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Even though modern political correctness and deliberate revisionism might sometimes regard a pride in our nations past as a highly negative and backward looking attitude to take, it is still sometimes hard to believe that less than a hundred years ago, the relatively small collection of islands that now form the modern United Kingdom were once at the centre of a global Empire that extended its reach throughout much of the known world. Reportedly the largest Empire that has ever existed throughout human history, at its height the British Empire was reported to have ruled over some four hundred and fifty millions subjects, a quarter of the world’s population at the beginning of the 20^th century and controlled an estimated thirteen million square miles of territory, around 25% of the world’s total land surface.

However, within half a century of having reached the absolute zenith of its power, much of its power and prestige, along with virtually all of its larger overseas possessions were gone and the vast British Empire, which had evolved and been fought over for well over four hundred years, began to pass into a collective memory. Perhaps even more sadly, over the past sixty years, even these national recollections and celebrations of Britain’s glorious past have been almost entirely expunged from British national life for fear of being seen as racist, imperialistic or undemocratic, such is the overwhelming desire for our United Kingdom to be seen as a multi-cultural, egalitarian and forward looking modern state.  Even though Britain’s great and expansive Empire has long since been consigned to the history books, even today it continues to divide opinion, with some critics accusing it of being the root cause of modern day Africa’s political malaise, founders of the world’s first infamous concentration camp systems and the world’s first major exploiter of other nations and of the earths vast natural resources.

Clearly though, such criticisms are almost always seen from an entirely modern perspective, they take little account of how the world was, many decades or even centuries ago and should therefore always be treated with a great deal of scepticism, or even disdain. Applying 21^st century values, opinions and explanations to events which took place between the 16^th and 19^th centuries is patently absurd, given that the religious, military, political and cultural imperatives of those particular times were probably informed by prevailing late medieval values, more than they were by our more modern and educated ones. Additionally, it also seems to be a common and deliberate mistake, to link the indigenous peoples of Britain to the wider and much larger Empire that was in and of itself an entirely political and economic union, a creation which had little in common with lives, traditions, values and customs of the native populations of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales.

Although the Roman’s knew our islands as their province of Britannia, earlier Greek explorers were thought to have known them as “Albus”, meaning “White”, a name that was said to have derived from the sight of the white cliffs of Dover, which early mariners may well have seen as they approached Britain from the south by sea. This early Greek name is also speculated to be the origins for the later and occasionally used name “Albion”, which has often been associated with both the English and British nation. According to modern day geneticists, the very earliest inhabitants of Britain were the hunter gatherers and settlers who originated from both the Iberian Peninsula and from the Basque region of Europe, both of whom were thought to have been trapped by the eventual rise in sea levels that separated Britain from continental Europe, creating what we now call the English Channel and Irish Sea.

The Celtic influences that were native to England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland are thought to have their earliest roots within the Iberian and French regions, although over centuries these had been added to and supplemented by the languages and cultures of other migrants groups, such as the Picts, Gaels and numerous others, who eventually evolved into the pre-Roman native tribes of Britain such as the Ordovices, Silures, Brigantes and the Deceangli, the tribesmen who populated various regions of Britain in the centuries prior to the Roman arrival. In fact, throughout its long history, Britain was thought to have been occupied by an almost endless succession of foreign migrants, most of who arrived here in relatively small numbers, along with those who participated in the three major military invasions of the country, all of which have helped to shape the language, culture, character and traditions of Britain and its native peoples. The first of the military invaders were the Roman’s, who conquered much of southern Britain and Wales during the First Century AD and who through their northern defensive walls, helped to create and define the northern boundaries of Roman Britain, at the same time helping to mark the boundaries of the countries that would later become England and Scotland. During the Roman occupation of Britain, much of England, Wales and Southern Scotland were known to have come under legionary control, whilst Northern Scotland and Ireland remained outside of the Roman sphere of influence, allowing them to retain many of their original Celtic traditions, languages and customs. (continued)

Britain’s expansion beyond its own territorial waters is generally thought to have begun during the “Age of Discovery”, which is said to have started during the 15^th century, most notably with the voyages of John Cabot in 1497 and continuing with the likes of Drake, Raleigh and Cook in the following centuries. The seaborne exploration of the globe was said to have been preceded by entirely land based expeditions, from Europe through to Asia, many of which were led by Italian explorers, who were often privately employed by the heads of the various medieval Italian city states. The most famous of these explorers, Marco Polo, was reported to have travelled throughout Asia during the 13^th century and became a guest of the great Chinese leader Kublai Khan. His experiences, many of which were recorded at the time as personal travel logs were thought to have been read widely all over Europe and helped to give the impetus for other north European adventurers to explore the wider, but still relatively unknown world. 

As an island kingdom, which is surrounded by water on all sides; and with no direct land route to the European continent, British exploration of the lands beyond its native shores was thought to have been entirely limited by the naval technology of the age. Unlike its foreign counterparts, many of whom had ready access to the profitable eastern trade routes first laid down by the Mongol traders of the 13^th century, Britain was generally thought to be a consumer of the rare and exotic products that originated in the far east, rather than a supplier; and it was only with development of bigger and faster ocean going vessels, which finally allowed British merchants and traders to explore the wider world, seeking out new commercial opportunities. Another major factor, which was said to have helped inhibit the widespread exploration of the Asian trade routes, was thought to be their domination by the emerging Turkish Ottoman Empire in the late 15^th century, which was determined to protect its virtual monopoly of the valuable spice and silk trades, by preventing other competing trading nations from gaining access to these generally isolated manufacturing centres.

The first north European nation to attempt to break this Ottoman monopoly of the Spice and Silk routes were reported to be the Portuguese, who launched a number of seaborne expeditions, most of which were said to have been authorised and financed by their Prince, Henry the Navigator, at the beginning of the 15^th century. Prior to this, the Portuguese, in common with most other northern European countries were thought to have been limited to trading within their own territorial waters, as well as in the more northerly seas, which had been known to them and their predecessors for generations. However, with the ascendancy and insistence of their ruler Prince Henry, Portuguese seafarers were said to have pushed out from their traditional trading routes, discovering the Madeira Islands in 1419 and the Azores in 1427, both of which they subsequently went on to settle. Despite these new territorial acquisitions however, Henry’s main interest was thought to have been in gaining access to the highly lucrative slave and gold markets of West Africa, which were reported to have run through the western Sahara Desert and been controlled by a number of generally hostile Muslim states based in North Africa. By searching for alternative sea routes, Henry hoped to bypass these largely unfriendly Arabic tribes and still gain access to the lucrative markets of the Indian Ocean and the Far East. Having received permission from the Pope, to establish a trade monopoly on these newly accessed lands and market places, for his part, Prince Henry was said to have promised the Pontiff that he would ensure the spread of Christianity to the native peoples of these newly discovered lands, thereby helping to extend the church’s influence well beyond its traditional European kingdoms.

