Читать книгу A Merchant Fleet at War онлайн

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The Mercantile Marine and Navy have always been so closely knit that it is often difficult to separate their histories. The Mercantile Marine was in reality, as has been said, the parent of the latter. As the State grew, and civilisation became more complex, a process of separation between the ships of commerce and the ships of war was inevitable, and the Navy became more and more a distinct Royal Service. The increasing difficulties of the problems of defence, armament, and so on, led to a process of specialisation, and could only be adequately studied and the Empire’s growing needs supplied by a State Department. On the other hand, the Mercantile Marine remained, and still remains, individualistic, each merchant ship-owner, or company of ship-owners, building the sort of vessel best adapted to the particular enterprise in hand. Thus we have sailing from our ports, ships of all descriptions, ocean-going liners carrying passengers, cargoes and mails, as well as tramps, colliers, cold-storage vessels, and an infinity of other types.