"Ships of the line late 1600s early 1700s" Topic
20 Posts
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Gunfreak | 06 Apr 2016 1:55 p.m. PST |
I have a decent grasp on the napoleonic period armerment number of guns ect. But what about this period? I assume they had smaller guns and less of them? |
ModelJShip | 06 Apr 2016 2:00 p.m. PST |
Langton miniatures scale 1/1200 Anglo Dutch ships link I hope you will be useful Best regards, Julián |
ModelJShip | 06 Apr 2016 2:04 p.m. PST |
Also you can use 1/1200 Valiant Enterprice Ltd. They have some spanish galleons and other ships link |
rmaker | 06 Apr 2016 5:24 p.m. PST |
Per J. J. Colledge, "Ships of the Royal Navy" the gun establishments for 1st Rates were: 1677 – 100 guns -26x42pdr, 28x18pdr, 44x6pdr 1716 – 100 guns – 28x32pdr, 28x24pdr, 28x12pdr, 16x6pdr 1740 – 100 guns – 28x42pdr, 28x24pdr, 28x12pdr, 16x6pdr 1757 – 100 guns – 28x42pdr, 28x24pdr, 28x12pdr, 16x6pdr 1792 – 110 guns – 30x32pdr, 30x24pdr, 32x18pdr, 18x12pdr 100 guns – 28x42pdr, 28x24pdr, 44x12pdr or 30x42pdr, 28x42pdr, 42x12pdr or 30x32pdr, 28x24pdr, 30x18pdr, 12x12pdr |
StarCruiser | 06 Apr 2016 5:40 p.m. PST |
Some of the weapons used in that period were heavier than those used later. As rmaker noted, the establishment shows some rather heavy guns on the lower deck. The British/English Royal Navy left the massive 42pdr behind since they were very difficult to handle quickly. They found the lighter 32pdr to be more effective in actual battle. Some navies stuck with heavier guns far longer – all the way into the Napoleonic period. |
Yellow Admiral | 06 Apr 2016 6:22 p.m. PST |
The basic warship design paradigm was stable by about 1660, with mostly incremental changes after that. In the 17th C. ships tended to have very high, raked sterns. The stern rake gradually dropped all the way until the end of the Age of Sail. In the 1690-1720 period, high sterns were still noticeable, but by the 1750s sterns looked very similar to Napoleonic era sterns. Until the mid-17th C. ships tended to vary wildly in the number of guns carried, but in the 1660s the major navies started establishing building standards and such standardized designs were becoming common by the 1670s. By about 1690 the standard 2-deckers were mostly rated as "50s" "60s" and "70s", and standard "big" ships were 2- or 3-decker "80s" and 3-decker "90s" or "100s". Smaller ships were less standardized. That said, gun ratings until the mid-1700s were much more nominal than precise, and many ships had extra guns aboard or guns taken out for various reasons, so a "70" might actually have 66 or 72 guns or something. As ships got old and their timbers weakened, they tended to shed guns, and ships going overseas (e.g. to the Indies) also tended to take out guns to make room for stores and improve seaworthiness. In English manuscripts it can be very hard to tell how many guns a warship actually had in a given encounter because it was still identified by its rating regardless of the actual count of guns aboard. I'm not sure if this is true in French, Dutch, Spanish, Danish, Swedish, or other national navies. The maximum size of warship was hit around 1690ish, because it was just impossible to build a seaworthy ship much longer than 200 feet (60m) until diagonal cross-bracing was introduced in the post-Napoleonic period. However, the average size of ships of the line grew steadily throughout the Age of Sail. This growth gradually improved the stoutness, seaworthiness, and roominess of the average fleet unit, and the practice of "overgunning" a hull gradually faded in favor of seakeeping and endurance, so ships of around 1700 tended to be more cramped and crank than Napoleonic ships of the same rating. Speaking of crank ships: it was very common for multi-deck warships built before the mid-18th C. to suffer submerged lower gun ports in any sort of breeze. It took a long time for naval builders to figure out how to build large ships of the line without this problem, especially 3-deckers. In fact 3-deckers were generally not sent outside European waters until the second half of the 18th C. because they were so unseaworthy. The "frigate" as we know it from Nelson's day was only invented in the 1750s by the French, and was sort of a small 2-decker with only one whole deck of guns; the other deck was left for storage and utilitarian uses, which is a large part of what made the frigates everyone knows about such