‘On its own, the history of these communities or island republics is of only modest, local interest, whilst its significance expands and takes on a brilliant radiance under the bright light of the histories of France and of England’. So claimed the French writer and intellectual, Eugène Pégot-Ogier, who was among Victor Hugo's circle during his exile on the Channel Islands, in his lengthy Histoire des isles de la Manche of 1881. As if to confirm the truth of this observation, the contributors to the present volume have directed the spotlight of international history onto the islands and uncovered the richness of their history as it played out on the stage of centuries of nearly permanent Anglo-French rivalry. Yet, by portraying the islands as passive objects of insight and meaning in this way, Pégot-Ogier arguably underestimated the value of the history of his temporary home. Situated between the two states, not just geographically but politically, economically, and culturally, the islands are more than just supporting actors to be brought out of the shadows. They cast a certain light of their own into previously unseen corners of the stage. Paradoxically, perhaps, it is precisely because they defy easy categorisation and seem to stand aloof from familiar political trends that the history of the Channel Islands can be employed to illuminate that of their more powerful neighbours. Indeed, the very smallness, isolation, and exceptional nature of the islands, which has traditionally shielded them from the critical gaze of historians, can be usefully held up like a conceptual mirror to put even some of our most cherished expectations and common assumptions about international history to greater scrutiny. It seems certain, therefore, that the academic interest in the history of these beguiling islands which has been sparked by the chapters in this volume will continue to grow in the future, shaping our understanding, not only of the naval and political relations of France and Britain, but of the nature of the very international system in which they operated.

War is the common theme that runs throughout the entire history of these islands. This is best illustrated by the naval history offered here by Colin Partridge.

Saint-Malo and Dunkirk were mainland France's most important privateering centres, and are referred to constantly by historians in France and elsewhere in discussions of privateering. Their reputation often obscures the activity of other ports, which are unfairly left in the shadows despite having also engaged in such warfare, with varying degrees of participation and success. The Norman port of Granville is one such example. It was heavily involved in privateering throughout the Second Hundred Years War, but is rarely mentioned as one of the major privateer towns.1 Its population was small and its port cramped, but Granville's location in the Channel, along with its history, maritime wealth, naval potential and entrepreneurial spirit, encouraged its inhabitants to take up privateering. What were the driving forces behind this decision? What were the characteristics of this activity? What were the results?

Granville's cod fishing and privateering within a distinctive geopolitical context

According to tradition, Granville was founded by the English during the wars of the Middle Ages, on the west coast of what is now the Cotentin Peninsula in Normandy, when they were planning to invade France. Mont-Saint- Michel blocked their way to Brittany and hindered their progress towards the centre of the kingdom. Unable to capture it, in 1439 the English bought the almost uninhabited cliff of Cap Lihou. This rocky promontory, jutting out westwards into the sea only a few kilometres from Mont-Saint-Michel, offered an easily defendable position and a firm base for future operations. In 1440, they reinforced an enclosure on top of the cliff. To protect themselves from the possibility of the French returning, a deep trench was dug across the isthmus to the east that connected the peninsula to the mainland. Finally, they forced many in the surrounding area into the new enclosure (frontispiece). The English thereby created Granville, both as a stronghold and a town. The occupation did not last, however, and the town was taken three years later by the knights of Mont-Saint-Michel.

Thereafter, the town and its port grew in importance. Its inhabitants engaged in coastal shipping and oyster, freshwater and cod fishing. At the end of the seventeenth century, it seems its population was small. The commissioner general of fortifications, Vauban, stated in a report drawn up

Beginning in the late 1780s the strategic geography of the English Channel and Western Approaches would be fundamentally altered by the construction of large artificial harbours, extending existing ports into deep water and enhancing their security against wind and tide. While Cherbourg, Plymouth and Holyhead pre-dated steam shipping, later works at Dover, Portland and Alderney and French harbour upgrades at St Malo, Granville, Dunkirk and Calais, were influenced by the prospect that future wars in the Channel would be fought by steam ships. Steam navigation posed a particular challenge for the Channel Islands, which lacked the local capital to acquire and operate steamers, and the floating harbours needed to operate them efficiently. While some islanders tried to persuade the British Government to build such harbours, the new technology significantly reduced the Islands’ offensive strategic potential. After 1830 local naval operations would be shaped by steam, not small sailing vessels. Island privateering was no longer a significant asset, but the Islands remained critical to commanding the Channel. Their security became a national priority and required new harbours.