Within twenty years of having sent out his first ships, Henry’s explorers were said to have discovered a new sea route, which essentially by-passed the Arab Muslim states and created a new trade in both African slaves and native gold, bringing great wealth to their country and their royal rulers. Later, more extensive explorations by the Portuguese was thought to have seen them establish new trading posts in what is now both modern day Senegal and the Congo by 1482; and within another five years they were said to have discovered yet another trade route, this time around the southern tip of Africa, giving their country free access to the Indian Ocean and its limitless supplies of spices, silks and much, much more. Portugal’s Iberian neighbour, the kingdom of Castile, which later merged with the kingdom of Aragon to form what would later become modern day Spain, did not begin to explore the wider world until the latter part of the 15^th century, although up until 1492 was regularly trading in African goods with the Moorish kingdom of Granada. However, following the conquest of Granada by the merged Spanish kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, virtually all of this trade was reported to have been lost, leaving the rulers of Spain with little option but to begin looking for their own new trading opportunities, much the same as Portugal had done more than half a century before. As a result of their need to replace these earlier trading routes, the joint monarchs of Spain, were said to have funded a number of expeditionary voyages, including that of Christopher Columbus, which they hoped might give them access to Asia from the west, rather than from the traditional eastern routes that were dominated by their Portuguese neighbours. However, rather than discovering a new route to the well known Asian markets, Columbus ultimately discovered a “New World”, which eventually evolved into the modern day regions of South, Central and North America, which in later years would be fought over by most of Europe’s leading nation states. (continued)

The historical relationship between Britain and Ireland is a famously troubled one and can generally be seen in the context of certain notable events, beginning with the Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169, which was reported to have been led by the Cambro-Norman knight Robert de Clare. At the same time that the east of Ireland was said to have been held by both Norman Lords and English monarchs, large parts of western Ireland was said to have remained in the hands of a number of native Irish Princes, often Catholics, who were constantly at odds with the predominantly Protestant English Crown. Inevitably the national, cultural and religious differences of the parties were thought to have led to direct military conflict between the two sides, as each fought for dominance over the other, finally leading to the Tudor invasion and settlement of Ireland during the most of the 16^th century. It was said to be these same underlying causes that would ultimately lead to centuries of simmering discontent and warfare between Britain and Ireland, cause the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people on both sides of the argument, a conflict which would only finally be resolved at the start of the 20^th century, some 400 years later.

According to most sources, prior to 1169 the English people were said to have had little interest, or indeed involvement in Ireland, save for the regular commercial trading that took place between the two countries, which was thought to have been in existence for hundreds of years. It was only in the second half of the 12^th century that a Norman nobleman called Richard de Clare or “Strongbow” was said to have arrived there, following an invitation from an Irish chieftain called MacMurrow, whose lands had been stolen from him, thereby creating a situation that would inevitably lead to English involvement in that country. It was said to be in response to De Clare’s arrival in Ireland that the English King, Henry II, led his own military expedition to the island in 1171, ostensibly to contest the Norman noblemen’s rights to rule there. It has also been suggested that Henry was also attempting to pre-empt any future challenge to his own rule in England, although having overcome De Clare and his allies, Henry was then reported to have passed his new Irish territories to his younger son Prince John, the brother of King Richard I, who later ascended to the English throne. Even though Prince John was widely recognised and accepted as the King of Ireland by most of the subject Irish people and English settlers, his royal possessions there were said to have been almost entirely limited and restricted to the east coast of the island, from Waterford in the south to Ulster in the north, whilst the western part of the country continued to be held by a number of native Irish Lords as individual Petty Kingdoms, who paid homage to their overlord Prince John. According to some records, John was said to have visited Ireland on at least two occasions, in 1185 and 1210, during which time he was reported to have campaigned against the native Irish rulers and where possible sought to replace them with his own candidates.

The last few remaining Norman interests, which continued to exist within Ireland, were thought to have continually clashed with the native Princes there, each side trying to strengthen their position at the expense of the other. From the middle of the 13^th century there was reported to have been nearly a century of intermittent hostilities between the two parties, which resulted in large swathes of English and Norman lands falling back into the hands of the Irish families who had owned them prior to De Clare’s invasion of 1169. The English and Norman communities were said to have been further weakened by the arrival of the Black Death in Ireland in around 1348, which saw the remaining settlers from both groups pushed farther back to well defended enclaves along the east coast of the country, essentially handing even more lands back to the native Princes, who were only too happy to exploit the relatively unexpected withdrawal of these foreign forces. By the end of the 15^th century, English control over Ireland was thought to have been virtually non-existent, save for the immediate areas outside of the heavily defended English port enclaves, which the English had just about managed to retain control of. With England itself divided by the War of the Roses, many of their former possessions in Ireland were reported to have reverted back to the control of the native Irish lords, especially the Fitzgerald family, the historic Earls of Kildare, who were said to have controlled much of the country by force of arms. Along with a number of other subordinate Irish families, much of Ireland was thought to be under Irish control, although the English authorities in Dublin remained in place, albeit in a non-functioning form. Perhaps because of this, in 1494 the English was reported to have withdrawn its government ministers from Ireland altogether and decided to administer its foreign possessions from London.      

Full English involvement in Ireland was only thought to have started in the first half of the 16^th century, during the reign of King Henry VIII, whose Reformation of the church in England, immediately put him at odds with the Catholic Church of Rome, which was then the predominant faith in Ireland, therefore making its native Roman Catholic population a potential threat to Henry’s new Protestant Church. Beginning in 1536, successive and largely Protestant English monarchs were said to have waged a series of often brutal and religiously inspired military campaigns against the Catholic majority in Ireland, culminating in the colonisation of captured native Irish lands by tens of thousands of English Protestant settlers, whose allegiance was first and foremost to the English Crown and its associated Anglican Church. This extended period of religious and military conflict, running from 1536 to around 1691, is often referred to as the “Plantation of Ireland”, a process that saw tens of thousands of both English and Scottish settlers forcibly introduced into Ireland, generally at a direct cost to the native Roman Catholic peoples and ultimately leading to generations of sectarian violence, which remains there even through to the present day.  King Henry’s decision to re-conquer Ireland in 1536 and bring that country back under full English control was not just because of different religious beliefs, but was also said to have been caused in part by the Fitzgerald’s decision to employ Burgundian troops in Ireland to help maintain control of the country. In conjunction with the arrival of this foreign mercenary force, the Irish leader’s reported decision to anoint one Lambert Simnel as the de facto King of England in 1487, undoubtedly made it imperative for Henry to suppress all of Ireland, not least to ensure that they could not be used as a base for a foreign invasion of England, then or in the future. (continued)

The British Empire’s active participation in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, which saw millions of Black Africans forcibly transported from their homelands to the Americas, where they were simply sold as chattels, is undoubtedly one of the darkest and least honourable episodes of Britain’s long and generally distinguished history. Commonly used to undermine Britain’s enormous and undoubted contribution towards creating the modern world that we all now inhabit, along with the supposedly wholesale destruction of numerous native societies, the capture, imprisonment, transportation and abuse of millions of Black Africans, remains first and foremost the biggest single charge laid against the founders of Britain’s great Empire. Interestingly however, those who are generally quick to point to Britain’s early and extensive involvement in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, appear to be reluctant to publicise the fact that it was Britain, which ultimately played a leading role in helping to outlaw the generally barbarous trade by the first half of the 19^th century.

