Publisher's note

SAILOR'S TALES

Thanks mainly to the novels of C S Forester, Patrick O'Brian and Dudley Pope, there has been an upsurge of interest in the navy and sea life in the age of sail. This new series of contemporary memoirs and autobiographies fully supports the old notion that truth is stranger than fiction, since the best of the sailors' own tales are just as entertaining, informative and amusing, while they shed faithful light on the curious and outlandish world of the seaman. Avoiding the oft-reprinted or anthologised pieces, `Sailors' Tales' offers only the rarest and most authentic accounts; but just as importantly they have been selected for their entertainment value, much enhanced in these newly designed editions.

Blurb

REMINISCENCES OF
A NAVAL OFFICER
This fascinating account of the day-to-day life and career of a naval officer during the Napoleonic Wars is a wonderful testament to the resourcefulness of the sailor, both in the face of battle and in his domestic rounds.

During the 1790s Crawford was involved in almost constant combat with the French invasion flotilla at Boulogne, and was present at the several attempts to attack the enemy ships in port with special weapons such as Congreve rockets and Fulton's `torpedoes'. Ingenuity also came to the fore in port when he transformed the quarterdeck of a frigate into a dancefloor for a ball on board. After participating in Admiral Duckworth's passage of the Dardanelles in 1809, he went on to serve in the Mediterranean, and was with the fleet supporting the Anglo-Allied army which landed in eastern Spain, taking part in the siege of Tarragona in 1811.

His intimate descriptions of shipboard life and the small-scale actions that were the common experience of the Royal Navy in the Napoleonic Wars make these memoirs compulsive reading.
Front cover illustration: Admiral Mitchell's action near Boulogne, 31 October 1803, by John Livesay. (National Maritime Museum)
ISBN 1-86176-109-0
CHATHAM PUBLISHING

Contents

Introduction by Tom Pocock
1 Joining the Navy
2 Under Captain Owen
3 The Inshore Squadron
4 Attack on the Boulogne Flotilla
5 Gale off the Elbe
6 A Visit Home
7 The Royal George
8 In the Mediterranean
9 The Dardanelles
10 To Cadiz
11 At Port Mahon
12 In the Gulf of Genoa
13 Blockading Toulon
14 The French Convoy
15 Captain Hallowell and the Tigre
16 Return to England
17 The Malta
18 Off Alicante
19 The Siege of Tarragona
20 The Catalonian Campaign
21 Napoleon in Exile
22 Home and Promotion

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