Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-10-31T23:32:39.553Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - On the High Seas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Martin J. Wiener
Affiliation:
Rice University, Houston
Get access

Summary

I perceived that the pennant was up for punishment. … I took it for granted that some aggravated offence, such as theft or mutiny, had been committed. … [Boatswain's mates took turns with the “cat.”] … The tails of this terrific weapon were three feet long, nine in number, and each of them about the size of that line which covers the springs of a traveling-carriage. … The last dozen being finished, the sum total was reported by the master-at-arms, “five-dozen!”

“Five dozen!” repeated Captain G – ; “that will do – cast him off. And now sir,” said he to the fainting wretch, “I hope this will be a warning to you, that the next time you wish to empty your beastly mouth, you will not spit on my quarter-deck.”

Captain Marryatt, Frank Mildmay: The Naval Officer (1829)

All Britons love the British sailor.

Lord Shaftesbury, in Parliament, 1873

The shocking scene imagined by Marryatt was set on a naval ship, during the Napoleonic wars, but captures the cruel possibilities of all life at sea before the Victorian era, where there was little check short of mutiny on the authority of merchant captains as well. An early testing ground of the “rule of law” beyond the United Kingdom was in the rapidly growing merchant fleet. Private ships flying the Union Jack constituted a liminal zone between Britain and her Empire.

Type
Chapter
Information
An Empire on Trial
Race, Murder, and Justice under British Rule, 1870–1935
, pp. 20 - 38
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • On the High Seas
  • Martin J. Wiener, Rice University, Houston
  • Book: An Empire on Trial
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511800665.004
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • On the High Seas
  • Martin J. Wiener, Rice University, Houston
  • Book: An Empire on Trial
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511800665.004
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • On the High Seas
  • Martin J. Wiener, Rice University, Houston
  • Book: An Empire on Trial
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511800665.004
Available formats
×