0:00:05 > 0:00:07On a summer's day in 1690,
0:00:07 > 0:00:10a Sussex merchant called Samuel Jeake
0:00:10 > 0:00:14looked out towards the Channel from his home in Rye.
0:00:16 > 0:00:20What he saw filled him with dread.
0:00:20 > 0:00:25English warships fleeing pell-mell across the horizon.
0:00:25 > 0:00:29The country had been at war with France for two years and people in this town
0:00:29 > 0:00:34knew that just a few days before the Royal Navy had been badly defeated
0:00:34 > 0:00:3625 miles up the coast off Beachy Head.
0:00:37 > 0:00:41So the sight of those English ships on the run could mean just one thing.
0:00:41 > 0:00:44The French were coming.
0:00:45 > 0:00:50With the Navy beaten, the English could do nothing to prevent a French invasion.
0:00:50 > 0:00:52The result was inevitable.
0:00:52 > 0:00:55Church bells rang out in panic.
0:00:56 > 0:01:00Jeake wrote about what happened next in his diary.
0:01:00 > 0:01:04"A terrible alarm in the town of Rye, the French is coming to land.
0:01:04 > 0:01:08"Their intentions were to fire and plunder the town."
0:01:12 > 0:01:18In desperation, people seized hold of their valuables and attempted to flee the town.
0:01:18 > 0:01:20This gate was the only way in and out of Rye
0:01:20 > 0:01:25and soon this narrow street was clogged with people clinging to their possessions.
0:01:25 > 0:01:28Their panic increased by the terrible sight
0:01:28 > 0:01:32that was now smouldering down on the beach below the town.
0:01:34 > 0:01:38If ever there was a vision to terrify the people of Rye
0:01:38 > 0:01:42it must have been that of England's first line of defence in flames.
0:01:46 > 0:01:53Lying here on the beach within sight of Rye Harbour was the Anne, a 70-gun Royal Naval warship
0:01:53 > 0:01:56which had been terribly damaged in the fighting at Beachy Head.
0:01:56 > 0:01:59100 of her crew have been killed or wounded.
0:02:02 > 0:02:07Unable to sail on any further, her captain ran her aground on this very spot.
0:02:07 > 0:02:11And then fearing that the French would capture her, he set her alight.
0:02:11 > 0:02:15Her remains are under my feet now.
0:02:15 > 0:02:18Sometimes when these sands shift
0:02:18 > 0:02:23she re-emerges like a ghostly reminder of a forgotten moment in our history.
0:02:23 > 0:02:28A moment of terror, chaos and defeat.
0:02:28 > 0:02:33Rule, Britannia? I don't think so.
0:02:33 > 0:02:37In 1690, there could have been no doubt in anyone's mind -
0:02:37 > 0:02:42France ruled the waves and England was at her mercy.
0:02:42 > 0:02:46For the English, this disaster was a turning point.
0:02:46 > 0:02:48They had no choice.
0:02:48 > 0:02:50If they were to survive they would have to build
0:02:50 > 0:02:54a navy capable of resisting the greatest power in Europe.
0:02:56 > 0:03:02But to do that would require a national effort unlike anything that had been seen before.
0:03:02 > 0:03:06It would transform the country, revolutionise agriculture,
0:03:06 > 0:03:12lay the foundations of industry and, most of all, unleash the power of money.
0:03:42 > 0:03:4415 sail, we're on midships.
0:03:46 > 0:03:49The battle of Beachy Head in 1690
0:03:49 > 0:03:54still ranks as one of the Royal Navy's most humiliating defeats.
0:03:54 > 0:04:00But then, in 1693, came an even more terrible loss.
0:04:00 > 0:04:04England was a nation of traders utterly dependent on the wealth
0:04:04 > 0:04:07generated by her huge merchant fleet.
0:04:07 > 0:04:13A fleet which, unless it was properly protected, was terribly vulnerable to enemy attack.
0:04:13 > 0:04:20On the 30th May 1693, 400 merchant ships gathered in a huge fleet
0:04:20 > 0:04:25and set out from England to the town of Smyrna in the Eastern Mediterranean.
0:04:25 > 0:04:32This giant trade flotilla was described as the richest that ever went for Turkey.
0:04:33 > 0:04:38On board was a year's worth of trade - wool, tin, spices and silver -
0:04:38 > 0:04:42the lifeblood of the economy, which had been accumulating in port
0:04:42 > 0:04:45for fear of being captured or destroyed at sea.
0:04:47 > 0:04:54The convoy was such a vital national interest that it was given an escort of 102 warships.
0:04:54 > 0:04:58The convoy moved down the Channel and out into the Atlantic.
0:04:58 > 0:05:02But this route took them past Brest, home of the French Navy,
0:05:02 > 0:05:05which is where the accompanying English admirals were expecting trouble.
0:05:05 > 0:05:09So as they passed without incident and entered the Bay of Biscay,
0:05:09 > 0:05:10the English escort ships
0:05:10 > 0:05:14turned round and headed home, thinking the convoy would be safe.
0:05:14 > 0:05:16This was a disastrous decision.
0:05:16 > 0:05:20The French had found out about the convoy and the time of its departure
0:05:20 > 0:05:24and they were preparing ships further down here to intercept it.
0:05:29 > 0:05:33As the convey reached Lagos Bay on the southern tip of Portugal,
0:05:33 > 0:05:37they found 93 French warships waiting for them.
0:05:41 > 0:05:46Almost 100 merchant vessels, carrying a year's worth of trade,
0:05:46 > 0:05:48were captured or destroyed.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58When news of the disaster reached England,
0:05:58 > 0:06:03it sent the business community into a paroxysm of despair.
0:06:05 > 0:06:10From his house in Rye, the merchant Samuel Jeake wrote in his diary,
0:06:10 > 0:06:15"News of the miscarriage of the Turkey fleet has put a great stop to trade."
0:06:15 > 0:06:17And this was an understatement.
0:06:17 > 0:06:24The losses suffered by the Smyrna convey were as bad as those in the Great Fire of London of 1666.
0:06:24 > 0:06:29And there followed a wave of bankruptcies among insurers and merchants.
0:06:29 > 0:06:32The secretary to King William III said
0:06:32 > 0:06:39that he had never seen His Majesty so sensibly affected with any accident as this.
0:06:39 > 0:06:42This commercial disaster, coming just three year's after
0:06:42 > 0:06:46one of the Navy's worst military disasters served as a brutal reminder.
0:06:46 > 0:06:53For England, a powerful navy was not a luxury, it was a central pillar of state.
0:06:53 > 0:06:57Without it the country was doomed.
0:06:57 > 0:07:02William desperately needed more ships and to build them, money.
0:07:02 > 0:07:05But the Treasury was empty.
0:07:05 > 0:07:11Then in 1694, a completely new kind of financial institution was created in London.
0:07:11 > 0:07:15One offering a unique investment opportunity.
0:07:15 > 0:07:22Anyone willing to put in at least £25 would receive a guaranteed return of 8%.
0:07:26 > 0:07:31The savvy merchant from Rye, Samuel Jeake, thought this sounded like a chance
0:07:31 > 0:07:35that was too good to miss and he instructed his agent in London to invest £200.
0:07:35 > 0:07:41But then he decided to gather together all his spare cash and head into London himself.
0:07:41 > 0:07:44He wrote in his diary, "I made myself ready for my journey
0:07:44 > 0:07:49"carrying the £100 with me, and at 7pm I took horse for London."
