Comments by "HaJo Os." (@hajoos.8360) on "HMS Victory - The Original Fast Battleship" video.

  1. I have a lot of other sources quoting Victory was a slow cow. Anyway, Frenchies were usually bigger, heavier and faster than British ones. The speed-situation improved when the Brits added very early the copper-plates. Usually the Spaniards built the best ships at all in the 18th century, but their crews, and more their officers were miserably trained.
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  2.  @Drachinifel  Hope, you will be patient, all my books are packed in boxes, because i have to renovate my flat. And my flat is complicated. Of course, i read sources, that HMS Victory was fast. A major problem is, that we cannot rely on painted pictures. If this would be true, that Victory was some knots faster than other British man'o'wars then Victory had to sail always with reduced sail in the line of battle, anywhere at Trafalgar or St.Vincent. Usually those ships were slow which had after a long time of service a lot of seaweed on the hull, which reduced the speed. On copper-plates this process of growing seaweed on the hull was exceeded, so the ships faster. On battle-sketches of Trafalgar in the lee-line led by Collingwood on Royal Sovereign usually we recongnize more gaps in the line caused by different speed of Collingwood's ships.
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  3. This is a fairy tale. Victory was slow as a cow. The Brits always built more 3-deckers than other nations, watch the Battle of Trafalgar. The British admirals copied it from the Dutch who liked a comfortable life on a warship. The Spaniards built instead longer 2 deckers with 80 guns which were more easy to handle, so the British admiralty tended to switch and razed several 64 to heavy frigates as Indifatigable with a main armament of 24s. Till the Napoleonic wars the French built their ships with a higher tonnage than the Brits. But from the Napoleonic wars the French built longer 2deckers with 80 guns als flagships like Bucentaure. The ability of British shipbuilders was quite low. The French and Spaniards had always better constructors. The main British measure to make their bad ships faster were the copper-plates, which gained the advantage.
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  4.  @Drachinifel  yes, the Dutch did not built 3 deckers, but more comfortable ships. The razed 64s are only an example for better handling in comparison to dwars-driven x-deckers by a remaining high firepower. 74s were, of course, the backbone of the fleets of all nations. Check the history of the HMS Gibraltar (Fénix), captured at the battle of Cape Vincent 1780. The main point is not ship construction, but education of the officers staff, which gave Britain the advantage. The trial of Admiral Byng after his failure at Minorca enforced the british tactic of shear aggression. The Spaniards and the French (except the Dutch) wanted to project operations, but they never wanted to fight a sea-battle. An french exception was Suffren, who was more british than the Brits. At Trafalgar the eldest British 3-decker was Britannia, 3 years older than Victory, all other 3-deckers were much younger than Victory. If the construction of Victory would have been so superiour, the admiralty would have copied it for all further 1. class or 2. class ships. At Trafalgar Royal Sovereign developed the utmost speed, because her copper-plates were brandnew.
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