<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> T H E B O S U N ' S C H R O N I C L E The official Ezine of the Thomas Kydd Shipmates' network <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> January 2008 In this issue - Julian chats about his recent Brittany location research, we introduce two new departments - and there's a brace of sea books up for grabs and a chance to win a Kydd Tankard with which to toast the New Year! 1 DISPATCHES 2 BOOKSHELF 3 FEATURE 4 SALTY SAYINGS 5 CONTESTS 6 KYDD'S WOODEN WORLD - new - 7 SHIPMATES AHOY! 8 THE GEORGIANS - new - ==================== 1 DISPATCHES + Collectors Set 2008 In 2007 Julian introduced the Kydd Collectors Set - comprising a signed UK First Edition of the current book, a signed cover postcard and an exclusive leather bookmark. The Set was strictly limited to 500 and proved so popular, quickly being oversubscribed, that we will now continue it as an annual tradition! If you would like to sign up for the 2008 Collectors Set email Admin@Julianstockwin.com + News from Kydd series cover painter Geoff Hunt RSMA As well as his busy painting schedule for the coming year, Geoff will be working on a new book, "The 28-gun Frigate Surprise - the Design, Construction and Careers of Jack Aubrey's Favourite Command", co-authored with Brian Lavery, and produced by Conway Maritime Press. Publication will be around mid-year, and we'll bring you more details in a future issue. Geoff is off to the Caribbean later in the month as a guest speaker aboard "Sea Cloud II". And congratulations are in order: at the Mystic Seaport International Show, Geoff won the prestigious Rudolph J Schaefer Maritime Award. + The Grand Old Lady rises from the ashes As we enter a new year, please consider a donation to the iconic "Cutty Sark". After the devastating inferno on May 21, the last vestiges of the fire-damaged materials were removed in August, and the conservation project is again in full swing - but the completion date has been put back a year to 2010 and there is now a multi-million pound funding shortfall. www.cuttysark.org.uk + Happy Homecoming During 2007 the Bosun's Chronicle featured some of the highlights of the 8-month deployment of HMS "Southampton", the type 42 Destroyer that hosted Julian and Kathy aboard for a short cruise earlier in the year. We are happy to report she returned safely to her home port of Portsmouth in mid-December, after visiting 14 countries, sailing in two oceans and covering over 33,000 miles. + Plaudits for THE ADMIRAL'S DAUGHTER Your emails about book eight keep coming in, thank you! And here's what some of the press reviews have had to say... > "Stockwin tells his story with crispness and clarity. His characters are simply but well-drawn, and events happen at a pace to keep the reader involved. As always, his display of seamanship savvy is one of the best in the genre..." - Naval History > "This book lives up to expectations developed by the previous titles. Kydd has returned to England, seas with which he is not familiar. He gains command once more in a vessel he knows well. His social adventures paint a picture of society of the times and his fortunes rise and fall in an absorbing adventure among privateers, smugglers and violent storms." - BroadlyBoats > It's terrific stuff and once more Stockwin fails to disappoint as he strips away the trappings of modern life and opens a portal into an early nineteenth century world of men-of-war, privateers, smugglers and intrigue. - Western Morning News ==================== 2 BOOKSHELF "Dressed to Kill" by Amy Miller Published by National Maritime Museum. GBP 20.00 ISBN 978 0 948065 74 3 With a collection of over two million items relating to seafaring, navigation, astronomy and time measurement, the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich is probably the foremost such institution in the world. Julian often visits to study at first hand some of the splendid artefacts from Kydd's sea world on display there. This wonderfully illustrated book examines British Naval uniform in the period 1748 (the official introduction of uniforms for commissioned officers) to 1857 (when ratings were given a regulated uniform). It is not just a record of naval attire, but a fascinating study of naval identity, period fashion and masculinity in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. ==================== 3 FEATURE Julian and Kathy spent much of December in Brittany on location research for the series. As promised in the last issue, Julian talks about this trip: "Not surprisingly, I opted to go by sea, and we boarded the Channel ferry for the overnight crossing to Roscoff on December 4, the very same journey that so many smugglers did in