0:07:49 > 0:07:54That was a 15-hour ride, so it's fair to suggest that by the time he met up with his agent
0:07:54 > 0:07:59the following afternoon in the city, Mr Jeake would have been quite saddle sore.
0:07:59 > 0:08:04So keen was Jeake to take advantage of the 8% interest being offered
0:08:04 > 0:08:10that he even scraped together a further £200 while he was here in London,
0:08:10 > 0:08:12to take his total stake up to £500.
0:08:15 > 0:08:18£500 was a lot of money for anyone, even Jeake,
0:08:18 > 0:08:21but it turns out it was a pretty good investment.
0:08:21 > 0:08:24That exciting new financial institution
0:08:24 > 0:08:27that launched in 1694 still exists.
0:08:27 > 0:08:29It's called the Bank of England.
0:08:31 > 0:08:35The funds required to build a new navy were vast,
0:08:35 > 0:08:37but the Bank of England delivered.
0:08:37 > 0:08:40In just 12 days it raised £1.2 million.
0:08:40 > 0:08:47And on August 1st 1694, it made its first loan to the government.
0:08:47 > 0:08:51The national debt was born and the Royal Navy was saved.
0:08:51 > 0:08:54England would build now and pay later.
0:08:56 > 0:09:00This is a list of all the original investors in the Bank of England,
0:09:00 > 0:09:01known as subscribers at the time.
0:09:01 > 0:09:05At the top of each page here is the date and their names
0:09:05 > 0:09:07neatly written out here with their occupations next to them.
0:09:07 > 0:09:12Right here at the bottom of this page is Samuel Jeake
0:09:12 > 0:09:14of Rye in Sussex, a merchant.
0:09:14 > 0:09:16This is a remarkable document
0:09:16 > 0:09:21because it allows us to get a kind of investor profile of this extraordinary new venture.
0:09:21 > 0:09:25At the very top of the list, appropriately enough,
0:09:25 > 0:09:26are their majesties.
0:09:26 > 0:09:29The King and Queen, who invested £10,000.
0:09:29 > 0:09:32But there are lots of other people from the very pinnacle of society as well.
0:09:32 > 0:09:37Men like Edward Russell, the First Lord of the Admiralty, invested £2,000.
0:09:39 > 0:09:41But it wasn't just the bigwigs that subscribed.
0:09:41 > 0:09:46There are nine people listed here as being in domestic service.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49And here I found Thomas Day of London,
0:09:49 > 0:09:53who's a blacksmith and he's invested £100.
0:09:53 > 0:09:58While over the page, Joseph Cake is a bricklayer.
0:09:58 > 0:10:03The National Debt created a virtuous circle of funding.
0:10:03 > 0:10:07The government borrowed money from the people which it spent on the Navy,
0:10:07 > 0:10:13which protected trade, which brought in taxes, which allowed the government to pay the people back.
0:10:17 > 0:10:24It was a financial revolution which, uniquely, would allow England to spend its way to greatness.
0:10:24 > 0:10:31More than half of that first loan, over £600,000, went on building up the Navy.
0:10:31 > 0:10:34And that huge injection of cash, the first of many,
0:10:34 > 0:10:40had a transforming affect on whole areas of the economy all over the country.
0:10:40 > 0:10:44The Northeast of England soon had Europe's largest ironworks,
0:10:44 > 0:10:50thanks to the Navy's spending spree and one enterprising industrialist called Ambrose Crowley.
0:10:53 > 0:10:55Iron ran in Ambrose Crowley's blood.
0:10:55 > 0:11:01His father and grandfather had both had a steady business in the Midlands in the iron trade.
0:11:01 > 0:11:04But young Ambrose Crowley the third wanted more.
0:11:04 > 0:11:08He wanted to expand and he realised that to do so he'd have to up sticks
0:11:08 > 0:11:13and move closer to his most precious raw material - not iron but coal.
0:11:13 > 0:11:18And that's why he ended up here on the south bank of the Tyne.
0:11:18 > 0:11:22He set up a series of blacksmith's shops up there about a mile away
0:11:22 > 0:11:28and brought the goods down here to the river where they could be shipped south.
0:11:29 > 0:11:35South was where England's shipyards were embarked on a massive building programme.
0:11:35 > 0:11:40And it was this that made Ambrose Crowley's ironworks so successful because wooden ships
0:11:40 > 0:11:48need lots of iron nails and in those days, every single one had to be made by hand.
0:11:48 > 0:11:53Blacksmith Mark Fearn still uses exactly the same techniques.
0:11:56 > 0:11:58This is the traditional set-up, is it?
0:11:58 > 0:12:00It is. The double-acting bellows,
0:12:00 > 0:12:05and every time you press that down, it's feeding air into the fire.
0:12:05 > 0:12:08- And how hot is that, do you reckon? - About 1,300 C.
0:12:08 > 0:12:101,300 degrees Centigrade.
0:12:10 > 0:12:14It's hard to believe that a packet of nails that we buy
0:12:14 > 0:12:17in the shop were actually made individually like this.
0:12:17 > 0:12:20Well, isn't it remarkable?
0:12:24 > 0:12:26Right, so here we go.
0:12:30 > 0:12:34And then we're gonna be ready to put it in the heading tool.
0:12:36 > 0:12:39- Then you see that.- Wow!
0:12:39 > 0:12:42And then beat a head onto it.
0:12:45 > 0:12:49Into the quench bucket and that should...
0:12:51 > 0:12:55That's not a bad nail. Well, do you reckon I could have a go?
0:12:55 > 0:12:56I reckon you could.
0:12:58 > 0:13:00There you go, a piece of iron, Dan.
0:13:00 > 0:13:03- Thanks, a piece of iron. - Yes. OK.- Get ready for one nail.
0:13:03 > 0:13:05- Yes, indeed.- So first of all I'll give it some of this.
0:13:08 > 0:13:10- OK, how about that? - That's looking good.
0:13:10 > 0:13:17'By 1700, the industrialist Ambrose Crowley was providing 40% of all the Navy's iron orders.
0:13:19 > 0:13:24'He created a factory system, with hundreds of workshops like this one,
0:13:24 > 0:13:28'and built iron mills and steel furnaces alongside.
0:13:28 > 0:13:33'It turned what had been a cottage industry into mass production.'
0:13:33 > 0:13:36- Into the heading tool.- Right.
0:13:36 > 0:13:38'After the financial revolution,
0:13:38 > 0:13:44'here were the first shoots of the industrial revolution, and driving it all was the Navy.'
0:13:46 > 0:13:51In only a decade, English dockyards built over a 150 new naval ships,
0:13:51 > 0:13:56but since England was at war many of these ships were, of course, destroyed or captured by the enemy.
0:13:56 > 0:14:03Nevertheless, by the end of the decade, the English Navy numbered 176 warships.
0:14:04 > 0:14:10'And each of them contained over five tonnes of iron nails.'
0:14:10 > 0:14:14- My first nail.- And you should be able to knock that out.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17Look at that. In fact, it's just sliding out.
0:14:17 > 0:14:19- Hey.- How good is that?- Look at that!
0:14:19 > 0:14:22Congratulations. Your first nail.
0:14:22 > 0:14:24That's fantastic.
0:14:24 > 0:14:27I can imagine that going through a piece of planking
0:14:27 > 0:14:29onto the hull of a ship.
