Royal Navy

(proper noun)

The Royal Navy is the principal naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. From the end of the 17th century until well into the 20th century it was the most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant world power.

Related Terms

Examples of Royal Navy in the following topics:

  • The Battle of the Atlantic

    • The Battle of the Atlantic was the longest military campaign of World War II, pitting the German Navy and Airforce against the Royal Canadian Navy, Royal Navy, the United States Navy, and Allied merchant shipping.
    • The Battle of the Atlantic pitted U-boats and other warships of the Kriegsmarine (German Navy) and aircraft of the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) against the Royal Canadian Navy, Royal Navy, the United States Navy, and Allied merchant shipping.
    • The Germans were joined by submarines of the Italian Royal Navy (Regia Marina) after their Axis ally Italy entered the war on June 10, 1940.
    • In 1941, material captured by the Royal Navy allowed all U-boat traffic to be read for several weeks, until the keys ran out.
    • Discuss the tonnage war in the Atlantic between Allied merchant ships and the German Navy and Airforce.

  • Slavery and the Revolution

    • Because of manpower shortages at sea, both the Continental navy and Royal Navy signed African Americans.
    • In state navies, some blacks served as pilots; South Carolina had significant numbers of black pilots.
    • Some African Americans were captured from the Royal Navy and used by the Patriots on their vessels.

  • Harassment by Britain

    • Impressment refers to the act of taking men into a navy by force and without notice.
    • Beginning in 1664, the Royal British Navy used this practice in wartime, and during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, impressment allowed the British to crew their warships.
    • As a result, the Royal Navy impressed more than 9,000 sailors who claimed American citizenship.
    • During the United Kingdom's wars with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France (1793 to 1815), the Royal Navy aggressively reclaimed British deserters on board ships of other nations, both by halting and searching merchant vessels and, in many cases, by searching American port cities.
    • The crew of the HMS Leopard pursued, attacked, and boarded the American frigate looking to impress deserters from the Royal Navy.

  • The Setbacks in the Atlantic

    • In 1939, the Kriegsmarine lacked the strength to challenge the combined British Royal Navy and French Navy, the Marine Nationale, for command of the sea.
    • The Royal Navy quickly introduced a convoy system for the protection of trade that gradually extended out from the British Isles, eventually reaching as far as Panama, Bombay, and Singapore.
    • Convoys allowed the Royal Navy to concentrate its escorts near the one place where they would find the U-boats — the convoys.
    • The Royal Navy formed anti-submarine hunting groups based on aircraft carriers to patrol the shipping lanes in the Western Approaches and hunt for German U-boats.
    • On September 14, 1939, Britain's most modern carrier, HMS Ark Royal, narrowly avoided being sunk when three torpedoes from U-39 exploded prematurely.

  • Fighting for Liberty

    • At the Siege of Yorktown in 1781, Baron Closen, a German officer in the French Royal Deux-Ponts Regiment, estimated the American army to be comprised of about one quarter black males.
    • Because of manpower shortages at sea, both the Continental navy and Royal Navy signed African Americans into the navy.
    • In state navies, some blacks served as pilots, such as in South Carolina which had significant numbers of black pilots.
    • Some African Americans had been captured from the Royal Navy and used by the Patriots on their vessels.

  • Last Efforts for Peace

    • The press at the time reported that the only thing the military was ready for was an enemy fleet attempting to seize New York harbor at a time when the German battle fleet was penned up by the Royal Navy.
    • Navy Secretary Josephus Daniels, ignoring the nation's strategic needs and disdaining the advice of experts, suspended meetings of the Joint Army and Navy Board for two years in response to unwelcome advice.
    • The Navy's only official war strategy, the "Black Plan," assumed the British Royal Navy did not exist and that German battleships were moving freely about the Atlantic and the Caribbean, threatening the Panama Canal.
    • Daniels' tenure would have been even less successful without the energetic efforts of Assistant Navy Secretary Franklin D.
    • Wilson, less fearful of the Navy than other branches of the service, embraced a long-term building program designed to make the U.S. battleship fleet the equal of the Royal Navy by the mid-1920s.

  • America's Growing Involvement in WWII

    • Navy in exchange for land rights on British possessions.
    • Thus, following the evacuation of British forces from France, the British Royal Navy found itself in immediate need of ships.
    • Thus, on September 2, 1940, United States Secretary of State Cordell Hull signed an agreement to transfer U.S. warships to the British Royal Navy.
    • Navy destroyers.
    • This agreement provided Britain with more ships for its navy, and also meant that the still-neutral U.S. took over defense of Britain's bases.

  • Slavery during the Revolution

    • Lord Dunmore, Royal Governor of Virginia, issued a proclamation offering freedom to all slaves who would fight for the British during the Revolutionary War.
    • George Washington lifted the ban on black enlistment in the Continental Army in January 1776 in response to a need to fill manpower shortages in America’s fledgling army and navy.
    • African Americans piloted vessels, handled ammunition, and even served as pilots in various state navies.
    • Some African Americans were captured from the Royal Navy and used by Patriots on their vessels.

  • The Debate over Preparedness

    • Neither the Army nor Navy was ready for war.
    • At this point, Wilson, less fearful of the Navy than of other branches of the service, embraced a long-term building program designed to make the U.S. fleet of battleships the equal of the Royal Navy by the mid-1920s.
    • The House gutted the naval plans as well, defeating a "big navy" plan.

  • The Madison Presidency

    • The United States entered the War of 1812 due to increased aggression by the British Navy on the open seas.
    • At the time, Britain used its navy to prevent American ships from trading with France—an act the United States considered a violation of international law.
    • The British Royal Navy boarded American ships on the high seas and impressed their seamen, forcing them to serve on the Royal Navy's ships.
    • Madison called on Congress to put the country, "into an armor and an attitude demanded by the crisis": He specifically recommended enlarging the army, preparing the militia, finishing the military academy, stockpiling munitions, and expanding the navy.
    • Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry defeats British Navy at the Battle of Lake Erie in 1813.