excellent cruising ships. Before that development, "frigate" was a looser term that seems to have meant any small warship with at least one complete gun deck. In the 17th C., "frigate" just meant "fast warship" and often included 2-deckers and 1˝-deckers. Some of the "frigates" of the Anglo-Dutch Wars were full-sized ships of the line! Decorations changed incrementally but substantially. Back in the Anglo-Dutch Wars, statuary was all the rage, and ships tended to have a riot of carvings studding the stern galleries and parts of the bows. This style only gradually subsided, so ships of the early 1700s still had vast collections of carvings in the stern galleries, though less than the 1690s and before. Side note: for a time, stern lanterns were also a warship fashion accessory. Warships needed stern lanterns for signaling and navigation, but in the 17th C. there was an unspoken competition to have the largest and most impressive lantern aboard, and Samuel Pepys' diary relates a story of fitting at least 9 people into the stern lantern of the Sovereign. Until the 1780s, the fore-and-aft sail on the mizzen mast was a lateen sail. This was replaced by the spanker (aka driver) between the AWI and Napoleonic Wars. Tip: If you want to convert a Napoleonic ship of the line to an AWI or SYW ship of the line, just replace the spanker with a lateen sail. Done! There was a funny little spritsail topsail (a topsail on a stubby mast sticking up from the end of the bowsprit) in the mid-late 1600s. It disappeared in the early 1700s, probably because the triangular jibs/staysails/headsails we all struggle to glue in between our Napoleonic bowsprits and foremasts became common, and were both easier to handle and more effective. The gun calibers themselves changed over time. In the decades around 1700, 42 pdrs were actually pretty common on the lowest decks of 3-deckers. These gradually disappeared through the 18th C., replaced by 32- and 36-pdrs which were faster to load and fire, easier to handle, lighter, and still had plenty enough punch. The "standard" guns of 2-deckers seems to have been about the same from the 1670s onward for a given ship rating, though a precise conclusion about that topic would require some research. There were gradual improvements in gun founding technology that made guns of a given ball weight lighter over time. For instance, Gribeauval introduced improved gun manufacturing techniques in the late 18th C. that produced lighter guns of the same nominal caliber, and if you carefully read the rosters of ships that served in both the AWI and Napoleonic Wars you find that some were "upgunned" to "larger" guns between the wars (e.g., all the 18 pdrs replaced with 24 pdrs, etc.). Gribeauval's improvements are outside the period you asked about, but these sorts of gunnery developments were happening throughout the Age of Sail, and in general guns at sea had a lower rate of fire the farther back you go. This helps explain why big sea battles could last 2-4 days without a decision in the 17th and very early 18th centuries. Yours in TMI, - Ix |
Yellow Admiral | 06 Apr 2016 7:38 p.m. PST |
More TMI: The Royal Navy built a whole series of 80-gun 3-deckers in the 1670s, and kept 1-2 dozen of this design in the fleet all the way until the 1740s. There were still a few in service as the Napoleonic Wars began. These ships were notoriously crank, cramped, slow, and disliked. I think nobody made much of an issue out of this in the 1600s since most 3-deckers were crank and slow and 80 was a lot of guns, but by the early 1700s there were plenty of large ships around and most other designs were either more powerful or better sailers. Admiral Matthews' fleet off Toulon in 1744 had many of them (9, I think?), and he partially blamed them for losing the battle, complaining that they were so crank they couldn't open their lower gun ports if "there be even a capful of wind". For some reason, this little side story is largely forgotten and poorly documented, so most AoS gamers are completely unaware of it. It can be hard to even discover which 80s were 3-deckers and which were 2-deckers. - Ix |
Yellow Admiral | 06 Apr 2016 8:25 p.m. PST |