It is also perhaps worth noting from the outset that slavery, in one form or another, is known to have existed throughout much of the ancient world and was reported to have been a common feature of most of the great human civilisations of the past, from the Greeks to the Romans, from the Persians to the Mongols. Even in Western Europe, the Roman legions were reported to have regularly enslaved hundreds of thousands of people from the territories that they conquered, often transporting them against their will to the various villas, houses and amphitheatres of Rome, where they would serve out their days for the comfort or amusement of the Roman elite, yet few historians are thought to be critical of that fact. Even after the fall of the great Roman Empire, slavery was said to have continued within numerous individual states and countries, where captured prisoners of war, or the indigenous population were simply sold into slavery, often being transported to slave markets in North Africa and the Middle East, where the buying and selling of human cargoes, was reported to have been a relatively commonplace event. In Britain, as elsewhere in Western Europe, large numbers of its native peoples, who were conquered by the likes of the Barbary Corsairs, Mongols, Anglo Saxons and even the fearsome Vikings were all thought to have been stolen away from their family, friends and homelands to be sold into permanent servitude in foreign lands, where strange languages and unknown customs were thought to have surrounded them for the remainder of their lives.

Even before, during and after the Roman settlement of Western Europe, large numbers of slaves were reported to have been taken from the countries that had been invaded by the legions of Roman, principally to serve the citizens of Rome or the Empire’s other great cities, who regarded the ownership of slaves, as an obvious indication of their own personal wealth and status. It has even been suggested by some historians that up to 25% of the entire population of the vast Roman Empire were slaves, including those convicted of debt, prisoners-of-war, orphans and the children of slaves, who by their very birth were automatically delivered into slavery. The Romans themselves were said to have inherited the idea of slavery from the earlier Greek Empire, who undoubtedly inherited it from even earlier peoples and Empires that had existed hundreds, if not thousands of years before the Greek Empire ever came into being. For both the Greeks and the Romans, slavery was not only an economic imperative, but was also thought to have become an essential part of their social structure, as in the case of the gladiators who fought in their arenas, the prostitutes who serviced their troops and the personal sex slaves who were owned by individual citizens. According to early Roman law, a slave was said to have been defined as anyone whose mother was a slave, anyone that had been captured in battle, or anyone who sold themselves into slavery, in settlement of a debt. Significantly, even early Christian leaders of the time, rather than attacking the concept or practice of slavery, were known to have supported it, telling their followers who were slaves to “obey their masters and dedicate their suffering to God”, suggesting that their enslavement was both a common and entirely legal process that the early church had little interest in overturning.

With the almost inevitable demise of the Roman Empire, much of Europe was then reported to have descended into chaos, with weaker countries exploited by their much stronger neighbours, a part of which would have involved their populations being snatched away to be sold in the thriving slave markets of the east, or within the aggressor nations own territories. In addition to the generally domestic western raiders, like the Anglo Saxons and Vikings, most of Europe’s leading western nations were thought to have been ravaged by marauding bands of sea borne Arab slave traders who would attack coastal communities on a fairly regular basis, robbing, burning and stealing away their citizens, particularly women, who would be carried away to the eastern slave markets, to be sold as domestic servants, or worse still, as prostitutes or sex slaves. Even in England itself, prior to the 11^th century, slavery was thought to have been fairly common, especially with the early Anglo Saxon’s who had invaded Britain in the 5^th and 6^th centuries. However, with the arrival of William the Conqueror in 1066, the practice was said to have been generally outlawed by the new English ruler, although even by 1086, the time of the Domesday Book, at least 10% of the native English population were still thought to have been enslaved in one way or another. Chattel slavery, as an outright form of ownership, was said to have been formally abolished in England around 1102, although bonded slavery, indentured service and serfdom were all thought to have continued after that date. Of the three forms of service, serfdom was said to be the most common, as it inextricably tied a common individual to the lands of a particular overlord or landowner, leaving them at the beck and call of that particular nobleman. Unlike a chattel however, serfs could buy and sell land, acquire personal possessions, get paid for their labours and generally enjoy many of the rights and freedoms that any free man might expect. This was thought to have remained the case throughout much of Britain’s history, with English Common Law, generally protecting the rights of the common man and curtailing the excesses of the nobles; and it was only in the 16^th and 17^th centuries that this protection was said to have been removed, but even then, only for those that were outside of Great Britain and Ireland. (continued)  

Most of the foremost western European empires that have existed throughout human history have known, used and appreciated the various exotic spices, herbs, oils and metals that man had learned to exploit from the very earliest times. Indeed, even at the time that Christ was reputedly born, gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh were reported to have been delivered to the newly born “King of kings”, by the three wise men, who had travelled across the Middle East, to welcome the new and legendary saviour of mankind.  Likewise, supplies of black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, ginger and turmeric were all thought to have been traded in various regions of the world, along with other equally unusual and highly prized materials, such as ebony and ivory, silks and other native textiles.

The Greek and Roman Empires were reported to have commonly used such items, as had the Persians and the Egyptians before them and it was through the trade routes established by these great human civilisations that such rare and valuable commodities came to be known throughout most of western Europe, even though such goods were typically too expensive for the everyday citizen to buy. Supplies of such prized goods was said to have become even much more limited and expensive following the decline of the Roman Empire, which allowed control of the Spice and Silk roads to fall into the hands of Arab traders by the 7^th century, creating supply monopolies that were tightly controlled by a generally small number of Islamic kingdoms, who were keen to exploit their monopolistic position to its very limit. By limiting supplies of these highly valuable commodities, to a small number of European traders, such as the Venetians, these Arab suppliers not only ensured high profit margins for themselves and their partners, but also that they continued to exercise almost complete control of the marketplace throughout the period. This situation was thought to have remained relatively unchanged for the best part of eight hundred years, until in the 15^th century, the Turkish Ottoman Empire began to emerge and evolve, allowing it to take control of the well established overland trade routes and putting in place, their own restrictive trading practices that limited the supplies and price of such goods being brought into western Europe. It was thought to be as a result of these restrictions and practices that the greatest European maritime nation of the age, the Portuguese, began to look for alternative, more direct trade sea routes, which would allow them to access these highly prized items at their source, effectively circumventing the Ottoman blockade of the eastern states and helping Portugal to become the main western supplier of these highly valued trade goods.

Although the Portuguese were known to have been exploring the world’s oceans for a number of years, it was only thought to be around 1498, when the explorer Vasco Da Gama first set out with a small flotilla of ships, determined to establish a trade route to the eastern states which supplied these highly prized products. Following traditional sea routes down the western side of Africa and around the southern tip of the continent, Da Gama and his small fleet were reported to have made their way into the Indian Ocean and in doing so established a Portuguese trading monopoly that was said to have lasted for the next century or more. It was thought another twenty years before Portugal’s larger Iberian neighbours, Spain, would set out to establish its own trading links with the eastern states, initially choosing to sail westward under the command of Christopher Columbus and Ferdinand Magellan; and on the way discovering the previously unknown American continent and the straits of Magellan, which provided access from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans. Beginning his voyage in 1519, Magellan was reported to have discovered the passage that allowed his ships access between these two great bodies of water and eventually reached the legendary “Spice Islands”, now marked by parts of modern day Indonesia and the Philippines, in 1521. The following year Magellan was said to have returned to Spain, his ship laden down with a cargo of Cloves and Nutmeg, his voyage deemed a huge financial success and with yet another new trading route established.