0:14:36 > 0:14:38Of course, the Navy didn't just need nails.
0:14:38 > 0:14:43Each new ship typically contained the wood of more than 2,000 trees.
0:14:43 > 0:14:51Over 7,000 square yards of canvas and 10 miles of rope, weighing 19 tonnes.
0:14:51 > 0:14:55The sailing ship was the most complex man-made machine on earth,
0:14:55 > 0:15:00a glorious piece of wooden architecture driven entirely by the wind.
0:15:00 > 0:15:04But it relied most of all on manpower.
0:15:05 > 0:15:11In ten years, the number of men serving in the Royal Navy quadrupled to over 44,000.
0:15:11 > 0:15:15That's more people than lived in any city outside London,
0:15:15 > 0:15:20and feeding them all transformed England's agriculture.
0:15:20 > 0:15:24The Navy was the single largest consumer of produce in the country
0:15:24 > 0:15:28and it awarded huge contracts to a handful of suppliers
0:15:28 > 0:15:33who bought up vast quantities of food from small farmers all over the country.
0:15:33 > 0:15:37Agricultural output went up by a third,
0:15:37 > 0:15:41but because this was a competitive market, prices stayed low.
0:15:41 > 0:15:46Once again, the Navy's insatiable demand was driving the economy forward.
0:15:46 > 0:15:51It had become the engine of English commerce, a national enterprise.
0:15:58 > 0:16:05It took the work of thousands on land to build the ships of the Royal Navy and keep them supplied.
0:16:05 > 0:16:11But once at sea, survival depended most of all on the skill,
0:16:11 > 0:16:14fortitude and raw strength of the crew.
0:16:14 > 0:16:20And to fuel all those men required by the Navy was actually quite a generous allocation of food.
0:16:20 > 0:16:28The central part of the diet was, of course, meat, salted so it survived for long ocean voyages.
0:16:28 > 0:16:29This is the weekly ration.
0:16:29 > 0:16:33Six pounds of meat - four pounds of beef, two pounds of pork.
0:16:33 > 0:16:38Now the beef was typically eaten in some kind of stew with suet, apparently.
0:16:41 > 0:16:43HE COUGHS
0:16:43 > 0:16:45Very salty.
0:16:53 > 0:16:57If you think salty boot leather, that's about right.
0:16:57 > 0:17:01Perhaps the most famous part of the sailing Navy's diet
0:17:01 > 0:17:04was the key staple, standing in for bread,
0:17:04 > 0:17:09the ship's biscuit. A subtle combination, flour, water and salt
0:17:09 > 0:17:12baked for hours until it was rock hard.
0:17:19 > 0:17:24It's like a particularly disgusting and tasteless version of rye bread.
0:17:24 > 0:17:28An added complication was that this became a home of little weevils,
0:17:28 > 0:17:33almost like tiny worms that used to live in them and feed off them.
0:17:33 > 0:17:37Now, some people like to bang them until the weevils fell out and you could get rid of them.
0:17:37 > 0:17:42Others used to go into a dark corner and simply eat the biscuit, weevils and all.
0:17:45 > 0:17:50What this diet does show is that the Navy's high command understood
0:17:50 > 0:17:54just how much physical effort was required to sail a ship effectively.
0:17:54 > 0:17:58Sailors were constantly climbing up and down masts and adjusting sails,
0:17:58 > 0:18:01with no protection from the elements,
0:18:01 > 0:18:07and in battle there were cannons weighing three tonnes each to manoeuvre.
0:18:07 > 0:18:12Little wonder, then, that the Navy's rations provided sailors with 5,000 calories a day.
0:18:12 > 0:18:17That's twice the recommended intake for an active man today.
0:18:17 > 0:18:19Oh, this feels a little bit precarious up here.
0:18:19 > 0:18:22It takes a special kind of head for heights
0:18:22 > 0:18:26to spend your time as a top man, up in the, er, up in the mastheads.
0:18:26 > 0:18:32And from up here you also get a much better view, so they are the ones with the sharpest eyesight.
0:18:32 > 0:18:35They could spot enemy sails when they saw them on the horizon.
0:18:35 > 0:18:41One bad thing about being up here, though, is that the movement on deck is magnified quite a lot.
0:18:41 > 0:18:47Up here we go through quite a big angle when you rock around.
0:18:52 > 0:18:55'Sailors in this period were a breed apart.
0:18:55 > 0:18:57'The average age would have been about 27,
0:18:57 > 0:19:03'but they'd have looked much older, their faces lined and weathered from a lifetime at sea.
0:19:03 > 0:19:05'Their hands would have been callused and scarred
0:19:05 > 0:19:10'and their vocabulary was almost indecipherable to landlubbers,
0:19:10 > 0:19:13'a mixture of swearing and nautical terms.'
0:19:13 > 0:19:16Line down.
0:19:16 > 0:19:20'Most noticeable of all was their peculiar rolling gait,
0:19:20 > 0:19:24'more suitable for the pitching deck of a ship than walking on dry land.
0:19:24 > 0:19:30'And all of this made them very recognisable to the naval press gangs who patrolled the ports,
0:19:30 > 0:19:32'looking for experienced recruits.'
0:19:34 > 0:19:37That was quite tiring and the amazing part
0:19:37 > 0:19:40about that process is that every time the wind changes in strength
0:19:40 > 0:19:43you've gotta go back up there and alter the sails.
0:19:50 > 0:19:55There are some written accounts that tell us what life was like for ordinary sailors.
0:19:55 > 0:19:58One of the most remarkable is by Edward Barlow.
0:19:58 > 0:20:02He first went to sea at the age of 13.
0:20:02 > 0:20:07He came ashore for the last time in 1703, at the age of 61,
0:20:07 > 0:20:13a total of 48 years at sea, which was an amazing feat of survival.
0:20:14 > 0:20:18Throughout that time he kept an incredible illustrated diary, and I've got it here
0:20:18 > 0:20:24and it paints his like at sea in the most vivid terms and leaves you in no doubt as to how tough it was.
0:20:24 > 0:20:29He says, "Often we were called up before we had slept half an hour
0:20:29 > 0:20:35"and forced to go into the maintop or foretop to take in our top source half awake and half asleep.
0:20:35 > 0:20:40"There we must haul and pull to make fast the sail, seeing nothing but air above us
0:20:40 > 0:20:46"and the water beneath us and that's so raging as though every wave would make a grave for us."
0:20:49 > 0:20:53The Royal Navy, rebuilt and renewed with borrowed money,
0:20:53 > 0:20:58was able to avenge the defeats of the early 1690s.
0:20:58 > 0:21:01It even captured Gibraltar and Minorca,
0:21:01 > 0:21:04two important bases in the Mediterranean.
0:21:04 > 0:21:08The English Navy was now a global weapon,
0:21:08 > 0:21:15its ships opening up the wealth of the world to the merchant fleet thousands of miles across the ocean.
0:21:15 > 0:21:17And no part of the world was more important
0:21:17 > 0:21:22than the one that had first fired the dreams of England's mariners.
0:21:26 > 0:21:30The island of Jamaica was the largest English colony in the Caribbean,
0:21:30 > 0:21:34the most hotly contested and dangerous region in the world.
0:21:34 > 0:21:39In the autumn of 1708, a 23-year-old naval captain called Edward Vernon
0:21:39 > 0:21:45arrived here in Port Royal, the nerve centre of the Navy's operations.
