A wreck

So there it is as we are passing over an old naval graveyard - the Wreck of the Deutschland. A nice smooth lean ship but a bit shallow in the draught, though the shipbuilders that laid her up at Kiel always said she was built for speed. A nice ship that was oft seen on the Northern Runs to the Hanseatic ports and then in later life on the runs to Saudi Arabia. Shame she went down at the end of her life with all hands on deck. The captain was a nice enough sort of chap, Captain JR Ewing O'Shaughnessy, but he was from Hannover and into all the usual trappings of German high careers, chiefly duelling with swords, so a bit of an old-fashioned aristo. Yes a sad day for General Blucher of the Prussian Home Guard and his uffiziellen such as Captain Siegen, and Captain Shallenberg, when they lost all overboard in the Wreck of the Deutschland. Shame. JR RIP.

Aha BC RIP

Ah now lads, ah now lads, there was a mighty Temeraire if ever I saw one, the HMS Chestleton RIP whose passing below the waves we commemorate this year. She was a mighty waggon built for speed, and there lay her eventual problem. Her crew were hyper-active, they did not believe in legitimate response, and the captain was always trying to anticipate the French rather than follow them and respond accordingly. A nice ship the Chestleton and much given to 21 gun salutes whenever she saw her queen, the young Victoria, and even in her young days, the young William IV. Ah yes a mighty warship retired often though somewhat prematurely when it was thought that steam fighting ships after the USS Lexington would take over the high seas, but she saw action here and there. An honourable member of the Royal Over-Seas League, the headquarters of which her captain, the young Cormac le Vincent and his chief petty officer Patricke le Venerable, often visited in London, and much given to supporting our Russian allies on the Royal Hannoverian Hanseatic League Run. Greenwich Naval College and the Chatham Shipbuilders will miss this one. HMS Chestleton RIP. Sad to see her go, but she was sunk when hit in the midships, just as she was approaching her home port of Milford Haven. Caught by a French skip. Anyway, a sad day for all concerned.

Capt Fitzroy

Ahoy there me hearties. Now there never was a finer captain on the seven seas than the old master of the brig called the SS Cheesle Hypertwin than the Lord high maestro on the rigging, Capt Fitzroy. A real smoothie from Greenwich Naval College himsell, and something of a songster too from a small village in Littlehampton near Wayward Heath. A grand stropping brusque of a petty officer and a great old boy at the soundings when plumblining the fathoms as the brig approached the terrible reefs and rocks off the sounds of Cornwall. Terrible reefs those ones lads, and many a small ship has been buggered by them there rocks to the south. Lulworth Cove and there's a jiffey. 

Ahoy there captains

The captains of the high seas are sure-fire types laddies and they know their men and their maps. Like the captains of industry back home. We all say that a good career at sea is an excellent prep for a career at home in industry. More ships.

And one for the high waves

Day is ended, dim my eyes, the journey long before me lies ... A valediction today lads on the high seas as we bury at sea the crew of the mighty and venerable warship the HMS Ivo Carnutensis, a lovely battleship and a big waggon of a gunship, but which alas was sunk without mercy by a brigade of French corvettes, the SS Elfgarcon and the SS Ignace de la Potterie that had lain in wait near the estuaries of London for the poor doomed maiden of the high seas. Yes, we take off our caps to day and sing olden songs of Tom Bombadil and Bilbo Baggins for these great ships. She didn't stand a chance, once the French got wind of her whereabouts. And a duplicitous lot the French are. Bonaparte laughing as ever, all the way back to his parisen coffee taverns, but we shall remember these great ships in a line that saw action against the interminable revolution of 1789. The HMS Hudson, the HMS Jordan, the HMS Hadden, the HMS Montmogery, the HMS Bede, the HMS Sharks, the HMS Toffalino, the HMS Lynch, the HMS Gilmore. Gawd bless 'em all.

Well there ye go

Ahoy there shipmates. It is not often that out here on the high seas one comes across a real slip of a French corvette that likes to sing along on the surface like a flying fish, but the SS Vincent Van Gogh has come into sight and I can her red enseign fluttering now clear as day through my telescope up here in the crow's nest. A nice little mover with a yaw and a keel that slices the water and leans to the left in high winds. Well done to all the petty officers on the decks of the SS Van Gogh. A nice mover. And a nice lean to the left.

Hoist the stars and stripes mateys

Aha there lads, here we are on the high seas, and there is a ship over yonder that is having a right old party, what with a few sailors and their concertinas, and that ship, saving your pardon as I am looking down me telescope, yes that ships is the Fair old English Rose, the Royal and V&A, where the shipmates are all partying on brandy and rum. Grand old time, ship drifting but at least the ship's company is having a great old craic. Martyrs Day, we are told. Or some such old English festival, probably from the time when the country was catholic, and the diktator Napoleon hadn't turned up, seized the imperial French crown from the bishops of Paris and ordained himself!!