The Dutch were also thought to have sent a flotilla of their own ships to trade with the Spice Islands in both 1595 and 1598, although it was only the second of these Dutch missions, which was thought to have returned home in 1599, laden down with goods and spices from these new found lands. Although British traders had attempted to establish trade routes with the Indian Ocean region between 1583 and 1594, all of these journeys were reported to have been generally small-scale private enterprises, which met with only varying degrees of results. It was said to be in 1591 that a small fleet of British ships, including the Edward Bonaventure, which was under the command of Captain James Lancaster, finally succeeded in completing the voyage that ultimately put in place regular trading routes and which would eventually lead to Britain’s formal and wholesale involvement in the Indian sub-continent. Of the three ships that departed with Lancaster in 1591, only his own survived the arduous journey, returning to England in 1594, loaded down with foreign merchandise and colourful reports of the fabulous wealth that existed in these faraway lands. However, Britain’s first formally authorised voyage to the region of the Spice Islands was only really initiated by the formation of a joint stock company, called the Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading with the East Indies and the granting of its official Charter by Elizabeth I on the 31^st December 1600. The trading company was reported to have been established by a relatively small number of London’s leading merchants, all of whom were keen to investigate and trade with the foreign lands that they were slowly but surely becoming aware of. The man that the Company chose to lead its first official expedition was none other than Captain James Lancaster, who was tasked to lead the Company’s fleet of ships to Sumatra in 1601. Carrying a mixed cargo of gold, silver, lead, ironwork and textiles with which to trade, Lancaster was said to have returned home to England in 1603 with a cargo of mixed spices and other exotic merchandise, said to be worth in excess of a million pounds. Despite its later evolution into a semi-autonomous Imperial agency, it seems unlikely that there was ever any intention on the part of these early traders, merchants or mariners to actually conquer the region that they were destined for, but rather they had simply set out to build and develop new trading links with a previously unknown and unexplored part of their world. (continued)

From an entirely modern European perspective, the New World, or the Americas was first discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492, when during a voyage sponsored by the Spanish monarchs, Ferdinand II and Isabella I, he inadvertently landed on the islands that would later become known as the Bahamas, beginning what would eventually evolve into the widespread European colonisation of South, Central and North America, along with the islands of the Caribbean. However, although it was not generally recognised at the time, Columbus and the other western explorers who followed him, were not actually thought to be the first Europeans to have set foot on this new continent, with Norsemen or Vikings being largely credited with that momentous feat, particularly the explorer Leif Eriksson, who was thought to have discovered Newfoundland around 1000 AD, some five centuries before Columbus even sailed out of European waters.

The question of European discovery aside, the American continent itself, from Canada and Alaska in the north, to Peru and Chile in the south was reported to have already been inhabited by a multitude of native peoples, who according to some sources, were descended from a common mixture of central Asian settlers, who had crossed a long extinct ice bridge to the north and early travellers from the Pacific Ocean, who had used small craft to navigate their way to these new, largely undiscovered lands. Either way, for hundreds of years before either Eriksson or Columbus had ventured across the often wild Atlantic Ocean, the native peoples of these highly diverse lands, were thought to have evolved into their own disparate tribal groups, forming the great human civilisations of south and central America and the largely hunter-gatherer based tribes in the north. Although entirely distinct and separate from one another, all of these “Native American” peoples would ultimately share a common fate, once their lands had first been discovered by the 15^th century European explorers, with war, disease and exploitation being introduced in equal measure over successive centuries, bringing death and disease to many of these earlier native American societies.

The subsequent division of the Americas, into its southern, central and northern regions was thought to have been as much a result of timing, as it was about geography, climate or natural resources. When Christopher Columbus first landed in the New World in 1492, he immediately and instinctively claimed these new lands for his employers, Ferdinand and Isabella. This assumed European right to claim any and all such unknown lands was subsequently employed throughout much of the continent, with Spain, Portugal, England and France all simply claiming ownership of the various territories, with little thought or consideration being given to the native peoples who happened to live there. For Spain particularly, the discovery of these new lands, some five years before any of its main European neighbours and competitors, proved to be vital, as it gave their explorers and traders sufficient opportunity to identify the most potentially profitable regions which might be brought under their immediate and absolute control. Reportedly fascinated by tales of the fabulously wealthy civilisations which lay to the south of their new territories, within a relatively short period, the Spanish Conquistadors were said to have searched for, found and conquered the great Aztec Empire, taking control of much of modern day Mexico, along with large parts of Central America and establishing the roots of their later extensive Spanish American colonies. Although the Spanish and Portuguese were known to have been at the forefront of the colonisation of the Americas, they were thought to have concentrated much of their efforts towards the area of modern day South America and rarely ventured much beyond what is now the US State of Florida. It is also generally accepted that the main drive behind the exploration and settlement of the wider world by these two Iberian neighbours, was the will of their individual monarchs, who were keen to expand their power beyond their own national borders, gain greater personal wealth and spread Christianity throughout the wider, but still largely unknown world. This was completely different to the English, Dutch and French, who were said to have been simply driven almost entirely by trade considerations, rather than any sort of religious or imperial zeal. The Spanish were reported to have been trying to establish settlements in the north of the Americas as early as 1526, when they founded the colony at San Miguel de Guadalupe, although that particular settlement was said to have failed to survive largely due to the harshness of the environment and outbreaks of disease. Two years later they were thought to have tried again, this time in what is now modern day Florida, but that colony was said to have failed as well, ostensibly because of similar problems and the unfriendliness of the local native tribes. They were then thought to have tried to establish a third colony at Pensacola in 1559, but that particular settlement was reported to have been destroyed by a hurricane in 1561, a natural and recurring phenomena which continues to dog this particular region of the United States even today, although with generally less catastrophic results. The fourth historic attempt by the Spanish to establish a presence in North America was reported to have been a colony which was established in what later became North Carolina in 1567, but this settlement too was thought to have failed after it was attacked by hostile native Indian tribes in 1569. (continued)

English and the later British colonisation of the Caribbean and West Indies, was reported to have begun in a meaningful way on Bermuda, otherwise known as the Somers Islands, in 1612, some three years after the islands had first been claimed for James I of England by Admiral George Somers. This first round of settlement was reported to have followed in 1623 by the colonisation of St Kitts and three years later by the permanent settlement of Barbados in 1627, both of which later became part of the Caribbean islands known as the West Indies. Once St Kitts was occupied it later became the launch point for the further colonisation of other nearby islands, including Nevis, Antigua, Anguilla, Montserrat and Tortola, which itself became the base for the later colonisation of the Windward Islands and the wider Caribbean region. Although the English were said to have shared the colonisation and use of St Kitts with French interests, this situation only continued until 1713, when complete control of the islands were said to fallen into British hands.  However, following Britain’s withdrawal from the thirteen colonies of North America, which later became part of the United States, British former interests in that region were thought to have been relocated southward to its historic Caribbean possessions and northward to the territories which later became part of an independent Canada. England’s Caribbean possessions are said to be inextricably linked to the transatlantic slave trade, by virtue of the numerous sugar plantations that were reported to have been established in the region by various English/British landowners, merchants and traders, a subject that has previously been dealt with elsewhere.