0:21:52 > 0:21:56Vernon's father was an MP and he disapproved of his son's career choice,
0:21:56 > 0:22:01but such was the draw of the sea on the minds of young men in that period
0:22:01 > 0:22:05that Edward had always had his heart set on joining the Royal Navy.
0:22:05 > 0:22:10He was just the kind of aggressive, bold commander that would thrive in an environment like this,
0:22:10 > 0:22:14where courage and initiative were key requirements.
0:22:14 > 0:22:18Vernon served in the Caribbean for four years,
0:22:18 > 0:22:23during which time the country was at war with France and Spain.
0:22:23 > 0:22:30It was the job of men like him to defend the merchant fleet on which England's prosperity depended.
0:22:30 > 0:22:36The Caribbean was the centre of world trade because of what was grown here.
0:22:39 > 0:22:44So this is raw sugar cane juice, made from pressing the sugar cane.
0:22:44 > 0:22:46I'm going to have a bit of a taste.
0:22:48 > 0:22:52Well, that's disgusting. That just tastes of mud, grass and sugar,
0:22:52 > 0:22:55which is not wholly surprising because that's basically what it is.
0:22:55 > 0:22:58But when this is boiled down and crystallised you get sugar,
0:22:58 > 0:23:04imported into Europe in vast quantities to liven up the rather dull European diet.
0:23:04 > 0:23:08Added to things like pastries and also other imports like tea and coffee.
0:23:08 > 0:23:14Over here we have another drink made from sugar cane, and that, of course, is rum.
0:23:14 > 0:23:17Much more recognisable. Becomes synonymous with the Navy in this period.
0:23:17 > 0:23:19Favoured drink of sailors.
0:23:24 > 0:23:28That's much more drinkable, but it's still a bit rough.
0:23:28 > 0:23:30This became synonymous with Edward Vernon
0:23:30 > 0:23:34because Vernon returns out here to the Caribbean as a senior commander.
0:23:34 > 0:23:40And he discovers that rum has become a staple among the Royal Navy ships' companies out here.
0:23:40 > 0:23:44They drink half a pint per man per day, so they're in danger of getting quite drunk
0:23:44 > 0:23:47and falling out the masts and rigging when they go aloft.
0:23:47 > 0:23:50So he insists that the rum ration is mixed with water.
0:23:50 > 0:23:53Now because his nickname is "Old Grogam",
0:23:53 > 0:23:57thanks to a coat he used to wear made out of material called Grogam,
0:23:57 > 0:24:02this new mixture of rum and water that's introduced on his watch is known as "grog".
0:24:09 > 0:24:16Sugar cane was cultivated by slaves, as was the tobacco which was grown in the American colonies.
0:24:16 > 0:24:19The slave trade was a lucrative sideline.
0:24:21 > 0:24:24But the English did not have a monopoly on all these commodities.
0:24:24 > 0:24:31The Caribbean was a pressure cooker of competing nations, all jostling over a few small islands.
0:24:31 > 0:24:34The Dutch, the French and the Spanish were all here,
0:24:34 > 0:24:37each of them greedily protecting their own interests,
0:24:37 > 0:24:41but also looking for opportunities to conquer new territories.
0:24:44 > 0:24:47And then there were the pirates.
0:24:47 > 0:24:50It's not hard to see what attracted those men to the Caribbean.
0:24:50 > 0:24:57It was the job of officers like Edward Vernon to hunt them down and provide a violent deterrent.
0:24:57 > 0:25:02Many of those pirates were of course state-sponsored, known as privateers,
0:25:02 > 0:25:07because they carried licences issued to them by the French and Spanish governments
0:25:07 > 0:25:09to prey on British shipping.
0:25:09 > 0:25:13Not that the British government was above using the profit motive either.
0:25:13 > 0:25:19In 1708, the year that Vernon arrived out here in the Caribbean, Parliament passed the Prize Act.
0:25:19 > 0:25:22This gave the Captain, offices and ship's company of any Royal Navy ship
0:25:22 > 0:25:27a portion of the value of any enemy vessel they captured.
0:25:29 > 0:25:33At a time when a Royal Navy captain typically earned about £20 a month
0:25:33 > 0:25:36and an ordinary seaman less than a pound a month,
0:25:36 > 0:25:42these prizes represented a significant salary bonus.
0:25:42 > 0:25:45While he was out here, Vernon took full advantage.
0:25:45 > 0:25:47He captured several prizes.
0:25:47 > 0:25:52One was a Spanish ship laden with tobacco, another was French with 400 slaves on board.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55He brought them back in here to Port Royal to have them valued,
0:25:55 > 0:25:59then, as captain, he was entitled to a quarter share.
0:26:00 > 0:26:03It was the most brutal form of incentive.
0:26:03 > 0:26:07Patriotism was now bolstered by prize money.
0:26:07 > 0:26:13Vernon embodied the naval revolution, rich, confident and supremely professional.
0:26:13 > 0:26:18He was the product of a navy and a country that had come a long way
0:26:18 > 0:26:23since those dark early years of King William's reign in the 1690s.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32After 25 years of almost continual warfare,
0:26:32 > 0:26:37the strategy laid down by William III finally paid off.
0:26:37 > 0:26:41France and Spain couldn't match the vast resources being poured into
0:26:41 > 0:26:47the Royal Navy, and after a series of defeats in 1713 they made peace.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51On this side of the Channel, it felt like time to celebrate.
0:27:09 > 0:27:14This is the painted hall of the Old Royal Naval Hospital in Greenwich.
0:27:14 > 0:27:18And the magnificent ceiling tells you everything you need to know
0:27:18 > 0:27:22about how the British saw themselves at the start of the 18th century.
0:27:32 > 0:27:36And I use the world British deliberately, because after 1707
0:27:36 > 0:27:41England and Scotland were joined together by Act of Union to form the Kingdom of Great Britain.
0:27:41 > 0:27:45And this is the image of that new nation -
0:27:45 > 0:27:50rich, confident, and filled with a sense of destiny.
0:27:52 > 0:27:56The central character is William, sitting in all his majesty,
0:27:56 > 0:27:59bringing peace and harmony to Europe.
0:27:59 > 0:28:02And if you notice, he's sitting on the defeated figure
0:28:02 > 0:28:05of the King of France, the terrible Louis 14th.
0:28:09 > 0:28:15The overwhelming theme is of course naval, and at the end of the painting here
0:28:15 > 0:28:20you see this vast British man-of-war towering out of the water
0:28:20 > 0:28:23with its cannons run out ready for battle.
0:28:23 > 0:28:25The decks of the ship are crowded with
0:28:25 > 0:28:31the spoils of victory - stuff, booty stolen off the French and Spanish.
0:28:31 > 0:28:35But fascinatingly, the ship is resting on the shoulders
0:28:35 > 0:28:38of a figure representing the City of London,
0:28:38 > 0:28:41all that financial wealth that she generated.
0:28:41 > 0:28:46And she in turn is above figures representing the great rivers of England.
0:28:46 > 0:28:48Isis and a man representing the Thames,
0:28:48 > 0:28:52and even the Tyne bringing an offering of coal.
0:28:52 > 0:28:53The message couldn't be clearer.
0:28:53 > 0:28:56This vast, awesome military machine
0:28:56 > 0:29:02is totally dependent on the wealth created by the City of London.