Kydd's day and which I wrote about in THE ADMIRAL'S DAUGHTER. I was honoured to be invited to join the captain, Commandant le Bourdonnec, on the bridge for the final entry into Roscoff. With high winds directly abeam (the most challenging in terms of seamanship), a perfect alongside was nevertheless accomplished. Kathy had declined to go up as the crossing had seen the winds peak at Force 9 and it was a bit of a bumpy ride! In Roscoff we stayed right on the old harbour, in a small inn dating to 1585. At one stage it was owned by French privateers. Then it was on to our base for the trip, the medieval town of Dinan. Saint Malo, the corsair city, has been a seaward fortress since the Middle Ages. We spent several fascinating days there and I gained an even greater respect for the rocks that menace navigation all along the Brittany coast. As usual on these trips we spent quite a bit of time in various libraries and museums gathering material for the series. It is always a very pleasurable time for me, the location research. I know in a general sense where future books are going, but it is only by visiting the actual locations that I can really start to develop a sense of a place, the unique sights, smells, sounds. And quite often some obscure fact unearthed in a dusty tome, or told by a local expert, will spark something that leads to an intriguing twist or turn in the book. As I write this we are still (just) in 2007, a year that has been both full and rewarding. Highlights that stand out are my time at sea aboard HMS "Southampton"; arriving in a horse-drawn carriage for the inaugural Appledore Book Festival; meeting up with old chums from Hong Kong days at a special London event to mark the 10th anniversary of the handover to China. But it's always the unfolding story of Thomas Kydd that gives me such a buzz each day. I feel very privileged to be able to share my passion for the age of fighting sail in this way." ==================== 4 SALTY SAYINGS Lifeline Today, if we talk about a lifeline, it is something that is regarded as a source of salvation in a crisis The origins of this word are definitely salty. In Kydd's day in foul weather ropes were rigged fore and aft along the deck of a ship to provide a secure handhold, something for a sailor to grab onto in heavy seas to prevent him from being washed overboard. In extremely rough weather a sailor would grab the line and wrap it around his arm for extra security - then hang on for dear life! Lifelines aloft were stretched from the lifts to the masts to enable seamen to stand securely when manning yards, as in a salute to an admiral etc. ==================== 5 CONTESTS Deadline: January 25 Bosun@Julianstockwin.com Don't forget to include your full postal address. + A brace of sea books! For a chance to win the latest copy of "The Mariner's Book of Days" from Seafarer Press, always a delight every year with its fascinating compilation of all things nautical - and also a mystery sea book, here's the question: Who is the author of "The Mariner's Book of Days"? + Cheers... And if you would like your name to go into the hat for a Kydd Tankard, which famous admiral is particularly associated with rum? The Kydd Tankard is an exclusive pewter tankard in Georgian style, engraved with a KYDD logo and the following words: "A right true drop! Duke William, 1793" Production was limited to 150 and the Tankard comes with a numbered certificate signed by Julian. Orders, while stocks last, to Admin@Julianstockwin.com It is priced at GBP47 plus p&p. Congratulations to the winners of the contests in the last issue - Steve Counsell won a John Chancellor print; a copy of "The History of Seafaring" went to Judith Edwards; Jan Roberts was first out of the hat for the Lucky Dip; and the McBooks prize went to Jim McGee. ==================== 6 KYDD'S WOODEN WORLD The supply of timber was one of the main constraints of naval power in Kydd's time. Just consider this: a ship o'-the-line like HMS "Victory" required the timber from about 6000 trees for the hull alone! Starting this month, we'll take a look at six of the main types of timber used in Kydd's wooden world. + Oak "Heart of oak are our ships, heart of oak are our men..." (David Garrick, 1759) Oak, prized for its strength and durability under exposure, was by far the most vital timber, often accounting for ninety percent of the timber in a ship's hull. Much of this was felled in the Wealden forests of Kent and Sussex. Curved or "compass" oak, which could take up to 100 years to grow to size, was highly valued and used for sternposts, frames, knees, etc. This often came from isolated trees, often deliberately constrained during their growth. Straight oak was used for