Although the island of Bermuda was reported to have first been discovered by the Spanish navigator Juan de Bermudez in 1505, the man who gave the island its name, for much of the next century, between 1505 and 1609, it was said to have remained unoccupied, save for numbers of passing ships and shipwrecked sailors who were thought to have landed there to re-provision or repair their ships. It was only in 1609 that Bermuda was accidentally visited by Sir George Somers, an admiral of the English Virginia Company, whose ship the “Sea Venture” was reported to have been wrecked on the coast of the island, as it made its way across the Atlantic to the company’s American colony at Jamestown in Virginia. It was said to be Somers who formally claimed the island for the English Crown, which was later incorporated into the territories of the Virginia Company, with its first settlers arriving there sometime around 1612, making it the oldest inhabited English colony anywhere in the New World, apart from those that now lie within the United States. Ownership of the island was said to have passed to the Somers Island Company in 1615, although its control of Bermuda was thought to have been revoked in 1684, mainly because of the company’s insistence on the islands economy being almost entirely directed towards the production of tobacco, much to the local population’s annoyance. Rather than having the island’s economy turned over to entirely agricultural purposes, most of the local inhabitants were thought to have been employed within Bermuda’s traditional shipbuilding industry, which had been established around its plentiful supply of native juniper trees, which were regularly replanted by the islanders to ensure a ready supply of wood. However, despite their best efforts in this respect, such was the scale of the shipbuilding industries on the island that before long, the thick canopy of trees which had once covered much of the island, was said to have been exhausted and the population began to look for alternative industries to maintain the islands economy. The natural replacement for the historic maritime industry was thought to have been salt production, although local people reportedly also turned their hands to whaling, fishing, shipping and even piracy to maintain Bermuda’s local economy.

Following Britain’s forced military withdrawal from the territories that later became the United States, Bermuda was said to have become the British Empire’s main military base in the Caribbean and as such was developed to house a significant naval presence in the region. Not only did these new Royal Navy dockyards and military bases serve to protect Britain’s valuable possessions in the Caribbean, but also provided a naval station from where the Royal Navy could patrol the waters of the eastern seaboard of the United States, restricting the international trade between America and Britain’s greatest European enemy of the time, France. Not only did these restrictions limit the amounts of goods being transported to French ports, but almost inevitably had an adverse effect on the American economy, much to the irritation of the United States merchants whose businesses were slowly being strangled by Britain’s unilaterally imposed trade sanctions. With the Royal Navy being expanded to meet the increasing danger posed by the French forces of Napoleon Bonaparte, there was reported to have been a shortage of experienced seamen to serve aboard these Royal Navy ships, leading to the widespread use of pressgangs to make up the shortfall in manpower. Although the use of the pressgangs was known to have been common practice in Britain, the increasing habit of the Royal Navy in forcibly abducting foreign sailors from ships which had been intercepted at sea, was said to have become a source of great contention for the American authorities, especially as many of their own British born seamen, or former Royal Navy personnel, were quite often the target for such recruitment practices.

With the possible exception of the Indian subcontinent, which was said to have first been visited by English traders in 1591 and who established their first trading post there in 1608, many of England’s first attempts at exploration, or colonisation, was directed almost entirely towards the west and the comparatively undiscovered and unknown New World. The fledgling colonies of North America and the numerous islands of the Caribbean seem to have dominated English thinking for much of the 17^th and 18^th centuries, a national mindset that was only changed in the late 18^th century, following Britain’s enforced withdrawal from the eastern seaboard of the later United States.

Some seven years after Britain had failed to retain control over its thirteen North American colonies, on the other side of the Pacific, the British authorities were reported to have despatched a large scale expedition to the then relatively unknown lands that would eventually become known as Australia. Although British navigators had already explored the coastline and even landed at Botany Bay in April 1770, it was only in January 1788 that the first fleet of eleven British ships complete with some fifteen hundred colonists, eventually landed at Port Jackson in the territory now known as New South Wales. Despite the fact that these British colonists were thought to have been the first Europeans to try and settle these new and relatively unknown new lands, most modern historians accept that it was in fact a Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon, who had made the first authenticated discovery of the new continent as early as 1606, although he was said to have made no serious attempt to actually explore the hinterland of these new territories. His initial discovery was reported to have been followed some thirty-odd years later by the exploratory voyages of his fellow Dutchman, Abel Tasman, who not only mapped the coastline, but also explored the lands that became known as Van Diemen’s Land, which was later renamed Tasmania, in honour of their European discoverer. During his extensive expedition, Tasman and his fellow voyagers were thought to have discovered both New Zealand and Fiji, as well as making the first known notes regarding the native peoples of these various previously undiscovered territories. However, by the second half of the 17^th century and despite the fact that explorers like Janszoon and Tasman had generally mapped the coastline of the Australian continent, none of the main European states had been inclined to claim, let alone settle, these faraway lands. According to most sources of the time, this reluctance to lay claim to these new lands was thought to have been largely informed by the belief that they contained very little of intrinsic value, so therefore would not warrant the cost of launching a large scale naval expedition, or indeed the even more expensive task of colonising these supposedly worthless lands.

This general indifference to the new and unclaimed continent would undoubtedly have continued, had it not been for events elsewhere, which were thought to have been driven by the conflicting Imperial ambitions of Britain and France. This was particularly true in the second half of the 18^th century, when both European nations were said to have been faced with the prospect of losing their extremely valuable North American possessions, initially to one another and then finally to the American settlers themselves. Between 1756 and 1763 the two imperial neighbours had fought one another for possession and control of various territories, but most notably, for those in North America, where Britain ultimately proved to be victorious, gaining much of Canada as a long term result of the conflict. However, less than twenty years later, Britain and France faced one another once again during the American Revolution, when French, Spanish and Dutch forces were reported to have joined with the fledgling American colonial army to overcome British military control of the territories which subsequently became the United States of America. It was said to be in between these two great military conflicts that the British navigator James Cook, aboard his ship “Endeavour”, first discovered and landed at Botany Bay in April 1770, even though it would be almost another eighteen years before Britain decided to try and colonise these new lands. Despite a number of other European states having claimed the territories for themselves, none of them had actually committed colonists to settling their new possessions, which ultimately allowed Britain to lay claim to them, after nearly twenty years of prevarication and general disinterest. It is interesting to note however that an outline proposal for the colonisation of Australia was only completed and presented in 1783, the same year that the Treaty of Paris brought a formal and final end to Britain’s historic possession of its thirteen American colonies. Additionally, it was also a significant factor that in the following year, this first proposal for the colonisation of Australia was said to have been amended, to allow for convicts to be transported to these new lands, people who would have previously been sent to the Americas to serve out their prison sentences. (continued)

Before the latter half of the 18^th century and even into the first half of the 19^th century, the continent of Africa was almost entirely seen in terms of the human, animal and mineral deposits that could be drawn from its shores, often from the hands of the continents own native peoples who knew its dark hinterland far better than any European explorer. However, thanks largely to pioneering adventurers like David Livingstone, Richard Burton and James Grant, to name but a few, by the second half of the 19^th century, much of the continent’s interior had been mapped, the immense Nile River had been explored and the great inland lakes discovered.