0:29:04 > 0:29:09In 1726, just as the finishing touches were being put to this hall, the French philosopher Voltaire
0:29:09 > 0:29:13visited Britain and was very struck by what he described as the grandeur of state.
0:29:13 > 0:29:17He wrote, "Trade raised by insensible degrees
0:29:17 > 0:29:21"the naval power, which gives the English a superiority over the seas.
0:29:21 > 0:29:25"And they are now masters of very near 200 ships of war.
0:29:25 > 0:29:28"Posterity will very probably be surprised to hear
0:29:28 > 0:29:31"that an island whose only produce is a little lead,
0:29:31 > 0:29:33"tin, fuller's earth and coarse wool
0:29:33 > 0:29:37"should become so powerful by its commerce."
0:29:37 > 0:29:41Voltaire saw instantly that commerce and naval power were linked.
0:29:44 > 0:29:48It was a formula for success that was tied up with the creation of
0:29:48 > 0:29:52"the Bank of England, and now Britain was reaping the rewards."
0:29:56 > 0:29:59Britain in the 1720s was a changed country.
0:30:01 > 0:30:04Thanks to the Navy, she had resisted the combined might
0:30:04 > 0:30:06of the French and Spanish alliance.
0:30:12 > 0:30:18But the coming of peace brought an end to 25 years of naval expansion.
0:30:18 > 0:30:24With no enemies to engage at sea, a generation of aggressive naval commanders took their fight
0:30:24 > 0:30:29to Westminster, where they argued the British ship of state
0:30:29 > 0:30:33should stick to its natural course...war.
0:30:35 > 0:30:39In 1722, the country held a general election
0:30:39 > 0:30:45and former commodore Edward Vernon became MP for Penryn in Cornwall.
0:30:45 > 0:30:47Vernon was a fiery patriot
0:30:47 > 0:30:50and what really got him going was the Caribbean.
0:30:50 > 0:30:53During his 21 years in the Royal Navy,
0:30:53 > 0:30:58he'd served out there twice, the second time as Commander in Chief of his Majesty's ships in Jamaica.
0:30:58 > 0:31:02And while there he'd seen ports stuffed with ships
0:31:02 > 0:31:06carrying the produce of Spain's American empire
0:31:06 > 0:31:11and he'd seen how the Spanish Navy were all too keen to run away from a fight.
0:31:11 > 0:31:15Vernon was convinced that this was the soft underbelly
0:31:15 > 0:31:16of the Spanish empire.
0:31:16 > 0:31:19"Attack their settlements in America," he wrote,
0:31:19 > 0:31:21"and Spain will fall."
0:31:21 > 0:31:25And if Spain fell that would have dire consequences
0:31:25 > 0:31:27for her close ally, France,
0:31:27 > 0:31:30who, of course, was Britain's greatest rival.
0:31:30 > 0:31:34So actually Britain would get two victories for the price of one.
0:31:34 > 0:31:36It all sounds like a great idea.
0:31:36 > 0:31:38But there was a problem.
0:31:38 > 0:31:44During the 1720s and '30s, the government's policy was to avoid war.
0:31:44 > 0:31:48But at the same time, British traders in the Caribbean
0:31:48 > 0:31:52were aggressively encroaching into the Spanish empire,
0:31:52 > 0:31:56and they had the backing of merchants and former naval officers at home.
0:31:56 > 0:32:01Then in 1738 something extraordinary happened.
0:32:01 > 0:32:05A merchant captain called Robert Jenkins appeared here before Parliament.
0:32:05 > 0:32:08He brought with him a bundle of cotton wool.
0:32:08 > 0:32:12Opening it, he produced his own severed ear.
0:32:16 > 0:32:20The story that Jenkins told Parliament that day
0:32:20 > 0:32:21was political dynamite.
0:32:21 > 0:32:26He said the ear has been chopped off by a Spanish naval officer
0:32:26 > 0:32:30while he'd been minding his own business peaceably off the coast of Cuba.
0:32:30 > 0:32:34It unleashed a wave of xenophobia through Parliament and the public,
0:32:34 > 0:32:38and no-one's voice was louder than Edward Vernon.
0:32:38 > 0:32:42Jenkins' mutilation was Vernon's gain.
0:32:42 > 0:32:46He strode into the Admiralty and demanded to be given command
0:32:46 > 0:32:49in the Caribbean, and Vernon got his wish.
0:32:55 > 0:33:0230 years after he first sailed to Jamaica, Edward Vernon returned, this time as a vice admiral.
0:33:05 > 0:33:11He arrived in Port Royal on 12th October 1739 and began his preparations.
0:33:13 > 0:33:18A week later, the British Government finally made up its mind and declared war against Spain.
0:33:18 > 0:33:23Vernon was now given official license "to commit all hostilities
0:33:23 > 0:33:29"against the Spaniards in such manner as you shall judge most proper."
0:33:32 > 0:33:38Britain's belligerent naval officers and her merchant class had got their war,
0:33:38 > 0:33:40the War of Jenkins' Ear.
0:33:40 > 0:33:44And it began when Vernon launched an attack
0:33:44 > 0:33:48on the Spanish colonial base at Porto Bello.
0:33:48 > 0:33:52On November 21st, Vernon sailed into Porto Bello
0:33:52 > 0:33:54with six Royal Navy warships.
0:33:54 > 0:33:58They opened up a massive bombardment against the Spanish defenders.
0:34:01 > 0:34:06The lead ship fired 400 shots in just 25 minutes.
0:34:06 > 0:34:11The Spanish were powerless to resist, partly because much of their gunpowder was damp.
0:34:11 > 0:34:14When Vernon's men stormed ashore,
0:34:14 > 0:34:19only 40 of the original 300 Spaniards were able to resist.
0:34:19 > 0:34:23They surrendered within 24 hours.
0:34:24 > 0:34:27Britain rejoiced.
0:34:27 > 0:34:31The Navy had delivered on its promise, projecting British force
0:34:31 > 0:34:35thousands of miles away from home, and Admiral Vernon,
0:34:35 > 0:34:43the scourge of Spain, was a hero, heir to Drake and the embodiment of a new imperial mission.
0:34:45 > 0:34:50A Scottish poet, James Thomson, really caught the national mood of celebration
0:34:50 > 0:34:52by penning a poem that became wildly popular.
0:34:52 > 0:34:57It contained the lines, "To thee belongs the rural reign
0:34:57 > 0:35:01"and thy cities shall with commerce shine."
0:35:01 > 0:35:04Now, in case you haven't guessed what it is yet, a few lines later comes,
0:35:04 > 0:35:10"Rule, Britannia! Rule the waves, Britons never will be slaves."
0:35:10 > 0:35:13These words have become part of our cultural DNA -
0:35:13 > 0:35:20liberty, commerce and mastery of the seas all rolled inextricably together.
0:35:20 > 0:35:24It was a defining moment in the creation of Britishness.
0:35:30 > 0:35:35Buoyed by his success, Vernon decided to attack Cartagena,
0:35:35 > 0:35:38the largest and richest city in Spanish America.
0:35:38 > 0:35:44He took a massive force of 8,500 troops and 124 ships.
0:35:44 > 0:35:48The public at home anticipated another easy victory,
0:35:48 > 0:35:52but Vernon had over-reached himself.
0:35:52 > 0:35:56The attack was an uncoordinated disaster and soon stalled.
0:35:56 > 0:35:59Exposed to the extremes of the Caribbean climate
0:35:59 > 0:36:03and running low on water, the British were killed in horrifying numbers.
