Chapter 683: Chapter 592 The Problem with Talents
The British “press gangs” would even go to the United States to capture sailors—they claid those sailors were immigrants from England who still had obligations to serve in the Royal Navy and took them away to be stuffed into British warships.
During the Napoleonic Wars, the British Navy’s battleship “Leopard” directly intercepted the United States Navy’s “Chesapeake” in Boston Port and attempted to board the ship to press n into service.
As a result, the Aricans imdiately sounded the battle alarm, and after the exchange of fire, the “Chesapeake” surrendered, and the British took so of the sailors on board…
This was the famous “Chesapeake Incident,” which beca an important catalyst for the War of 1812.
As for why France did not adopt England’s practices,
One reason was that the French people were not as compliant as the British commoners; they had “protest” in their veins. If the French Navy dared to press n like the British press gangs, they would face riots from the citizens of the port cities.
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Furthermore, the number of French sailors was far less than the nationwide mariti-dependent English; sailors were relatively rare resources, and the French Navy was unwilling to severely offend the seafaring community.
Therefore, France adopted the current reward system—the sailor registration system.
Any sailor who registered at the governnt office could receive subsidies of several dozen francs per year, but when the navy needed them, registered sailors must fulfill their service obligations.
The navy would even pay for the registered sailors’ travel expenses from their hotowns to the camps and double the spoils of war during conflicts.
Yet, even so, the French sailors, “loving freedom and unruly,” still did not want to register.
For example, the navy’s registration list currently only had about 10,000 people. Yet, the gap for sailors during warti could reach up to forty or fifty thousand.
This forced the French Navy to conscript many inexperienced individuals to board ships, even temporarily borrowing people from the army—so of these individuals had never even set foot on a ship before.
With such quality of sailors, it was impossible to say that their warships were originally not as good as British ones. Even if the French and the English had identical fleets, France would still end up disastrously defeated.
The well-known Battle of Trafalgar during Napoleonic tis was exactly like that. The French and Spanish Combined Fleet’s warships were not much inferior to the British ones, but the outco still resulted in a devastating defeat by the British, with skilled British sailors playing a critical role.
After hearing Marquis Castries, Joseph imdiately thought of adopting the model used by the army.
“Perhaps,” he said, looking at the Navy Minister, “we could establish a naval academy to train a large number of qualified sailors.”
Marquis Castries seed not very enthusiastic and said diplomatically, “Your Highness, this might help sowhat, but it will hardly solve the problem completely.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
“We need a large number of crew mbers, like during the Seven Years’ War, where we conscripted forty to fifty thousand sailors.”
“Fifty thousand?” Joseph frowned, realizing the number was indeed significant, but still insisted, “Then we will train fifty thousand cadets.”
For the sake of naval developnt, he was willing to invest substantial funds.
Marquis Castries imdiately waved his hands, saying, “Your Highness, we really can’t use that many people.”
Joseph staggered back, “What do you an? Do you need fifty thousand sailors or not?”
Marquis Castries hurriedly explained, “Your Highness, the navy usually only needs over six thousand personnel. It’s only during war that we need tens of thousands of sailors. This ans we don’t have to sustain such a large number of crew mbers…”
He elaborated further, and Joseph finally understood; normally, nearly 70% of the fleet remained docked at the port—it was unavoidable, as these money-consuming behemoths, once deployed, would cost a massive amount of money.
This was also why the navy’s expenses were substantial during the war.
Moreover, the number of combat positions on the warships also significantly increased during warti.
For example, a third-class battleship normally only needed to carry 40 marines, but during a war, it needed a full crew of 150 people.
These marines, unlike the marines of later tis, primarily served to supervise the crew and help the captain maintain “control.” Of course, they could also fire at enemy ships during intense battles.
At the sa ti, the number of sailors on the warships increased during warti as well. For instance, gunners definitely had to be fully staffed, which was not necessary during peaceti. Additional sailors were also required for other positions as replacents during battle losses.
This ant that after the outbreak of war, the navy’s need for crew mbers would surge dramatically.
In this aspect, the British Navy was even more extre, with their crew size increasing tenfold during warti!
And since sailors’ salaries were quite higher than infantryn’s, the navy, which was always strapped for funds, definitely did not want to maintain so many freeloaders during peaceti.
More importantly, the navy preferred having these sailors go out to sea with rchant ships rather than idle on land, as this helped continuously improve their navigational skills.
In this era, the mode of operation of rchant ships and warships was nearly identical, including the commands.
The rchant sailors brought on board warships could imdiately engage in combat.
As Joseph and company sat down at the dining table, he pondered, “So, it seems that what we lack are not sailors but ordinary sean.”
Marquis Castelli imdiately nodded, “Indeed so, Your Highness. It’s not just the navy; our rchant ships constantly struggle to find enough sean. rchants often have to go round to Italy to recruit people before heading for long voyages.”
“Why do people not wish to be sean then?”
“This…” The Navy Minister seed a bit embarrassed, and his voice dropped considerably, “When we had North Arican and Far Eastern colonies, this problem wasn’t so severe…”
Joseph was silent as well.
Indeed, France lost all its overseas colonies during the Seven Years’ War; without the support of massive overseas trade, who would beco a seaman and not starve to death?
England alone supported many sailors with just the British-Indian trade route. So, Louis XV could still compete with England on the seas back then, but afterward, the situation worsened progressively.
He sighed deeply and said, “The naval academy still needs to be established. We should strive to support the foundation of the navy with professional soldiers. This will also allow us to implent uniform standards of combat and navigation across the fleet.”
In this era, every position on a warship could be considered a high-level talent, especially positions like officers, helmsn, navigators, gunners, and doctors; if only relying on civilian training, the process would inevitably be very slow.
But if there were a dedicated naval academy to teach these, the process would be much faster, and the quality of personnel could also improve.
Historically, it was not until nearly half a century later that France realized this issue and established its first naval academy. Of course, at the mont, aside from Portugal, which had a semi-military-style mariti academy, no other European countries had naval academies.
“Additionally, we need to increase our mariti trade volu as much as possible.”
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