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| Unpooped http://www.nelsonandhisworld.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=100 |
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| Author: | Tony [ Tue Apr 08, 2008 1:15 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Unpooped |
In the year or two following the Battle of Trafalgar, the poop decks were removed from some of the ships that took part. This information comes from two letters written by Collingwood to Captain Mansfield during 1807, one of which Oliver Warner quoted in "The Life and Letters of Vice-Admiral Lord Collingwood". In the first Collingwood says: "...for if they persist in building those wall sided ships - no power of art can keep them together - a feeble attempt is made towards it by cutting their poops off - that I consider as a step in the declension - for every officer knows the great advantages which result from so commanding a station as the Poop - would they go back to the construction of Venerables, Cullodens, Terribles &c. - we should then have ships that could carry their poops through a storm... - every ship in that action [Trafalgar] had a Poop - though some have been since removed..." In the second he says: "...I am sorry to hear they have unpooped the Minotaur - what infatuation is it that has made Poops the victims? ..." I haven't come across any other references to poop decks being removed at this time, although I know older ships were sometimes cut down so that they carried fewer guns. A couple of questions: Does anyone know which other ships had their poops removed? How would the officer's accomodation have been reorganised after the poop was removed? |
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