0:36:03 > 0:36:07Not by the Spanish, but by disease.
0:36:07 > 0:36:10Worse still, Vernon was out of range of reinforcements,
0:36:10 > 0:36:15so after almost six weeks of fighting he was forced to withdraw.
0:36:17 > 0:36:22Cartagena was a wake-up call to a nation drunk on patriotism.
0:36:22 > 0:36:25There were limits, after all, to what the Navy could achieve.
0:36:25 > 0:36:30The problem wasn't so much ships and men, it was organisation.
0:36:30 > 0:36:33If Britain wants to realise her dream of global domination,
0:36:33 > 0:36:38then the Navy's internal structures - running things like logistics and strategic thinking -
0:36:38 > 0:36:44had to be of the same quality as her awesomely powerful ships and her tough sailors.
0:36:48 > 0:36:55The man who would take on that challenge was another veteran of the Caribbean, Captain George Anson.
0:36:56 > 0:36:59Following Vernon's victory at Porto Bello,
0:36:59 > 0:37:04Anson had been ordered to take a squadron of six warships to attack the Spanish in the Pacific.
0:37:04 > 0:37:08But his mission quickly turned into a nightmare.
0:37:10 > 0:37:13Anson's route may look like the trail of a drunken spider,
0:37:13 > 0:37:16but as he attempted to round Cape Horn,
0:37:16 > 0:37:20his squadron was so battered by storms, that he lost half his ships
0:37:20 > 0:37:25and after so long at sea a third of his men had succumbed to scurvy,
0:37:25 > 0:37:26typhus and dysentery.
0:37:26 > 0:37:34Yet by the time he arrived back here in Britain in 1744, he'd become a national hero.
0:37:34 > 0:37:37Why? Because on his way home, as he passed the Philippines,
0:37:37 > 0:37:43he'd managed to capture a Spanish galleon, the Nuestra Senora de Covadonga.
0:37:43 > 0:37:48And in her hold was over 1,000 kilos of virgin silver
0:37:48 > 0:37:54and more than one million pieces of eight, solid silver coins.
0:37:54 > 0:37:58She was one of the most valuable prizes ever captured by a British ship.
0:37:59 > 0:38:03The public had a new hero to cheer and the treasure was paraded
0:38:03 > 0:38:07in 32 wagons through the streets of London.
0:38:07 > 0:38:11To cap it all off, just six months later, at the age of 47,
0:38:11 > 0:38:14Anson was appointed to the Board of the Admiralty.
0:38:17 > 0:38:24George Anson arrived here just after Christmas 1744 with a reputation as a man of action.
0:38:24 > 0:38:28And he was shocked by the bureaucratic lethargy he found.
0:38:28 > 0:38:33The organisation needed a shake-up from top to bottom.
0:38:46 > 0:38:49So this is it - the Admiralty boardroom.
0:38:49 > 0:38:52The beating heart of Anson's Navy.
0:38:52 > 0:38:54I tell you what, it feels like a long way
0:38:54 > 0:38:58from the pitching quarterdeck of a man-of-war going round Cape Horn.
0:38:58 > 0:39:03In a way, of course, Anson's experiences on that epic circumnavigation
0:39:03 > 0:39:07had prepared him well for one of these seats at this table.
0:39:07 > 0:39:12On that voyage he hadn't just been commander of a naval squadron, he'd had to become a shipwright,
0:39:12 > 0:39:15a teacher, a judge, even a diplomat.
0:39:15 > 0:39:21And of course he'd seen the terrible effects of diseases like scurvy at first hand.
0:39:21 > 0:39:25Anson was the most experienced sailor in the Navy.
0:39:25 > 0:39:29He was the perfect man to lead a complete overhaul of the service.
0:39:29 > 0:39:31Incredible as it may sound,
0:39:31 > 0:39:38at the time the Navy had no formal system of rank. It didn't even have a uniform.
0:39:38 > 0:39:40Anson introduced both.
0:39:40 > 0:39:43This is him in full dress.
0:39:43 > 0:39:46He also made the Navy more of a meritocracy.
0:39:46 > 0:39:52Officers were to be promoted on the basis of ability instead of time served.
0:39:52 > 0:39:59Anson literally re-wrote the rule book of the Royal Navy, so-called Articles of War.
0:39:59 > 0:40:01This was partly in response to a manpower shortage.
0:40:01 > 0:40:06Increasing numbers of inexperienced men were being recruited as sailors.
0:40:06 > 0:40:10But he also wanted to stiffen the resolve of his officer corp.
0:40:10 > 0:40:15From now on the penalty for negligence, disaffection or cowardice would be death.
0:40:15 > 0:40:21Iron discipline and organisation would be the keys to success in Anson's Navy.
0:40:21 > 0:40:27Anson was not prepared to rely on the natural talent of a few good men.
0:40:27 > 0:40:34He wanted to ensure that the correct mindset and skills were perpetuated throughout the Navy.
0:40:34 > 0:40:38He was institutionalising the qualities needed to guarantee victory
0:40:38 > 0:40:42and he was doing it with a clear enemy in mind.
0:40:42 > 0:40:50Over the previous three decades, France had been re-building her Navy and massively expanding her trade
0:40:50 > 0:40:54and her empire in places like North America and India.
0:40:54 > 0:41:00By the middle of the century, the two great rivals, Britain and France, were evenly matched.
0:41:00 > 0:41:03They're relationship was a powder keg of competing interests.
0:41:03 > 0:41:08It was only a matter of time before someone lit the fuse.
0:41:21 > 0:41:26On the 8th June 1755, a French squadron was heading for Canada when,
0:41:26 > 0:41:32through the murk of a North Atlantic morning, they caught sight of Royal Naval ships.
0:41:32 > 0:41:38As the two fleets converged, a French captain shouted across to his opposite number on the British ship.
0:41:38 > 0:41:40"Are we at peace or at war?"
0:41:40 > 0:41:44The words came back, "At peace, at peace."
0:41:44 > 0:41:48But it was followed seconds later by a crashing broadside.
0:41:53 > 0:42:00The British Admiral Edward Boscawen had loaded all his cannon with two cannonballs
0:42:00 > 0:42:03and the French ships were pulverised.
0:42:09 > 0:42:17After this naked act of aggression, a formal declaration of war was an inevitability.
0:42:20 > 0:42:26The Seven Years War, as it became known, was also the first world war.
0:42:26 > 0:42:32Wherever British or French flags flew, from North America to the Caribbean, West Africa to India,
0:42:32 > 0:42:36the two sides launched themselves at each other.
0:42:36 > 0:42:40But perhaps surprisingly, the first real test for the Navy
0:42:40 > 0:42:44came in defending their own base in the Mediterranean.
0:42:44 > 0:42:50In the spring of 1756, Admiral John Byng set sail from England.
0:42:50 > 0:42:52He was to take a squadron of 13 warships
0:42:52 > 0:42:55to protect the island of Minorca.
0:42:55 > 0:42:59But by the time he arrived, he found he French had already landed
0:42:59 > 0:43:03and had the British garrison under siege from land and sea.
0:43:03 > 0:43:06Despite enjoying a small advantage in terms of the number of ships,
0:43:06 > 0:43:11Byng decided to risk a full scale battle and retreated to Gibraltar.
0:43:11 > 0:43:13This meant the French captured Minorca.
