The Invisible College by Robert Lomas

Author:Robert Lomas
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781409082019
Publisher: Transworld
Published: 2016-03-18T13:15:45.894065+00:00

During the period of the Protectorate the colonies had prospered under benign neglect from Cromwell’s England. However, by 1660 they were under threat from the increasingly confident Dutch. It is surprising that they had survived at all under Charles’s grandfather James VI(I). His navy had become run down and would not have been able to protect the young colonies from a determined naval action by any of the European powers. The welfare and payment of his seamen had been neglected and the management of his naval dockyards had been a byword for corruption. Fortunately, during this period possible European predators had been distracted by the Thirty Years War (1618–48). By the time they were again looking westwards to the New World Cromwell had partly rebuilt the navy, under Admiral Robert Blake. Cromwell was able to use Blake to subdue the colonies and drive off the Dutch but he was no empire builder. His iron Puritanism and reluctant dictatorship did not encourage new colonies. He did, however, leave a small but respectable navy when he died. But Charles must have known that his fleet was nowhere near strong enough to protect his newly restored overseas assets from any determined attack by the Dutch and it had suffered a further two-year deterioration in the confusion since Cromwell’s death.

Charles II inherited two major naval problems. Cromwell’s reign had caused an unnatural repression in trade and overseas adventures, but with the Restoration there was a sudden surge of energy and expansionism. Along with this new energy came a greater interest in enlarging the existing colonies and founding new ones in the Americas. The First Dutch War had, however, failed to solve the problems of Dutch and English competition in America. New Amsterdam, to the north of New England, was thriving, and its Dutch masters also had expansionist plans. They had a large merchant navy and plans to make it even larger. The colonies were still bridling under the trade restrictions Cromwell had forced on them with his Navigation Act of 1651, which forbade the carrying of English merchandise on Dutch ships. The colonists of the New World were keen to trade with the Dutch and to cut out the run-down and expensive English merchant fleet.

His second problem was the French. There was a real danger of France joining in the game of empire and supporting the Dutch in America. One of Charles’s first acts as King was to reinforce and extend Cromwell’s Navigation Act of 1651, but legislation is worthless without the military strength to back it up. Charles simply did not have a strong enough navy. He clearly knew what had to be done. The Dutch were already a threat to the control and growth of the colonies and seemed to be developing into a threat to the security of his newly restored Kingdom. But where was he to get the money and the expertise to develop his navy?

Charles needed more ships and the ability to sail them quickly to trouble-spots on the other side of the world.

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