One of the first European countries to try and establish a new colonial settlement on the African continent were said to have been the Dutch, through their agents, the Dutch East India Company, who were reported to have founded their Cape Colony on the southern tip of Africa in 1652 and established their main settlement of Cape Town in the same year. Initially founded as a supply station for the numerous Dutch ships that were travelling between Europe, India and Asia, over time, this original supply depot was thought to have grown into a much more formal settlement, with Dutch farmers and settlers helping to expand the physical limits and actual purposes of this first European outpost. In the first instance, the local African tribesmen, the Khoikhoi, were said to have welcomed the new settlers, trading with them and providing the passing ships with much needed stores of meat that were necessary for such long sea voyages. However, as time passed and the Dutch settlers became even more eager to expand their territorial holdings, so the Khoikhoi were reported to have been pushed further and further away from their traditional grazing lands, which not only led to armed conflict between the two sides, but ultimately the impoverishment of the native African peoples. With their tribal economy severely undermined by the incoming European settlers, before long many of the local Khoikhoi tribesmen were thought to have been employed by the Dutch colonists to undertake much of the manual work in their new farms and settlements, a situation not helped by the widespread use of black African slaves from other regions of the continent. For the next one hundred and forty years or so, the Dutch colony was thought to have expanded well beyond its original limits, being further strengthened and settled by other European migrants, all of whom began to be shaped and formed by their adopted African homeland, ultimately helping to create the unique white race that referred to themselves as Afrikaans. However, despite their geographical and cultural separation from their historic homeland in the Netherlands, it was said to have been events back in mainland Europe that would ensure that this group of isolated colonists would inevitably become embroiled in the military turmoil which was to affect much of Europe in the last few years of the 18^th century.

In 1795, Napoleonic France was reported to have invaded the seven European provinces of the Dutch Kingdom, causing fears within Britain that the new French Emperor might try to use Cape Colony as a staging post for an attack on British interests in India. In order to prevent such an action, British forces were reported to have occupied the Dutch settlement by sea later in the same year and after a brief military engagement took control of the region, primarily on behalf of the ousted Dutch monarch Prince William of Orange, who had been forced to flee to England. Nominal British control of the colony was reported to have lasted until 1803, when the region was temporarily returned to Dutch ownership, before being seized by Britain yet again in 1806, after which the decision was made to establish a permanent British colony in the area, with the town of Port Elizabeth being founded in 1820. Over the course of the next few decades, British settlement in Cape Colony was thought to have increased significantly, bringing with it the associated priests, evangelists and missionaries who were keen to convert the native peoples of Africa to their own particular faiths. Amongst this number, was a young Scottish missionary called David Livingstone, who had come to South Africa with the London Missionary Society in 1841, ostensibly to bring God’s word to the native peoples of the continent. However, despite having spent his first decade there, attempting to convert various native African tribesmen to his faith, Livingstone was thought to have been largely ineffective in this particular respect and so began to look for an alternative role for himself in Southern Africa.

Having arranged for his wife and family to return to Britain, around 1852, Livingstone and a small party of native bearers were reported to have begun an expedition north of Cape Colony, into what were then still relatively undiscovered lands, where men and animal alike often fell victim to any number of strange diseases, such as malaria, dysentery and sleeping sickness. Beginning his journey at Luanda, in what is now modern day Angola, on the west coast of Africa, Livingstone and his party were said to have travelled eastward, along what is now the Zambian and Zimbabwe border, traversing the Zambezi River and becoming the first western European to witness the raw power and natural beauty of Mosi-oa-Tunya, “the smoke that thunders”, which Livingstone subsequently named Victoria Falls. As he and his porters made their way towards Mozambique, on the east coast of the continent, the party were said to have encountered numerous native tribes, some of whom were highly suspicious of the party, but for the most part, were generally friendly towards Livingstone and his companions. As a committed Christian, Livingstone was said to have tried to introduce his beliefs to the various tribesmen that he met, but was always careful to avoid forcing his faith on them, for fear of alienating or antagonising them. Having successfully navigated his way across Africa, the young Scot was then reported to have returned to Britain, in the hope of raising additional funds for further exploration and development of the Zambezi River region, which he believed was the key to the future modernisation and civilisation of Africa’s generally unknown interior. (continued)

As an island race, the native peoples of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland have always relied on having access to and use of the seas and coastal waters of the North Atlantic, both as a source of food, as well as a means of establishing permanent trade links between themselves and the indigenous tribes of the European continent. One of the earliest and best known forms of maritime transport of pre-Roman Britain was said to have been the coracle, which was thought to have been reported by Julius Caesar following his first military expedition to Britannia in the middle of the first century. Generally constructed in the shape of a half walnut shell, the coracle was said to have been made of a framework of tied willow rods, which was then covered by an animal hide, coated with a thin layer of tar that ensured it remained waterproof. Used throughout the British Isles, these early crafts have come to be more commonly associated with Wales and Ireland, although they were also reported to have been used in the south of England, often by local fishermen who would travel along local rivers, casting their nets from their sturdy native river crafts. It also seems to have been the case that the construction of these earlier river craft differed from region to region, suggesting that although the coracle had undoubtedly evolved from a much earlier single source, over time each region’s boat builders had gradually adapted the crafts design to best suit their own watercourses and conditions. However, although the word coracle generally relates to the Welsh word “cwrwgl”, both the Irish and the Scots tend to refer to their own versions as “currachs”, even though according to some sources the “currach” was a much larger vessel than the coracle and therefore an entirely separate kind of boat. For some historians however, the distinction to be made between the two types of craft is that the coracle was generally an inland vessel, used primarily on inland waterways and rivers, whilst the larger, much more robust currach, was more suitable for coastal waters, being able to travel greater distances, in heavier seas and with larger numbers of crew.