The Channel resumed its central place in British grand strategy after the 1814−15 Treaties of Paris and Vienna, where British diplomacy helped shape a European system to resist French expansion in Europe, while the Waterloo campaign demonstrated how the Castlereagh/Wellington diplomatic and strategic ‘System’ worked. With France constrained by the 1815 borders the only significant strategic threat it could pose to Britain would be against merchant shipping, especially at the focal point in the Channel and Western Approaches. As all French regimes between 1815 and 1870 attempted to secure domestic support by overturning the Vienna Settlement, these attempts frequently reduced Anglo-French relations to diplomatic crises and arms racing. It would be against the background of heightened tension that Britain developed a series of new naval stations to support steam warfare in the Channel, specifically to counter the emerging naval base at Cherbourg.

The Channel Islands remained a critical element in this response. In late 1830 former Prime Minister Wellington became anxious about their security, fearing a ‘Revolutionary’ French government would use war to maintain domestic credibility, encouraged by a francophile Whig administration that deliberately weakened links with Austria, Prussia and Russia, which had hitherto restrained France, and secured Britain's vital interests in Europe, keeping Belgium and the River Scheldt outside France.

Within French naval strategy between 1815 and 1906, the Channel Islands were part of France's global rivalry with London. Several elements of this strategy and the interactions between them merit consideration. France is an amphibious nation. Both continental and maritime, it has faced numerous landand sea-based threats, from both within Europe and overseas. The country is surrounded by sea on three sides and also has to deal with the lock that is Gibraltar. The unifications of both Italy and Germany, followed by the signing of the Triple Alliance, increased the complexity of this geostrategic challenge. France's strategy involved prioritising and identifying links among the threats posed by Germany, Britain and Italy. It was only Italy's neutrality and then the Entente Cordiale that would change matters in the early twentieth century.

This complexity could be seen in the English Channel when it came to selecting a main naval base within it. While siting the base at Dunkirk would have made it possible to block the Hochseeflotte (hereafter HSF)'s entry into the Channel from the north, as well as posing a threat to London, the port was isolated and exposed. At the western end, Brest was well protected, but it was far not only from France's industrial base but also from the British centre of gravity and the Dover Strait. Meanwhile, Cherbourg, right in the middle of the Channel, was isolated from Paris until the mid-nineteenth century and vulnerable to the Royal Navy and the HSF. This vulnerability was increased by the development of Portland and Alderney. The narrowness of the central section of the Channel meant that fluidity was limited: British bases were close, navigation difficult and the legal framework restrictive. The configuration of the waters and the coastline favoured denial of access and raids on commerce or bases. This combination of limiting factors was reinforced by the technological revolutions that came along after 1850. The debate, which mainly concerned coastal protection and commerce raiding, was arbitrated by civil society because naval policy partly escaped experts’ control owing to statements made in parliament and the press. Many actors therefore contributed to the development of naval strategy.

Introduction

The primary role of the Royal Navy in the First World War was to protect seaborne commerce and communications, and there was no greater challenge to the flow of oceanic trade than Germany's unrestricted submarine campaign of 1917–18. Since the wars with Louis XIV the protection of trade had been critical to England's national survival, with the Western Approaches and English Channel the decisive maritime theatres. William III crossed the English Channel at the beginning of the War of the League of Augsburg, and the privations of Spanish, Dutch and French commerce raiders during the War of Spanish Succession were so significant that the newly created United Kingdom was forced to introduce compulsory convoys in 1707. The defence of trade was no less significant for the conduct of distant colonial campaigns during the Seven Years War, and the protection of merchant shipping necessitated a strict convoy policy during the American Revolutionary War. The Act of 1798 once again granted the Admiralty the power to enforce the convoy system on oceanic merchants, and indeed it was control of these vast supply lines, and the mobilization of capital and credit this enabled, that contributed so profoundly to victory against Napoleon's Empire.

The legal basis for the protection of oceanic trade, and the rules of engagement for maritime warfare, became codified during what Stephen Cobb described as the new ‘liberal age of free trade’ that emerged in the decades following the Congress of Vienna. Privateering was abolished by the 1856 Declaration of Paris and the rights of neutrals during a naval blockade reinforced by the 1907 Hague Conference and the 1909 Declaration of London. Warships engaged in trade interdiction were expected to follow prize law, necessitating basic consideration for the crews of captured ships and assuring the safety of passengers.6 By 1914 the Royal Navy's conceptualization of trade defence had transitioned from the traditional 18th century combination of convoy escort and close blockade to a geographically globalized laissez-faire model that provided for the security of oceanic communications and trade routes through command of the sea.