beams, external planking and external strengtheners, and planking of the main gun deck. Some straight oak was imported from Danzig, modern Gdansk. Concerned at the dwindling supply of timber, Admiral Collingwood famously scattered acorns around his estate in Northumberland. He loved to walk the hills with his dog "Bounce" and would always start off with a handful of acorns in his pocket and whenever he found a good place for an oak tree to grow he would press an acorn into the soil. ==================== 7 Shipmates Ahoy! Julian loves hearing from his readers around the world, and responds personally to them all. You can email him on Julian@Julianstockwin.com Here's two recent correspondents who have been inspired to trace their naval ancestors, one in sail, one in steam:- Beatrice Garnett greatly enjoys the Kydd series because the books provide "a fascinating and exciting insight into the life of the ordinary sailor." A number of Beatrice's ancestors were in the Royal Navy and she has followed one in particular, Moses Hunt, who joined as a boy seaman in 1824 and eventually reached the rate of petty officer. He served under a number of famous captains, including Frederick Marryat, the father of the genre in which Julian now writes. It was said that Moses Hunt was a very gentle man but with a wonderful voice that would carry for an eighth of a mile when squaring yards from a boat. --- Alan Dixon contacted Julian to ask for his suggestions in tracking down information on his father, Teasdale Dixon, a marine engineer who began his career in tramp steamers in the first decade of the twentieth century. Alan is piecing together a picture of his father's working life, and would love to hear from other Shipmates if they can shed more light on some of the gaps in his research to date, in particular where S.S. "Datchet" (in which his father served from 1917 to 1928) went during WWI. The poem "Cargoes" by John Masefield evocatively captures the working lives of these gritty little vessels - "Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack Butting through the Channel in the mad March days With a cargo of Tyne coal Road rails, pig lead Firewood, ironware, and cheap tin trays" =================== 8 THE GEORGIANS One of the reasons Julian was attracted to the period he writes about is the great colour and vitality of the times - and the many larger-than-life personalities both at sea and ashore. In this new department we will feature six of these, starting with Edward Pellew, 1st Viscount Exmouth. Born into a Cornish family, he became a naval officer of great courage and leadership. He fought during the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary War and the Napoleonic Wars. He was captain of the "Nymph" which took the French warship, the "Cleopatre" in 1793, in the first significant action of the war. [Julian alludes to this incident in ARTEMIS.] Unusually for the period, Pellew was a good swimmer, and on several occasions sprang overboard to the assistance of drowning seamen, saving a number of lives at considerable risk to his own. Perhaps the most dramatic demonstration of this occurred on January 26, 1796, when the East Indiaman, the "Dutton", crippled after having lost her rudder at sea, was swept onto rocks under the Citadel Ramparts on Plymouth Hoe. Due to the heavy seas, those aboard, some four hundred soldiers and a number of women and children, were unable to get ashore and faced certain death. Pellew was on his way to dine with the local vicar when he saw crowds of people running towards the Hoe. On investigating the situation, he quickly took charge, swimming out to the ship, where he quelled the panic and set about an orderly rescue. But for his intervention all souls would have been lost; there were just 15 casualties. In January of the following year, in company with another frigate, Pellew's ship "Indefatigable" daringly took on a French ship-o'-the-line. The list of his achievements includes quelling a mutiny in Bantry Bay by seizing the ringleader with his own hands, and decisive action against the Dey of Algiers which resulted in the freeing of some 1000 Christian slaves. A firm disciplinarian, Pellew took the well-being of those under his command very seriously. Codrington said of him: "Men worked well for Nelson for fear of not pleasing him, whilst working well for Pellew for fear of displeasing him." =================== Coming next month - The role of the naval schools, a double helping of ASK JULIAN, great contests and an update on the "Teazer" model being built by Shipmate John Thomson. Have you visited Julian's website recently? www.Julianstockwin.com Happy New Year! Yours aye, THE BOSUN ++ Download back issues from the WebSite ++