As for modeling: As Julián mentioned, you can use Langton Anglo-Dutch Wars ships. These look appropriate (or can be modified to) until early in the WSS. It looks like ship sterns and color schemes began to change during the course of the WSS, but it's also possible that artistic styles in nautical art changed. Perhaps the paintings we have as visual resources are exaggerating and the ships looked pretty much the same until after the WSS. <shrug> Navwar makes a line of 1/1200 Dutch Wars to Seven Year War Vessels. I have two of these (Eendracht and, uh, something else), and one of them struck me as looking very "early 18th C." in style. I don't know about the rest. As usual, Navwar castings are crude, but in all honesty they can look decent if properly painted and dressed up. Put Langton masts on them and the hulls will hide nicely under all that rigging. :-) I have always found the Valiant 1/2000 scale Napoleonic ships to be a bit bulbous and cartoonish, but I also discovered that this looks perfectly appropriate to the 17th C. if you add a steeply raked poop deck (with lanterns) on the rear of the ship and glob on some putty to make the stern galleries the right shape. These are small enough that this work can be done by hand in very low detail and still look nice – especially if there are a lot of them on the table and nobody is examining any one of them too closely. - Ix |
Blutarski | 07 Apr 2016 2:34 a.m. PST |
YA covered the issue very comprehensively. I would only offer the following thoughts - > English warship design prior to the 7YW period lagged badly behind that of the Spanish and French. While the 80 gun 3-deckers were notably poor designs, British warships of all classes during that period were generally small, cramped, slow and badly over-gunned. Brian Lavery's "Ship of the Line" offers a good overview of this. B |
wminsing | 07 Apr 2016 6:43 a.m. PST |
Man, I don't know how to add to Yellow Admiral's summary. EXTREMELY good capsule history of the topic. -Will |
KniazSuvorov | 07 Apr 2016 7:18 a.m. PST |
Dutch ships tended to be even smaller and more cramped than English ones, albeit with lighter armaments. The heaviest Dutch cannon were 36-pdrs, and those were quite rare, partial batteries of them appearing only on the flagships. The Dutch armaments industry was smaller and far more haphazard than those of the other Great Powers, and it wasn't until at least the 3rd Anglo-Dutch War (1672-74) that some of their ships finally received uniform lower-gundeck batteries; before that, a mix of gun sizes on the same gundeck was common. The average Dutch warship only carried 24- or even 18-pdrs as their heaviest gun, and even then it was often only a partial gundeck of 6 or 8 guns. I can't find the source, but I seem to remember a story about a captured Dutch warship being rearmed by the English; the gunports were so close together that there wasn't enough room to mount larger guns the Royal Navy favoured. The most common lower-deck guns on English warships were "demi-cannon" (32-pdrs), and even ships with as few as 56 guns would usually have a full lower-deck battery of this size. Only the largest 1st and 2nd-rate flagships carried "cannon-of-7" (42-pdrs). The Royal Navy rating system during the Dutch Wars was based on the number of crewmen, rather than the number of guns; a 1st rate had 500+ crew, but might mount anywhere from 82 to 100+ guns, while a 2nd rate had from 300 to 500 crew, but could carry anywhere from 56 to 92 guns! Obviously there was a lot of overlap between different rates. NO navy at the time had anything like the standardized system of ship sizes developed by the French starting in the 1740s (and soon adopted by everyone else). The most common warships would have been smallish 2-deckers carrying 42, 44, 46, 48, 50, 52, 54 or 56 guns (Yes, they were all pretty much equally common). Ships with fewer than 40 guns still tended to have two partial gundecks, rather than the unpierced "gundeck"/berth deck and armed (upper) gundeck of the 18th-century frigate. The partial gundecks left more room for stores, giving these vessels the endurance to act as cruisers, but because they tended to be short, deep-drafted and crank, they were often actually slower and no more maneuverable than bigger warships. In terms of tactics, "line ahead" was developed by the English in the First A-D War, and adopted by the other major navies shortly after. The Royal Navy developed their Fighting Instructions prescribing line ahead during this period, but, unlike the 18th Century, the formation seems to have been seen at the time as a starting point for gaining a decisive advantage, rather than the sum total of tactics to