Greenwich Hospital was a permanent home for retired sailors of the Royal Navy, which operated from 1692 to 1869. Its buildings, initially Greenwich Palace, in Greenwich, London, were later used by the Royal Naval College, Greenwich and the University of Greenwich, and are now known as the Old Royal Naval College. The word "hospital" was used in its original sense of a place providing hospitality for those in need of it, and did not refer to medical care, although the buildings included an infirmary which, after Greenwich Hospital closed, operated as Dreadnought Seaman's Hospital until 1986.
Impressment, colloquially "the press" or the "press gang", is the forced conscription of men into a military force, especially a naval force, via intimidation and physical coercion, conducted by an organized group. European navies of several nations used forced recruitment by various means. The large size of the British Royal Navy in the Age of Sail meant impressment was most commonly associated with Great Britain and Ireland. It was used by the Royal Navy in wartime, beginning in 1664 and during the 18th and early 19th centuries as a means of crewing warships, although legal sanction for the practice can be traced back to the time of Edward I of England. The Royal Navy impressed many merchant sailors, as well as some sailors from other, mostly European, nations. People liable to impressment were "eligible men of seafaring habits between the ages of 18 and 55 years". Non-seamen were sometimes impressed as well, though rarely. In addition to the Royal Navy's use of impressment, the British Army also experimented with impressment from 1778 to 1780.
Chatham Dockyard was a Royal Navy Dockyard located on the River Medway in Kent. Established in Chatham in the mid-16th century, the dockyard subsequently expanded into neighbouring Gillingham; at its most extensive two-thirds of the dockyard lay in Gillingham, one-third in Chatham.
Pensions in the United Kingdom, whereby United Kingdom tax payers have some of their wages deducted to save for retirement, can be categorised into three major divisions - state, occupational and personal pensions.
Able seaman is a military rank used in some navies.
The King's shilling, sometimes called the Queen's shilling when the Sovereign is female, is a historical slang term referring to the earnest payment of one shilling given to recruits to the armed forces of the United Kingdom in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, although the practice dates back to the end of the English Civil War. To "take the King's shilling" was to agree to serve as a sailor or soldier in the Royal Navy or the British Army. It is closely related to the act of impressment. The practice officially stopped in 1879, although the term is still used informally and there are some cases of it being used still in the early 20th century, albeit largely symbolically.
A Royal Naval Hospital (RNH) was a hospital operated by the British Royal Navy for the care and treatment of sick and injured naval personnel. A network of these establishments were situated across the globe to suit British interests. They were part of the Royal Naval Medical Service. The British Army equivalent was a Military Hospital, and in the 20th century a number of RAF Hospitals were also established.
Sheerness Dockyard was a Royal Navy Dockyard located on the Sheerness peninsula, at the mouth of the River Medway in Kent. It was opened in the 1660s and closed in 1960.
Deptford Dockyard was an important naval dockyard and base at Deptford on the River Thames, operated by the Royal Navy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. It built and maintained warships for 350 years, and many significant events and ships have been associated with it.
A Greenwich Pensioner was the Naval equivalent of a Chelsea Pensioner.
HMS Undaunted was a wooden screw frigate, the fifth ship of the name to serve in the Royal Navy.
HMS Doterel was a Doterel-class sloop launched by the Royal Navy in 1880. She sank at anchor off Punta Arenas after an explosion on 26 April 1881. Her loss caused the deaths of 143 crew members, and there were 12 survivors. She was en route to join the Pacific Station. Her loss was initially the source of much speculation. Causes considered included an attack by the Fenians, a lost torpedo, and a coal gas explosion. An enquiry in September 1881 concluded coal gas was the cause.
HMS Active was a 28-gun Coventry-class sixth-rate sailing frigate of the Royal Navy, launched in 1758. She was one of the captors of the Spanish ship Hermione. After Hermione surrendered, her captors found that she carried a large cargo of gold and silver that would lead to the greatest single amount of prize money awarded to the crew of a British warship.
During the early 17th century, England's relative naval power deteriorated; in the course of the rest of the 17th century, the office of the Admiralty and Marine Affairs steered the Navy's transition from a semi-amateur Navy Royal fighting in conjunction with private vessels into a fully professional institution, a Royal Navy. Its financial provisions were gradually regularised, it came to rely on dedicated warships only, and it developed a professional officer corps with a defined career structure, superseding an earlier mix of sailors and socially prominent former soldiers.
The Glorious Revolution of 1688 rearranged the political map of Europe, and led to a series of wars with France that lasted well over a century. This was the classic age of sail; while the ships themselves evolved in only minor ways, technique and tactics were honed to a high degree, and the battles of the Napoleonic Wars entailed feats that would have been impossible for the fleets of the 17th century. Because of parliamentary opposition, James II fled the country. The landing of William III and the Glorious Revolution itself was a gigantic effort involving 100 warships and 400 transports carrying 11,000 infantry and 4,000 horses. It was not opposed by the English or Scottish fleets.
The Navy Office was the government office responsible for the civil administration of the British Royal Navy from 1576 to 1832. It contained all the members of the Navy Board and various other departments and offices. The day-to-day business of the Navy Office was headed by the Clerk of the Acts from 1660 until 1796. When this position was abolished duties were assumed by separate committees for Accounts, Correspondence, Stores, Transports and Victualling presided over by the Comptroller of the Navy. The Navy Office was one of two government offices that were jointly responsible for directing naval affairs. In 1832 following reforms of the naval service the Navy Office was abolished and its functions and staff taken over by the Admiralty.
The Navy Pay Office also known as the Navy Treasury was established in 1546. The office was administered by the Treasurer of the Navy, and was semi-autonomous of the Navy Office. It existed until 1835 when all offices and accounting departments of the Royal Navy were unified into the Department of the Accountant-General of the Navy. The Navy Pay Office received money directly from HM Treasury.
The Sixpenny Office was one of the British admiralty's smaller offices. Established in 1696, it was originally based at Tower Hill, London. The office's main responsibility was the collection of six pence from all serving seaman's wage's monthly that was used to fund Greenwich Hospital's provision of care for sick and aged seaman..
The Paymaster of the Marines was established in 1831 following the abolition of Marine Pay Department within the Admiralty that had its own paymaster for the marines. This office holder was part of the Navy Pay Office under the Treasurer of the Navy. The post holder was responsible for processing payments to the Corps of the Royal Marines until the Navy Pay Office was abolished in 1832 as part of reforms of HM Naval Service.
A ship's mast stands on the site of the Royal Navy shore establishment HMS Ganges at Shotley, Suffolk in England. It was formerly used for mast climbing practice when the site was a training centre for boy seamen. Every boy at the school had to climb partway up the mast to qualify. On ceremonial occasions the mast would be manned by a team of boys standing on various parts. The one who stood on the truck at the top was known as a "button boy". In 1928 one of the boys climbing the mast died after falling and missing the safety net at its base. Ganges closed in 1976 and the mast afterwards fell into disuse, though it is a grade II listed structure. There are proposals to restore the mast as part of a redevelopment of the site for housing.