0:43:13 > 0:43:17Back in Britain, the news of the loss of such an important naval base
0:43:17 > 0:43:20in the Mediterranean was greeted with outrage.
0:43:22 > 0:43:25Byng was ordered back to England to meet his fate.
0:43:25 > 0:43:29He was court marshalled, according to the new Articles of War,
0:43:29 > 0:43:35and found guilty of failing to do his utmost to take or destroy the enemy's ships.
0:43:35 > 0:43:38The sentence was death.
0:43:40 > 0:43:46On the 14th March 1757, Admiral John Byng was executed
0:43:46 > 0:43:48on the quarterdeck of his own ship.
0:43:48 > 0:43:52He'd been allowed to direct his own firing squad.
0:43:52 > 0:43:55When he was ready for them to fire, he dropped a handkerchief.
0:43:59 > 0:44:03Once again, the great French philosopher Voltaire put it most succinctly.
0:44:03 > 0:44:10"In this country," he wrote, "it is wise to kill an Admiral from time to time to encourage the others."
0:44:10 > 0:44:12Well, it worked.
0:44:12 > 0:44:16From then on, Royal Naval officers were aggressive to a fault.
0:44:17 > 0:44:21Relentless aggression became a hallmark of the Royal Navy,
0:44:21 > 0:44:26a psychological weapon just as important as the quality of its ships and guns.
0:44:26 > 0:44:31But victory in this war would require more than just aggression.
0:44:31 > 0:44:33The Navy needed a strategy.
0:44:38 > 0:44:41Back at the Admiralty, the First Lord, Anson,
0:44:41 > 0:44:44was wrestling with the challenges of fighting war on this global scale.
0:44:44 > 0:44:47Even though British naval expenditure was twice that of France,
0:44:47 > 0:44:53there still weren't enough ships to send in sufficient numbers to all the different theatres of war.
0:44:53 > 0:44:57And so instead Anson seized on a very simple idea.
0:44:57 > 0:45:02It had first been conceived by Admiral Edward Vernon in a previous war.
0:45:02 > 0:45:05Now, Vernon's idea was keeping a fleet of battle ships here to
0:45:05 > 0:45:08the south-west of the British Isles.
0:45:08 > 0:45:12Here they could keep an eye on the French naval base at Brest,
0:45:12 > 0:45:16blockading the French ships in there. But also protect the trade coming back in here
0:45:16 > 0:45:21from North America and the Caribbean, and up here from the Mediterranean.
0:45:21 > 0:45:23But there was one key problem.
0:45:23 > 0:45:26Any fleet of ships being kept at sea for that long
0:45:26 > 0:45:30would inevitably come up against the two deadliest enemies of the sailor,
0:45:30 > 0:45:33malnutrition and disease.
0:45:34 > 0:45:3918th-century naval rations were based around salted meat and sea biscuits.
0:45:39 > 0:45:44Any food that couldn't be dried or salted would quickly rot.
0:45:44 > 0:45:50So a balanced diet was almost impossible, and that's where the problems began.
0:45:50 > 0:45:54'Even on the Navy's most modern warship, maintaining food supplies,
0:45:54 > 0:45:58'vittling, as it's known, is still a prime consideration.
0:45:58 > 0:46:03'On HMS Daring, it's the responsibility of Petty Officer Neil Mogridge.'
0:46:03 > 0:46:04Come through this way.
0:46:06 > 0:46:08What's in here?
0:46:08 > 0:46:11This is the main freezer compartment.
0:46:11 > 0:46:14Right. Ooh, it's freezing.
0:46:14 > 0:46:18This gets to about minus 22 in here, so quite cold.
0:46:18 > 0:46:21I can see some frozen chips down there. Is everything chips?
0:46:21 > 0:46:25No, no, we keep your basic meats on board.
0:46:25 > 0:46:29Chicken, minced beef you can see down here,
0:46:29 > 0:46:31stuff like gammon, bacon, sausages.
0:46:31 > 0:46:36It's literally everything you go down the supermarket for you can pretty much find down here.
0:46:37 > 0:46:42So if we just steamed off into the horizon now, how many days can we last for with a full hold of food?
0:46:43 > 0:46:48What we call endurance on this ship is a maximum of 90 days.
0:46:48 > 0:46:52So the ship can actually stay at sea and sustain itself for 90 days
0:46:52 > 0:46:54on a balanced diet for the ship's company.
0:46:54 > 0:46:58But that must represent quite a lot of money, so what's a full hold cost?
0:46:58 > 0:47:05You're probably looking on a maximum endurance probably between £150,000 to £200,000 worth of food on board.
0:47:05 > 0:47:08So how much is that per sailor per day?
0:47:08 > 0:47:15At the moment we get a massive £2.31 to feed per man per day.
0:47:16 > 0:47:22Keeping the crews well fed was the greatest challenge Admiral Anson faced
0:47:22 > 0:47:26back in the 1750s as he tried maintain his western squadron at sea.
0:47:30 > 0:47:34If this has been an 18th-century ship, within a few weeks of leaving harbour
0:47:34 > 0:47:36these sailors would be reduced to eating
0:47:36 > 0:47:43rock-hard stale biscuits crawling with weevils, and water polluted with algae and bacteria.
0:47:43 > 0:47:48Within about six weeks typically, diseases like dysentery, typhus and scurvy would spread.
0:47:48 > 0:47:50No-one knew what caused these diseases,
0:47:50 > 0:47:54but Anson did know that fresh produce seemed to prevent them.
0:47:54 > 0:47:59Therefore in order for the western squadron to become an effective weapon
0:47:59 > 0:48:02they had to work out a proper way of re-vittling it.
0:48:02 > 0:48:05This was the challenge that Anson set to the man he placed in command
0:48:05 > 0:48:09of the western squadron, the appropriately named Admiral Edward Hawke.
0:48:11 > 0:48:17Hawke had over 20 years of command experience in the Navy and had earned a reputation
0:48:17 > 0:48:21for great tactical skill and single-minded aggression.
0:48:21 > 0:48:23He was the personification of the new Navy.
0:48:26 > 0:48:29He was given 30 ships and 14,000 men.
0:48:29 > 0:48:32His orders were to position his squadron
0:48:32 > 0:48:36just outside the French naval base at Brest and to stay there.
0:48:36 > 0:48:42Realising the implications of this, Hawke set up a supply chain from Plymouth to deliver
0:48:42 > 0:48:47fresh fruit and vegetables and even live cattle directly to his squadron, ship to ship.
0:48:49 > 0:48:55This beat scurvy for the first time, allowing Hawke to stay at sea almost indefinitely.
0:48:55 > 0:48:58It was a feat unimaginable 80 years before.
0:49:03 > 0:49:07With the threat of disease eliminated, Hawke could concentrate on his mission
0:49:07 > 0:49:11and that was maintaining such a strong presence outside the French Naval base
0:49:11 > 0:49:13that their fleet would not dare to leave.
0:49:13 > 0:49:16It was called close blockade and it was the first time in history
0:49:16 > 0:49:19it had ever been tried successfully on this scale.
0:49:19 > 0:49:26From May to November 1759, Hawke bottled up the French fleet in its harbour.
0:49:26 > 0:49:30It was a massive achievement and it had a decisive impact on the outcome of the war
0:49:30 > 0:49:35and all of it was done without Hawke's big battleships firing a shot in anger.
