England Becoming A Sea Power

Before Elizabeth’s reign, England had been little more than a northwest European maritime power. When Elizabeth I died in 1603 England was a much more significant force in sea trade and conflict than it had been in the 1550s. English ships became a regular presence from northern Russia to the Mediterranean, as well as in parts of the Americas, Africa and Asia.

Most ships were built for the purpose of trade and cloth was the main English export throughout the period. In the first half of the 16th century the English maritime economy was dominated by the trade between London and Antwerp. Economic and political crises led to the decline and eventual collapse of the Antwerp market in the 1550s and 1560s. This prompted English merchants to start looking further afield. From the 1550s onwards a succession of voyages to the more distant parts of Europe, as well as growing numbers of transoceanic enterprises, sought to open new markets and gain access to exotic, high-value goods. London merchants were the principal financiers of this expansion and the capital’s elite was probably the main beneficiary.

Ships were expensive to build and maintain and part-ownership was common because it helped spread the risk of financial loss from shipwreck or capture. Joint stock companies were set up to exploit trading possibilities, the most famous of which was the East India Company, created in 1599 with the aim of breaking into the valuable spice trade of the Far East. 

 Trade brought huge profits. Cargoes were generally worth a good deal more than the ships that carried them. Sometimes the difference was extraordinary. In 1588 the cargo of cloth and goods on a small, old Dunkirk ‘flyboat’proved to be 56 times more valuable than the paltry £15-worth of vessel that carried it.

 Elizabeth I’s ‘navy royal’ was never a large force. It did not have a permanent body of sea officers and mariners. As a result, the royal fleet relied on manpower from the ‘merchant navy’ and the support of merchantmen as additional warships, stores vessels and troop transports. Between 1585 and 1603 England and Spain waged a bitter maritime war that England survived rather than won. In 1588, out of some 226 English vessels mustered to face the Armada, only 34 were the queen’s ships. The rest belonged to her subjects.

the Invincible Armada(the Spanish Armada)

British ships

Francis Drake was chosen by Queen Elizabeth I of England in 1577 to command the first English voyage around the world. Drake was already a successful privateer (or sea pirate), and his voyage was designed to disrupt the command of the Pacific Ocean and the Americas enjoyed by England's rival Spain. He made a landing in 1579 somewhere on the Pacific coast of North America, and returned to England in 1580 to be knighted by the Queen. (Drake was the second captain to circle the globe -- the trick had already been turned by the expedition of Ferdinand Magellan in 1519.) Drake made a specialty of harrassing Spanish shipping and ports, and he was vice admiral of the English fleet when it defeated the Spanish Armada in 1588. He died during an expedition to the Caribbean in 1596, and was buried in a lead coffin somewhere near modern-day Panama.

Francis Drake

See below the famous Francis Drake Prayer, 1577. This is a sample of thinking that made England a grear sea power.

Disturb us, Lord, when we are too well pleased with ourselves,  when our dreams have come true because we have dreamed too little,  when we arrive safely because we sailed too close to the shore.

Господь, не дай нам стать слишком самодовольными,Когда наши мечты сбываются по причине своей малости,Когда мы возвращаемся домой живы-здоровы (лишь) потому, что не отплывали далеко от берега.

Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess, we have lost our thirst for the waters of life, having fallen in love with life,we have ceased to dream of eternity, and in our efforts to build a new earth,  we have allowed our vision of the new heaven to dim.

Господь, растревожь нас, когда, обретя богатства,Мы потеряем жажду к воде жизни и начнём влюбляться в жизнь,Перестанем думать о вечности; когда в своих стремлениях построить новую землюМы затуманим своё видение новых небес.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly, to venture on wider seas, where storms will show your mastery,where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.We ask you to push back the horizon of our hopes, and to push us into the future in strength, courage, hope, and love.This we ask in the name of our Captain, who is Jesus Christ.

Господь, дай нам больше отваги идти в дальние (широкие) моря, где штормы покажут нам твою власть и силу,Где будет невиден берег, а путь нам укажут звёзды.Просим: раздвинь горизонт наших надежд и воздвигни нас в будущем в силе, мужестве, надежде и любви.Мы просим этого во имя нашего Капитана, имя которому Иисус Христос.

world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake world map compiled by Francis Drake

World map compiled by Francis Drake