Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Tables
- Preface
- About the Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction, Analysis and Interpretation
- 1 Spithead Mutiny: Introduction
- 2 The Delegates: A Radical Tradition
- 3 What Really Happened On Board HMS London?
- 4 The Spirit of Kempenfeldt
- 5 Voices from the Lower Deck: Petitions on the Conduct of Naval Officers during the 1797 Mutinies
- 6 Crew Management and Mutiny: The Case of Minerve, 1796–1802
- 7 The 1797 Mutinies in the Channel Fleet: A Foreign–Inspired Revolutionary Movement?
- 8 The Nore Mutiny: Introduction
- 9 The East Coast Mutinies: May–June 1797
- 10 Reporting the Mutinies in the Provincial Press
- 11 A Floating Republic? Conspiracy Theory and the Nore Mutiny of 1797
- 12 Lower Deck Life in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
- 13 ‘Launched into Eternity’ Admiralty Retribution or the Restoration of Discipline?
- 14 Discipline, Desertion and Death: HMS Trent 1796–1803
- 15 ‘We went out with Admiral Duncan, we came back without him’: Mutiny and the North Sea Squadron
- 16 The Influence of 1797 upon the Nereide Mutiny of 1809
- Select Bibliography
- Index
15 - ‘We went out with Admiral Duncan, we came back without him’: Mutiny and the North Sea Squadron
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Tables
- Preface
- About the Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Abbreviations
- Introduction, Analysis and Interpretation
- 1 Spithead Mutiny: Introduction
- 2 The Delegates: A Radical Tradition
- 3 What Really Happened On Board HMS London?
- 4 The Spirit of Kempenfeldt
- 5 Voices from the Lower Deck: Petitions on the Conduct of Naval Officers during the 1797 Mutinies
- 6 Crew Management and Mutiny: The Case of Minerve, 1796–1802
- 7 The 1797 Mutinies in the Channel Fleet: A Foreign–Inspired Revolutionary Movement?
- 8 The Nore Mutiny: Introduction
- 9 The East Coast Mutinies: May–June 1797
- 10 Reporting the Mutinies in the Provincial Press
- 11 A Floating Republic? Conspiracy Theory and the Nore Mutiny of 1797
- 12 Lower Deck Life in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
- 13 ‘Launched into Eternity’ Admiralty Retribution or the Restoration of Discipline?
- 14 Discipline, Desertion and Death: HMS Trent 1796–1803
- 15 ‘We went out with Admiral Duncan, we came back without him’: Mutiny and the North Sea Squadron
- 16 The Influence of 1797 upon the Nereide Mutiny of 1809
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Summary
For the North Sea Squadron under Admiral Duncan, the year 1797 was a time of seemingly irreconcilable contrasts. During the early summer of that year the North Sea Squadron, which he had commanded for the past two years, was taken from him. Not because of his transfer elsewhere, but through the emergence of elected shipboard committees that assumed power in their own right. These committees, which represented an indeterminate proportion of the seamen of Duncan's fleet, after consultation among themselves, decided upon sailing the squadron into the Thames. Here, at the Great Nore anchorage, they joined other vessels in mutiny, some of these also part of Duncan's squadron. Admiral Duncan, for his part, remained off the Texel, continuing to blockade an enemy invasion fleet, with no more than two battleships (Venerable and Adamant) and two frigates (Circe and Trent). Within four weeks, however, Duncan had regained total control of his squadron. Furthermore, on 11 October of that same year, he not only led this once disloyal fleet into battle, but also gained a massive naval victory over a superior force of Dutch warships.
These are powerful and extreme contrasts. In one part of the year virtually an entire squadron had not only rejected their admiral but had shown contempt for authority by sailing, on their own volition, to an alternative port. Yet, in complete contrast, and towards the end of that year, these same seamen were prepared to sacrifice life and limb in a viciously fought naval engagement.
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- The Naval Mutinies of 1797Unity and Perseverance, pp. 243 - 263Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2011