However, one of the earliest sea going vessels ever discovered in mainland Britain is thought to be the craft known as the Dover Bronze Age boat, which reportedly dates from around 1500 BC and is deemed to be one of the most significant archaeological discoveries ever made in Britain. Along with three other Bronze Age boats, which were uncovered at Ferriby, Yorkshire in 1931, 1940 and 1963 respectively, all four of these early craft were said to have been examples of sewn plank vessels, designed to operate in and around the coastal waters of Britain, as well as the near continent. According to most informed sources, these craft, resembling punts, were thought to have evolved from the canoes and rafts that would have been the very earliest form of water transports designed by man. Described as being up to sixteen metres long, with a flat bottom and curved ends, like a traditional canoe, these early craft were thought to have been powered by a number of paddlers or oarsmen, who would have used the boats timber cross members to sit on. Constructed of several oak planks, often up to four inches thick, these were said to have been sewn together with yew or willow ties, with gaps between the shaped wooden planks being packed with moss, which was then kept in place with timber trims and tar, helping to make the entire hull reasonably watertight. Although it is unclear whether or not these early type of vessels employed masts and sails to propel them through the water, it is generally assumed, given the limitations of these early boats that sails were only employed when the wind was blowing in the right direction and for the majority of the time human muscle was required to move the craft forward in the water.

At the same time that the Northern Europeans were just beginning to develop their skills at boatbuilding in order to explore their own coastal waters, to the south and most notably in the region of the Mediterranean, a number of native kingdoms and peoples had already perfected the arts of shipbuilding and maritime commerce. The Greek, Persian and Egyptian Empires were just three of the great civilisations that were known to have developed advanced shipbuilding techniques, which allowed them to construct vessels that could operate within their own regional waters, either as commercial cargo carriers, or as armed warships which could be used to confront their traditional enemies at sea. However, apart from the exploratory voyages undertaken by some early Greek mariners, who were anxious to learn about the wider world, few if any of these new and advanced marine technologies were thought to have found their way into northern Europe, where the native peoples were thought to be still using the most rudimentary techniques and designs to produce their own kind of sea going vessels. Although it is virtually impossible to attribute individual ship designs to any particular nation, the next significant step forward in British ship design was thought to have occurred as a result of the Roman invasion of Britain in the 1^st century AD, with the introduction of the Empire’s various galley-type ships, themselves a derivation of the earlier Greek and Persian designs, which were thought to have sailed the Mediterranean for thousands of years. Including Liburnians, Biremes, Triremes and Hemiolia, the Romans were thought to have come to Britain with a vast array of sea going vessels, which ranged from heavy warships, to much lighter scout and cargo ships, all of which were intended to support their land forces and protect their new northern territories from any seaborne pirates who might try to attack them. Although the Roman Navy was never regarded as being equal to its land based forces, as its Empire grew, so it became necessary to confront the threat of the numerous sea based piratical societies, who regularly began to attack their outlying provinces and extensive trade routes, forcing Rome’s leaders to develop an effective martime deterrent. This was thought to have been particularly true for its most northerly European province, Britannia, which was not only a source of great wealth for the expansive Empire, but also became a regular target for the marauding seaborne raiders who repeatedly attacked its Romano-British settlements. In response to these ongoing attacks, a number of Roman naval bases were reported to have been established throughout Britain to house the Classis Britannia, including those at Dover, London, Lancaster and Chester, to name just a few, whose job it was to protect, not only the coastline of Britain, but also the valuable merchant ships that plied their trade in and out of the various Romano-British ports. (continued)

For much of the next fifty or sixty years, England’s navy continued to thrive, being engaged in not only protecting the country’s rapidly expanding trade routes, but also playing a full role in a number of European military alliances that were raised in answer to one or other conflict, such as the War of the Spanish Succession, which was fought between 1702 and 1713; and during which the navy captured the valuable Spanish territories of Gibraltar and Minorca. Over the course of the same period, English ships were reported to have made significant gains from the declining Spanish Empire, particularly in the transatlantic slave trade and by annexing several of the Iberian kingdoms historic territories, including Sicily and Panama, helping to progress England’s reputation from that of a European sea power to that of a world power, often at a direct cost to its immediate neighbours. The period was also marked by the Act of Union, the legislative treaty that formally united the kingdoms of England and Scotland, into the single nation of Great Britain and Ireland, essentially uniting these three historic kingdoms and their ancient crowns into a single political, commercial and constitutional state, a creation that continued to exist well into the first half of the 20^th century. However, the next great conflict that was thought to have tested the skills, ships and men of the British Royal Navy was the Seven Years War, which once again pitted French warships against those of Britain and that was notable for the British navy because of the death of Admiral John Byng, who was executed on the deck of his own flagship. A highly experienced naval officer, Byng was said to have been given the relatively straightforward task of reinforcing the English garrison at Fort St Philip on Minorca, which had been besieged by French troops in 1756, but without being given adequate ships, stores and men with which to complete the task. Rather than being provided with well equipped front line vessels and a large enough landing force of marines to undertake a successful attack on the island and the French forces there, instead, the unfortunate English commander was said to have been given a fleet of ten largely unseaworthy ships and then had his specially trained marines replaced by regular troops, who were ill-suited to face an opposed landing. According to some sources, Byng was said to have made his concerns known to his superiors, but despite his obvious reservations was ordered to carry out his orders regardless, in a sense helping to create the situation that almost inevitably ensued.

Sailing first to the British military base at Gibraltar, Byng was said to been refused additional troops by the Governor there, a fact that he was also said to have reported to the Admiralty, before continuing his journey to Minorca. Arriving off the coast of the island around the middle of May, on the 19^th of the month, the English commander was reported to have begun communicating with the trapped English garrison at Fort St Philip, before he landed any troops on the island, discussions that were said to have been interrupted the following morning when a French naval squadron suddenly appeared on the scene. Unfortunately, either through poor planning or just plain bad luck, as Byng ordered his flotilla to engage the French fleet, it was said to have approached at such a steep angle of attack that it left his leading ships exposed to enemy fire and without the support of the rest of the British battle line, an oversight that led some of his leading vessels being seriously damaged by French guns. As they watched these events unfold, it was reported that one of his subordinates suggested to Byng that he move his own flagship in closer, so as to entice the enemy fleet, but the English commander rejected the idea, for fear of inviting even greater damage to his own ships. Even though the French fleet was only thought to have been equal to his own, there was a suggestion that Byng appeared to be undecided as to the best course of action to pursue, causing a delay that ultimately allowed the enemy ships to simply sail away undamaged, leaving Byng and his vessels sitting off the coast of Minorca for the next four days. Even though the Admiral later reported that he had been trying to observe and communicate with the English garrison during that time, in the end he finally made the fateful decision to sail back to Gibraltar to have his damaged ships repaired, rather than attempting any sort of reinforcement of Minorca. Having successfully returned his fleet to Gibraltar, Byng was reported to be in the process of replacing those men who were sick or injured when news arrived from England that he had been replaced as the commander of the fleet and ordering him to return home, where he was subsequently placed in custody to face a court martial. It was said to be as a result of Byng’s reluctance to reinforce the garrison on Minorca that on the 29^th June 1756 the British troops there were forced to surrender to the besieging French forces, before being transported back to England.