0:49:36 > 0:49:40Not only was the French navy rendered utterly powerless,
0:49:40 > 0:49:45their land forces in America and India were cut off from vital supplies and reinforcements.
0:49:46 > 0:49:50And as French forces around the world began to capitulate,
0:49:50 > 0:49:54in Britain the church bells rang in celebration.
0:49:54 > 0:49:58It became known as the annus mirabilis, the year of wonders.
0:50:01 > 0:50:06First to fall was Guadaloupe, the jewel in France's Caribbean crown.
0:50:06 > 0:50:11Then Quebec, capital of her vast North American empire, was captured by the British.
0:50:14 > 0:50:17At sea, the Gibraltar Squadron attacked and destroyed
0:50:17 > 0:50:20the French Mediterranean fleet off the coast of Portugal.
0:50:20 > 0:50:23While in the east, the Royal Navy chased the French
0:50:23 > 0:50:28out of the Indian Ocean, allowing the British Army to achieve victory on land.
0:50:32 > 0:50:37It was the greatest year in British military history and, being Brits,
0:50:37 > 0:50:41they turned it into a year of wild rejoicing.
0:50:41 > 0:50:43One author, Horace Walpole,
0:50:43 > 0:50:48wrote that the church bells were "threadbare with the ringing of victories".
0:50:48 > 0:50:52But, across the Channel, the French has one card left to play.
0:50:52 > 0:50:58King Louis XV, with his empire in ruins, his trade destroyed and his Treasury empty,
0:50:58 > 0:51:05ordered his Brest fleet to collect an army and head to sea to invade Britain.
0:51:05 > 0:51:08His Admiral, Conflans, hoped to avoid the Royal Navy,
0:51:08 > 0:51:14but if they did meet he promised, "I will fight them with all possible glory."
0:51:17 > 0:51:20The French navy's opportunity came in November,
0:51:20 > 0:51:25when autumn gales scattered the British ships that were blockading Brest.
0:51:25 > 0:51:29Immediately, the French admiral, Conflans, took to sea.
0:51:29 > 0:51:35He headed south to pick up a fleet of ships with soldiers embarked and ready to launch an invasion.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38Admiral Hawke wasted no time in pursuing him,
0:51:38 > 0:51:43sensing an opportunity for the decisive clash he craved.
0:51:43 > 0:51:47He caught up with the French here in Quiberon Bay.
0:51:50 > 0:51:53That reef there, with the rollers crashing onto it
0:51:53 > 0:51:57and all the white water around it, is the reason the French thought they'd be safe
0:51:57 > 0:52:02because they were coming into this dangerous bay between two reefs.
0:52:02 > 0:52:08As you can see from the chart, there was almost an impenetrable barrier of rocks, islands, and reefs.
0:52:08 > 0:52:11I've never seen Quiberon Bay before and it's absolutely fascinating.
0:52:11 > 0:52:16These incredibly jagged reefs here are absolutely terrifying, terrifying for me,
0:52:16 > 0:52:20but terrifying for the British ships who had no charts of this area.
0:52:20 > 0:52:27The British ships were charging into an unknown bay with the wind blowing on shore on a November twilight.
0:52:38 > 0:52:42I've only got about half my sails up today because it's so windy,
0:52:42 > 0:52:46and if you put any more up it risks ripping fittings out the deck and doing huge damage to the ship.
0:52:49 > 0:52:55Only that incredible aggression of the kind that had been bred in the Royal Navy over the past decade
0:52:55 > 0:52:57and reinforced by the execution of Byng,
0:52:57 > 0:53:00only that incredible aggression would have driven those men in here.
0:53:05 > 0:53:12And on that November night there was a full gale blowing from that direction.
0:53:20 > 0:53:23Hawke himself was so keen to get to grips with the French,
0:53:23 > 0:53:28particularly the French Admiral, the French flagship, his opposite number.
0:53:28 > 0:53:33His captain warned him, he said it's too dangerous, it's too dark and we can't go in after those Frenchmen.
0:53:33 > 0:53:36Hawke said, "Your duty was to tell me that it's not safe,
0:53:36 > 0:53:40"but your duty is also to obey my orders and lay me alongside that French flagship."
0:53:40 > 0:53:43Hawke was not gonna make the same mistake that Byng had made
0:53:43 > 0:53:45and he was not gonna let these French get away.
0:53:45 > 0:53:48After six months of tedious blockading,
0:53:48 > 0:53:51he now had his chance to destroy the flower of the French fleet.
0:54:01 > 0:54:06He came alongside and he waited so close that his men could reach out and touch the French ship
0:54:06 > 0:54:09with their hands and he fired a giant broadside into them.
0:54:11 > 0:54:15Tonnes of lead pounding into a French ship at point blank range.
0:54:15 > 0:54:19The wood shattered, sending splinters a yard long cartwheeling through the air,
0:54:19 > 0:54:23scything people down, and soon the sea was covered in wreckage, masts,
0:54:23 > 0:54:28survivors clinging to the masts, dead bodies, a scene of total anarchy.
0:54:32 > 0:54:36The French lost five ships and 2,500 men.
0:54:36 > 0:54:38The British only lost two ships.
0:54:41 > 0:54:46The battle fought in these waters is one of the most decisive in British history.
0:54:46 > 0:54:52It annihilated French naval power and it removed any chance France had of getting back her colonies.
0:54:52 > 0:54:55The Royal Navy, in this storm-tossed bay,
0:54:55 > 0:54:58fought and won a battle for global supremacy.
0:55:12 > 0:55:17The story of Britain's transformation inside 80 years is a remarkable one.
0:55:17 > 0:55:25In 1690, England had been the sick man of Europe, broke and completely at the mercy of the French Navy.
0:55:25 > 0:55:30Now in 1759, the situation was completely reversed.
0:55:30 > 0:55:35Now, for the first time in history, one nation dominated the world's oceans.
0:55:35 > 0:55:39Britannia really did rule the waves.
0:55:43 > 0:55:47Behind the vanguard of its now formidable naval forces,
0:55:47 > 0:55:53Britain had become a commercial powerhouse, boosted by an explosion in credit and overseas trade.
0:55:54 > 0:55:56General salute.
0:55:56 > 0:55:59Present...arms!
0:56:03 > 0:56:05At the same time, mastery of the sea had helped secure
0:56:05 > 0:56:10the first footholds of empire around the globe.
0:56:17 > 0:56:23The Navy had delivered victory and Britain was prosperous, afloat on a golden ocean.
0:56:23 > 0:56:26THEY CHEER
0:56:36 > 0:56:41But away from all the celebrations something else was going on, unnoticed by most.
0:56:41 > 0:56:46In 1690, England had been part of an alliance of smaller nations.
0:56:46 > 0:56:52Together they had resisted the continental ambitions of the French King Louis XIV and they'd survived.
0:56:52 > 0:56:55But by 1759, what the British couldn't understand
0:56:55 > 0:57:00was that the rest of Europe now regarded them as as great a threat to liberty
0:57:00 > 0:57:03as Louis had been 80 years before.
0:57:03 > 0:57:07Britannia was triumphant but alone.
0:57:08 > 0:57:12Next time, how the Navy forged an empire that became the envy
0:57:12 > 0:57:17of the age, fuelling a ferocious conflict with her old enemy, France,
0:57:17 > 0:57:22and transforming one British commander into a national icon.
0:57:43 > 0:57:47Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:57:47 > 0:57:50E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk