of Great Britain [NA], ADM 51/55).  Each squadron commander, in the centre division, flew a rectangular flag at the fore (including Tourville).  The second-in-command of each squadron (the functional vice-admiral regardless of titular rank) flew a rectangular flag at the mizzen, and the third-in-command (the functional contre-admiral or rear-admiral) flew a swallow-tailed ‘cornette’ at the mizzen.  The command flags in the Avant-garde (Van Squadron) were blue, those in the Corps de Bataille (Centre Squadron) were white, and those in the Arrière-garde (Rear Squadron) were bicolour white over blue.  In addition to the nine division commanders, the French placed a junior flag officer (chef d’escadre – abbreviated ‘CdE’ below) at the very head and tail of the line.  These flew special pendants at the mizzen peak (the tip of the diagonal mizzen yard), the only ships in the fleet with pendants (though Tourville’s ‘seconds’ stationed immediately before and abaft him were also chefs d’escadre).  In all ships, jacks and ensigns were white.  The flag arrangements were rather different from those specified by the current Ordonnance, which apparently had not anticipated fleets of such great size.

In the list below, the division commanders and their flagships are in bold type.  In the RATE column, the five fourth-rate light frigates not in the line are identified as ‘4F’.  Their names are indented showing their approximate stations on the unengaged side of the fleet.  Fireships are designated by ‘fs’ in the RATE column and their names are double-indented.  All the flag-officers including the junior chefs d’escadre each evidently had at least one fireship under his control.  The eight ships indicated as ‘Répétiteurs’ were designated signal repeaters.  There is some controversy about this, since the Chevalier de Forbin-Gardane claimed later in his Memoirs of the Count de Forbin (London, 1731), p. 277, to have been among the répétiteurs, but Sue’s list allots this honour to Forbin’s next-ahead, the Chevalier de la Rongère.

The rates for ships in the French navy of the 1690s did not correspond to English rates.  The three-decked French first-rates included all of what the English would have counted as first- and second-rates.  French second-rates roughly equated to large English third-rates, and French third-rates were about the same size and force as the small English third-rates and large fourth-rates.

Some details in the list below still remain wanting.  I was unable to find the forenames of most of the captains, and have accordingly omitted them all.  I was able to identify only three flag-captains, as shown below.  Finally, French proper names in the seventeenth century were often rendered in a variety of phonetic spellings.  To those who disapprove of the versions adopted here, I cheerfully apologize.

RATE       SHIP                       GUNS        MEN             COMMANDER

Avant-garde (Van Squadron)

2          Le Fier                          68-72         515             CdE De Relingues

fs                   L’Hameçon                6            30            Deslauriers

3          Le Fort                          52-60         365            De Lartelloire

4          Le Maure                       52-54         282            Chev. La Galissonnière

2          L’Éclantant                     64-68         441            De Septesmes

1          Le Conquérant             70-74         588           Lt-Gén. Marq. de Villette-Mursay / Capt. de La Roche-Allard

fs                   Le Fanfaron              10           30             La Serre

2          Le Courtisan                  62-66         400             De Pointis

4          L’Indien                        44-50         250             De Roussel

4F             Le Solide                  42-48         250             De Ferville

4          Le Trident                     46-52         282             De Riberet

3          Le Hardy (Répétiteur)     56-58         350             Comte des Gouttes

3          Le Saint-Louis                56-58         362             La Roque-Percin

3          L’Excellent                     56-60         351             Chev. de Montbron

2          Le Pompeux                   72-74         460             D’Aligre

fs              La Branche d’Olivier        6            30             Moreau

1          Le Dauphin-Royal       90-110          705       Lt-Gén. Château-Renault / Capt. Delcampe

fs                   L’Impudent               10           30             Origène Marchand

fs                   Le Déguisé                4            30             De Lalande

3          L’Ardent                        62-66          364             D’Infreville

3          Le Bon                          52-56         315?           Chev. de Digoine du Palais

3          Le Précieux                        54         330             De Périnet

3          L’Aquilon (Répétiteur)     52-54         350?           De Beaugeais

4F             L’Alcion                     40-44         150             Jean-Bart

3          Le Fendant                     52-58         340?           La Vigerie

3          Le Courageux                     60         365             De Sévigny

1          La Couronne                72-78         517         CdE Marquis de Langeron

fs                   Le Dur                      10           30             De Longchamps

3          Le Ferme                       54-60         358             De Vandricourt

3          Le Téméraire                 52-58         343             De Rivault-Huet

4F             L’Éole                       46-50         250             Du Tast

 

 

Corps de Bataille (Centre Squadron)

3          Le Brusque (Répétiteur)  50-56         314             De Ricours

3          L’Arrogant                      54-60         362             Chev. des Adrets

4          L’Arc-en-Ciel                   44-46         272             Chev. de Sainte-Maure

2          L’Henri                           62-66         390             D’Amblimont

1          Le Souverain                80-84         588          CdE De Nesmond / Capt. d’Aire

fs                   Le Périlleux               10           30             Monnier