be employed. Squadrons routinely maneuvered to break each other's line, and it took 100 years and Nelson before equally-dynamic line-breaking tactics again emerged. Strangely, it seems to have been the French who made rigid line-ahead fashionable; they had larger, more powerful ships, but a comparative lack of naval leadership, so a rigid formation played to their advantage. Battles tended to be much larger than their Napoleonic equivalents-- in the Dutch Wars and the early French Wars, fleets of 100+ warships were common, divided into three (or more) semi-autonomous squadrons. Slower ships, slower rates of fire, and more evenly-matched opponents tended to turn battles into ordeals of endurance as well; engagements could last multiple days, with the most heavily-engaged ships actually running out of shot during the fighting. Despite the huge numbers of vessels involved, the heaviest fighting always seems to have centred around the big flagships; there was no equivalent of the 18th-Century "74", and 3rd-rate ships (and their foreign equivalents) were "3rd rate" in every sense of the word--good for blasting away at their equivalents in the enemy line, but generally too poorly armed and/or manned to stand against a flagship, or to seriously affect a battle's outcome individually. As the focii of the action, the big flagships would usually engage each other, and would sometimes be captured and recaptured several times over the course of a single battle. Carronades didn't exist, so there was no quick way to clear an enemy deck, and a well-crewed ship might still be combat effective even after fighting several boarding actions. |
KniazSuvorov | 07 Apr 2016 7:31 a.m. PST |
Also: War Artisan offers 1/600 scale cardstock models for the Anglo-Dutch Wars. link There are some good pics of some of the Langton 1/1200 models, as well as some more random information on my old blog: link It looks like I only ever posted pics of about half the ships I built, but what's there still gives a good idea of what these things look like. |
Yellow Admiral | 07 Apr 2016 12:09 p.m. PST |
Man, I don't know how to add to Yellow Admiral's summary. KniazSuvorov did! Well said, sir, lots of good info in there. And now, a criticism: It looks like I only ever posted pics of about half the ships I built, but what's there still gives a good idea of what these things look like. Wait… what? Get to work man! Your work deserves to be displayed. The photos you did post are some of my favorites on the web, and I have them bookmarked so I can revisit them whenever I need inspiration. I really appreciate the commentary, too, and the scale shots of the ships next to keys and coins and fingers. I keep wishing you would either resume that blog or transfer that information to wherever you currently post. - Ix |
Yellow Admiral | 07 Apr 2016 12:43 p.m. PST |
Also: War Artisan offers 1/600 scale cardstock models for the Anglo-Dutch Wars. I am embarrassed that I didn't think to mention these. Duh! Thanks. It's also worth mentioning that since you print those models yourself, you can rescale them up or down a bit if you don't like 1/600 scale. Some others I totally forgot to mention: Tumbling Dice makes 1/2400 ADW period ships. I don't like them and don't have any, but they are worth mentioning. Navwar makes ADW models in 1/3000. I don't own any of these either, but some of these must be so small they're nearly invisible. - Ix |
StarCruiser | 07 Apr 2016 3:51 p.m. PST |
I think between YA and KS, the subject has been thoroughly beaten into shape… |
Yellow Admiral | 07 Apr 2016 4:26 p.m. PST |
Dead horses, thoroughly pulped, on request. At your service, sir. - Ix |
StarCruiser | 08 Apr 2016 6:59 a.m. PST |
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Kevin in Albuquerque | 08 Apr 2016 6:55 p.m. PST |
I wonder if anyone makes 1:600 galleons and man-o-wars. THey're pretty but small at 1:1200. |
KniazSuvorov | 09 Apr 2016 4:06 a.m. PST |
Looks like War Artisan is going to do galleons; there's a picture of a Spanish one in his 'Workbench' section. @Yellow Admiral: I've thought a few times about resuming the blog, but it never seems to happen--it's always pretty low down the priority list when it comes to hobby time. Maybe some day. |
Yellow Admiral | 09 Apr 2016 10:38 p.m. PST |
I can't blame you; I have abandoned web projects littering the World Wide Web. :-) - Ix |
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