Warships of the Napoleonic Era. Design, Development and Deployment

book summary

Between 1793 and 1815 two decades of unrelenting naval warfare raised the sailing man of war to the zenith of its effectiveness as a weapon of war. Every significant seapower was involved in this conflict, and at some point virtually all of them were arrayed against Great Britain. A large number of enemy warships were captured in battle, making them of interest to British artists, engravers and printmakers, while the Admiralty ordered accurate draughts to be made of many of these prizes. Consequently, for this era the ships of all navies, not just British, can be illustrated by an unprecedented variety of paintings, models or plans.
This book reproduces many of the best (and least familiar) images of the ships, chosen for their accuracy, detail and sheer visual power in an extra-large format that does full justice to the images themselves. These are backed by an authoritative text that looks at how the ships were used by the different navies, and explains the function and development of the apparently bewildering array of rates and types.
CONTENTS:
Introduction
The First Rate
The Second Rate. Speed and Length
The 80-Gun Ship
The 74-Gun Ship
The 64-Gun Ship
The 50-Gun Ship. The 44-gun two-decker
Frigates:
-Post ships of 20 and 24 guns
-Frigates armed with 9pdrs
-Frigates armed with 12pdrs
-Frigates armed with 18pdrs
-Frigates armed with 24pdrs
-The role of the frigate
-Quality versus Quality
Sloops of War
Gunboats and Gunbrigs. Experiments and Innovation
Cutters and Schooners
Bomb Vessels and Fireships. The invasion threat
Service Craft. Great Lakes Warships
France:
-The French fleet
-Ship types and their roles
-The Boulogne Flotilla
-French design rationale
Spain. The Spanish fleet
The Netherlands
Denmark-Norway
Other European Navies: Russia, Portugal, Sweden
The United States of America
Sources and Notes