3          Le Brillant                      58-66         480             De Beaujeu

4          Le Neptune                         46         240             De Forbin

3          Le Sans-Pareil (Répétiteur)58-60       385             Chev. de La Rongère

3          Le Fidèle                         46-56        242             Chev. de Forbin-Gardane

3          Le Diamant                     54-56         355             De Serquigney

2          Le Sérieux                      56-64         324             Chev. de Bellefontaine

2          Le Tonnant                     70-72         515             CdE Marquis de La Porte

fs                   L’Espion                    10           30             Drognon-Terras

1          Le Soleil-Royal           98-104          904        Vice-Adm. Comte de Tourville

fs                   L’Insensé                  10           30             Cadeneau

4F             Le Faucon                      44             —             De Montbault

1          Le Saint-Philippe                  80         525             CdE Chev. de Coëtlogon

fs                   La Jolie                     10           30             Naudy

3          Le Marquis                      58-60         343        Chev. de Château-Morand

3          Le Furieux                       58-60         365             Desnots

3          La Fortuné (Répétiteur)    58-60         368             Pallas

3          L’Apollon                         56-58         365             Bidault

3          Le Saint-Michel                54-58         348             De Villars

3          L’Entreprenant                 56-60         365             De Sébeville

1          Le Magnifique               76-80         590        Lt-Gén. Marquis d’Amfreville

fs                   La Bouffonne             10           30             Descourtis

fs                   Le Fâcheux                10           30             Verguin

2          Le Content                      56-60         390             Comte de Saint-Pierre

3          Le Vermandois                58-60         262             Du Challard

4          Le Cheval-Marin              40-46         252             Chev. d’Amfreville

3          Le Fougueux (Répétiteur)     58         368             De Saint-Marc

 

 

Arrière-garde (Rear Squadron)

4          Le Comte                       40-44         250         Marq. La Roche-Courbon-Blénac

3          Le Vigilant                      52-56         315             Chev. de Chalais

2          Le Parfait                       60-62         350             Machault

2          Le Triomphant             70-72         515             CdE Chev. de Flacourt

    fs                   L’Impertinent        6            30             Fremicourt

2          Le Bourbon                   58-62         350             D’Hervault

3          Le Duc                          48-52         305             Pallière

3          Le Vaillant                     48-54         350             Feuquières

3          Le Capable (Répétiteur)  50-54         250             La Boissière

3          Le Brave                       50-58         385             De Champigny

3          Le François                    44-46         262             Chev. d’Hailly

3          L’Agréable                     58-60         360             Le Motte

2          Le Florissant                  72-80         500             De Cogolin

fs                   La Diligente          6-10            30             Rolland

1          Le Grand                     80-86         660         Vice-Adm. Comte d’Estrées

fs                   Le Boutefeu         6            30             Jean-Étienne

2          Le Belliqueux                72-74         515             Des Francs

fs                   Le Royal-Jacques 6-10            30             Perron

4F             Le Léger                       44         200             Du Rouvroy

3          Le Prince                      56-58         365             Baron des Adrets

3          Le Prudent                    52-58         234             Des Herbiers

3          Le Modéré (Répétiteur)       50         315             Des Augiers

3          Le Fleuron                    54-58         339             De Chabert

2          L’Aimable                     66-70         450             Du Magnon

1          L’Intrépide                 80-84         600             Lt-Gén. Gabaret

fs                   La Maligne          6-10            30             De Reussy

2          Le Glorieux                  60-62         392             Belle-Isle Érard

2          L’Illustre                      66-70         472             Chev. de Rosmadec

2          Le Terrible                   72-74         515             CdE Pannetié

fs                   L’Extravagant         10           30             Longchamps-Montendre

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Return of the Thirty Ships, Part 1

by

In the mid-1670s, [Samuel] Pepys and other members of the administration became increasingly alarmed at the navy’s numerical inferiority to the French and Dutch. In 1665, Charles II’s fleet had contained 102 major ships, compared to 81 Dutch and 36 French; ten years later, the picture had changed alarmingly…[Figures that Pepys presented to Parliament in April 1675 demonstrated that Britain now had 77 ships of 40 guns and upwards, compared with 85 French and 108 Dutch.]…At least twenty new ships of the first to third rates were required, and the number soon rose to thirty. 

