The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 72

Past and Present Views on Britain's Naval Defences

Past and Present Views on Britain's Naval Defences.

"Mein Gott! Vat a city vor to sack!"—Field-Marshal Blucher, on his visit to London, after Waterloo.

"The Royal Navy of England hath ever been its greatest defence and ornament. It is its ancient and natural strength—the floating bulwark of our island."—Black-stone (Commentaries, 1765).

"England will defend her Colonies with her last ship and her last shilling."—Speech of the late Lord Granville, in the early sixties.

[This declaration was dragged from Lord Granville by reason of the popular feeling which had been created against the late Mr. John Bright's assertion that the Colonies were "a burden and a danger" to the Mother Country, and conferred little economical benefit; and against his doctrine of "Wayward sisters, go in peace!" Happily, all this has been changed, and the financial and commercial world now knows and appreciates the great and growing advantages of the Colonies to the Mother Country, and to her productive industries and requirements.—D.M.L.]

"We are bound to give to the Colonies effective protection by naval means. Depending, as we do, on imported food, it is essential that our supplies should be made secure. It is not too much to say that upon the efficiency of its naval defences the British Empire will stand or fall."—Lord Brassey.

"One hundred years ago England was nearly, if not quite, self-supporting. To-day we are not provisioned for more than six weeks or two months."—Hon. T.A. Brassey, in Nineteenth Century.

"The continued advance upon India, of Russia and France make it necessary for the frontier to be closely guarded."—Address of Lord Lansdowne, January 22.

"Loss of the Colonies would be England's ruin. The active naval preparations at present carried on by Russia and France are directed against England."—Speech of the Right-Honorable Arthur Balfour at Manchester, January 23.

"France has greatly increased her Empire, not only in China and Tonquin but in Africa, and has extended her interests in other parts of the world; and in the event of a war with this country all these interests would be jeopardised, and in a very short time France would be cut off from communication with her outlying dependencies in different parts of the world."—Speech of Mr. Shaw-Lefevre in Parliament, May, 1889.

"Spanish military experts are advising the fortification of the Bay of Algeciras, to the west of Gibraltar, in order to secure power to silence the forts at Gibraltar."—Cable message from Madrid, January 23.

"In any future war in which the British Empire may become involved, British commerce will undoubtedly suffer losses. Their number and extent will depend on the strength and efficiency of the British Navy; but it is only in the case of that strength being allowed to fall to a point which will leave the command of the sea in doubt that British commerce will be seriously interrupted. In such a case it is idle for British merchants to talk of securing the safety of their trade under a neutral flag. No Power with which we might be at war would respect the neutral flag where ships were carrying food supplies absolutely vital to the existence of the enemy. Place the command of the sea in doubt, and the ruin of British commerce and the British Empire is assured.—Hon. T. A. Bras ey.

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"The wealth of this country cannot be concealed or withdrawn from the eyes of the world. Lord Salisbury warns the country that its position at present is far from one of security. It was useful to point out, as Lord Salisbury did to the people of Cardiff, the consequences that would follow from even the temporary ascendancy of a foreign fleet outside their port. Yet, without bombarding a town, without in any way bringing the horrors of war home to a single port, an enemy who could drive our fleets off the sea would hold us entirely at his mercy.

"It is not a question of losing greatness, or consideration, or Empire. It is a question of losing our very independence, and of suffering actual conquest without putting the enemy to the expense of invasion. Our frontier everywhere is the sea, and our natural existence depends upon our holding it against all comers."—The Times, November 29.

"We are literally sleeping upon a volcano at a time when sleep should be allied with the most acute watchfulness in preparing for a peril that is imminent. The destruction of every empire has been preceded, after a period of careless luxury, by a comatose condition of the mind which has closed the eyes to external warnings. If 18 millions per annum are necessary for expenditure upon an army which would be positively helpless in a war with a first-rate Power, does it not prove to the meanest understanding that we depend for our existence entirely upon our Navy? We should lose no time in doubling cur effective naval strength."—Sir Samuel Baker

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