The later humiliating loss of Fort St Philip on Minorca, undoubtedly caused a great deal of public anger to be levelled against Admiral Byng personally, although ultimately it was a series of changes in the Royal Navy’s own Articles of War that would prove to be so fateful for the English commander. Where in earlier times, a senior military officer might well have escaped serious censure by a board of his peers, the fact that junior officers might often suffer a death sentence, because of a senior officer’s orders or actions, who then escaped a similar fate because of his high rank, had caused the Articles of War to be much more stringently enforced by the various court martial panels. Charged with cowardice, disaffection and failing to do his utmost against the enemy, Byng was subsequently acquitted of the first two charges, but convicted of the third, in that he failed to pursue and confront the French fleet at Minorca, thereby protecting his own, a clear contravention of the Royal Navy’s own Articles and one that was punishable by death. Even though some members of the court martial had been inclined to recommend clemency for Admiral Byng, subsequent appeals to the monarch, King George, all proved to be fruitless, as the Royal Navy, Parliament and the King sought to find somebody to blame for the humiliating loss of Minorca. In fact, the only allowance made by the monarch was for the unfortunate Byng to be executed on the quarterdeck of a Royal Navy vessels, the HMS Monarch, which was stationed in the Solent, where on the 14^th March 1757 Admiral John Byng was led from below decks, allowed to kneel and make his peace with God, before being shot to death by a platoon of Marines. Throughout much of the country, the execution of John Byng was thought to have caused enormous outrage, especially as the public became increasingly aware of the poor condition of the ships that he had been provided with by the Admiralty. However, for others, the fact that such severe punishment was likely to be applied to any and all such servicemen, who failed to do their duty, or who showed cowardice in the face of the enemy, was said to have made the nations fighting men much more resolved to do their duty, as it was generally seen to be better to face the enemy, rather than face the gallows or the firing squad. (continued)

Prior to the arrival of the Roman army in the 1^st century AD, Britain did not have any sort of large standing military force with which to defend the country, but rather a collection of individual tribal groups, who would periodically fight one another in disputes over territory, mineral deposits, water rights, or other such valuable commodities. It was thought to be as a result of one of these inter-tribal disputes, between the Catuvellauni people and their neighbours, the Atrebates that eventually led to the military invasion of Britain by the legions of the Roman Empire in 43 AD. Dispossessed of his kingdom by the Catuvellauni princes, Caratacus and Togodumnus, who were seeking to extend their own territorial influence, the Atrebate ruler, Verica, was reported to have travelled to Rome, where he pleaded with the new Roman Emperor, Claudius, for military support in regaining his tribal homelands. Fortunately for the ousted British king, his pleas for military aid came at a convenient time, given that Claudius was reportedly desperate to stamp his own authority on a Roman Empire, which had been severely damaged by the actions of his predecessor, the Emperor Caligula, whose madness was said to have brought the empire to the edge of destruction.

Britain at that time was reportedly composed of a large number of regional tribes, including the likes of the Catuvellauni, Atrebates, Iceni, Silures, Ordovices, et cetera, who were commonly ruled by a single high born individual, or members of a particular household, or clan, whose decisions were often informed by their closest and most experienced advisers. Each of these pre-Roman societies were thought to have been slightly distinct from one another, with some having tribal capitals, whilst others did not, others produced their own coinage, whereas others relied almost entirely on barter, some tribes grew crops, others bred and traded horses. However, even though each of these peoples were thought to have regarded themselves as being entirely distinct from the other surrounding British tribes, many of the smaller, more peaceful tribes were thought to have shared a common enemy in the form of the larger, more militaristic societies, such as the Catuvellauni, who used their martial strength to impose their demands or their territorial ambitions on their smaller, weaker neighbours. Consequently, when the four Roman legions of Aulus Plautius landed at Richborough in Kent in 43 AD, many of the smaller tribes were reported to have generally welcomed their arrival, simply because the Roman’s military presence promised to curtail the expansionist policies of the stronger British tribes. It was precisely because of Britain’s fragmented and regionalised tribal system that the estimated forty thousand Roman legionaries, who arrived in the summer of 43 AD, were able to successfully land on the British mainland and establish their first bases there. According to most contemporary sources, both Caratacus and Togodumnus, the rulers of the Catuvellauni were reported to have been in the vanguard of the British resistance to the European invaders and despite lacking the military strength to confront the Roman legions directly, were said to have conducted a highly effective guerrilla campaign against Rome’s military forces, using hit-and-run, as well as a scorched earth policy to slow down the legion’s inexorable advance into the centre of the country. Unfortunately, the Catuvellauni princes’ decision to rely on the Rivers Medway and Thames to hold back the advancing Roman legions ultimately proved to be a mistake, as the highly experienced legionaries quickly overcame both natural barriers and were able to confront and defeat the British defenders, with Togodumnus reportedly being killed shortly after the battle on the Thames.

Unlike his brother, Caratacus was reported to have avoided being killed or seriously injured at the battle on the Thames, although with much of his army killed or captured by the Roman’s, he was said to have been left with little choice but to retire westward, in the hope of finding new military forces with which to resist the invaders. In the short term however, Aulus Plautius and his four legions were content to request Claudius to come from Rome, so that he could triumphantly enter the Trinovantes capital of Camulodunum (Colchester), at the head of his triumphant Roman army, where he was said to have received the submissions of eleven British tribal leaders, mostly from the south of the country, who were keen to show their allegiance to the new military administration. Having established their hold on the south east of the country, over the next four years the Roman legions were reported to have pushed further west, imposing client relationships with those willing to accept their rule and conquering those that were not. For those that were able to escape the Roman’s military expansion, almost inevitably they were forced back into the Welsh homelands of the Silures and Ordovices people, who controlled much of the territory there. Although both of these British tribes were reported to have resisted increasing Roman expansion within Britain, especially along their own regional borders, with what would later become known as England, it was only in 47 AD that the Roman authorities began to plan for the large scale invasion of the unconquered western regions of the country, when the new Roman Governor of Britain, Publius Ostorius Scapula, began a series of military campaigns against the peoples of Wales and northwest England. However, despite the experience and professionalism of his legionary forces, Scapula was reported to have found it difficult to suppress the fighting men of the Silures and the Ordovices, both of whom were said to have been led at some point by the renegade Catuvellauni prince Caratacus, who was thought to have organised British resistance to Rome, right the way through to 51 AD, when his forces were finally defeated at the Battle of Caer Caradoc. Although he managed to escape once again, following the battle, Caratacus’ wife and children were all reportedly captured by the Roman’s, who were said to have used them as hostages, in order to force the British prince’s surrender, but all to no avail. Unfortunately for the rebel prince, having fled Wales, he then made the mistake of fleeing north, to the kingdom of the Brigante’s and the court of their queen, Cartimandua, a client ruler of the Roman Empire. Duty bound to seize Caratacus, Cartimandua was reported to have ordered him chained and handed over to the Roman authorities, who subsequently arranged for the rebel prince and his family to be taken to Rome in chains, where Caratacus would be publicly displayed, before being executed. However, according to the Roman historian Tacitus, the British prince was permitted to make a speech before the Senate, which so impressed the Roman Emperor Claudius that Caratacus and his family were released from their imprisonment and allowed to settle in Rome, where they were said to have remained for the rest of his life. (continued)