At first, it proved impossible to convince Parliament of the extent of the problem and of the need to vote huge sums of money for the building programme necessary to remedy it. MPs were deeply suspicious of what they saw as a crypto-Catholic, Francophile court, and Pepys was shouted down in the parliamentary sessions of 1675. One backbencher protested that ‘ships must have been built of gold at these rates’, and like many critics of defence spending in later years, he grumbled that much of the naval budget was actually being spent on the salaries of bureaucrats. Another warned that they should ‘not provide here such a number of ships, as not to come here again’. However, the year 1676, when Parliament did not sit, saw a series of stunning French naval successes in the Mediterranean, which proved conclusively that Louis’ fleet was not the paper tiger that some MPs had complacently assumed it to be. When Parliament reconvened in February 1677, the mood was decisively different. ‘The king of France’s great fleet is not built to take Vienna’, one MP observed presciently, and on 5 March Parliament voted £600,000 to build one first rate of 1,400 tons, nine second rates of 1,100, and twenty thirds of 900.

That was how, in Pepys’s Navy, I described the genesis of the ‘thirty new ships’ building programme of the 1670s and 1680s. The ships that emerged were iconic in many ways. They included the first British warships to bear the names Britannia and Neptune. Some of them survived for many years: making allowance for the nature of the eighteenth century practice of ‘rebuilding’ ships, which often produced essentially new ships, the Neptune of 1683 was nominally the same ship as the Torbay that fought in Admiral Rodney’s fleet at the battle of the Saintes ninety-nine years later. Several of the ‘thirty ships’ were wrecked in dramatic circumstances, and their wrecks provide some of the most exciting and important dives around the British coast: the Coronation, wrecked off Plymouth in 1691, is the subject of ongoing study, while the Stirling Castle, Restoration and Northumberland, lost on the Goodwin Sands during the Great Storm of 1703, have produced a large number of fascinating artefacts that have enhanced our understanding of the seventeenth century navy.

However, my choice of theme for this blog was determined by the recent ‘reappearance’ of another of the thirty ships, the Anne, built at Chatham by Phineas Pett the younger and launched in 1678. She was a prestigious ship, and in 1687 she was the flagship of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Grafton, Vice-Admiral of England and an illegitimate son of King Charles II, during a cruise in the Mediterranean which included a visit to Malta; Grafton’s flag captain was Cloudesley Shovell, and also aboard the ship was Henry Fitzjames, illegitimate son of King James II and Arabella Churchill (the sister of the future Duke of Marlborough). I described this event in an essay for the Transactions of the Naval Dockyards Society, v (2009), a description which inspired Richard Endsor, the leading authority on the design and construction of late-17th century British warships, to paint the Anne lying in Malta’s Grand Harbour:

Grafton’s fleet, comprising the Anne, the brand new fourth rate Sedgemoor, and the ancient 32-gun fifth rate Pearl, had been substantially reinforced for the occasion. The ageing 48-gun fourth rate Hampshire, the Crown, and the Mermaid from the Sallee squadron had arrived in Malta a few days earlier, as had the Isabella Yacht, the duke’s personal despatch- and pleasure boat…Grafton’s arrival in the Grand Harbour was greeted by a salute of at least sixty-one guns, [and] the fleet proceeded to stay at Malta for ten days [which included an interview with the Grand Master of the Knights of Malta]…

Scan_Pic0049

On 30 June 1690 the Anne was part of the combined Anglo-Dutch fleet that fought the French in the Battle of Beachy Head, a controversial action during which the French gained the upper hand. The Anne, commanded by John Tyrrell, was driven ashore at Pett Level near Hastings and burned. However, the lower part of the hull survived in the sand, and parts of it are exposed from time to time. This year, the timbers of the Anne have reappeared for the first time in sixteen years, as this video demonstrates. As Richard Endsor has written,Anne

This year the warship Anne near Pett Level is exposed to a greater extent than has ever been known in living memory. All the sand is removed from the beach leaving the remains some 70cm above clay ground level. At the time of sighting the tide was not particularly deep and the gully in which she lies did not have time to drain properly so that only about half the ship above ground level was visible…The Anne is very exposed and vulnerable and we can only expect her rapid deterioration. It is therefore essential on this once in a lifetime opportunity that the remains be accurately recorded as soon as possible before their destruction. The whole of the bottom of the Anne survives undamaged and because she is in her original, as built condition, probably represents the only [British] seventeenth century warship that can be recorded to demonstrate how they were built. 

Richard’s reconstruction drawing indicates the extent of the surviving remains in relation to the original appearance of the ship.

Anne

A team based at the Shipwreck Museum, Hastings, and led by Jacqui Stanford and Kimberley Monk, is working to record the wreck as thoroughly as possible; updates on progress will be posted in this blog and in my Twitter feed, and I hope to get down to Pett Level myself some time during the next few months to see the Anne for myself. However, a word of caution to anyone thinking of doing the same – the Anne is protected by law, and whilst visitors may view the ship, they may not touch or remove anything from it.

***

Next week I’ll be blogging about the exciting project to build a full-sized replica of the first of the ‘thirty ships’, the Lenox. That post, like this one, will have significant input from Richard Endsor – I’m very grateful to Richard for allowing me to quote him at length and to reproduce several of his stunning illustrations.