Ships of the Line Formation

Ships of the Line Formation

This is a naval strategy developed by the Dutch and British in the 16th century.

Daniel Scotland

ship-of-the-line warfare. (2015). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved from http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/341978/ship-of-the-line-warfare

British English

Ship-of-the-line warfare, also called line-ahead battle or line of battle, columnar naval-battle formation developed by the British and Dutch in the mid-17th century whereby each ship followed in the orientation of the ship ahead of it. This formation maximized the new firing power of the broadside (simultaneous discharge of all the guns arrayed on one side of a ship) and marked a final break with the tactics of galley warfare(discussed later), in which individual ships sought each other out to engage in single combat by means of ramming, boarding, and so on.

The ships of the fleet arrayed themselves one after the other at regular intervals of about 100 or more yards, for a distance that could stretch 12 miles (19 km). When in battle, the entire column endeavored to sail close-hauled—that is, as near as possible to the direction of the wind. By maintaining the line throughout battle, the fleet, despite obscuring clouds of smoke, could function as a unit under the control of the admiral. In the event of reverses, they could be extricated with a minimum of risk.

Advocates of a strict adherence to this form of naval warfare came to be known as “formalists,” who insisted that the line be maintained throughout battle whatever the situation. They were opposed by “meleeists,” who saw an advantage to breaking the line at the discretion of a squadron commander in order to pursue a fleeing enemy. The formalist viewpoint dominated British naval tactics until well into the 18th century. At that time the tactical advantages of the melee came to be recognized to the extent that at a signal from the fleet admiral for a “general chase” the line could be broken and enemy ships pursued.

This tactic was not used until the 17^th century. The interim solution was to make sailing ships fire backwards from the stern, as a defensive measure, or forward from the bow, as an offensive measure. The latter was only partially achieved either by canting (angling) the side guns towards the bow or stern as far as the ship's structure would allow, or to place guns on the sterncastle (cabin’s cabin) and fire them in an arc on either side of the forecastle. Both solutions were problematic since they created a blind spot dead ahead and made it especially difficult to hit low-lying targets, like galleys. The method that was deemed most effective by contemporaries was to simply counter the threat of galleys with other galleys.

The line-of-battle tactic favoured very large ships that could sail steadily and maintain their place in the line in the face of heavy fire. The change toward the line of battle also depended on an increased disciplining of society and the demands of powerful centralized government to keep permanent fleets led by a corps of professional officers. These officers were better able to manage and communicate between the ships they commanded than the merchant crews that often comprised large parts of a navy's force. The new type of warfare that developed during the early modern period was marked by a successively stricter organization. Battle formations became standardized, based on mathematically calculated ideal models. The increased power of states at the expense of individual landowners led to increasingly larger armies and navies.

The main problem with the line of battle was that when the fleets are of similar size, naval actions using it were generally indecisive. The line was also easily countered by the gunnery doctrine where material damage at long range is the goal. The French in particular were adept at gunnery and would generally take the leeward position to enable their fleet to retire downwind while continuing to fire chain shot at long range to bring down masts. Eventually so many vessels in a line would be damaged that they would be forced to retire for repairs while the French took few casualties and very little damage themselves. British Permanent Fighting Instructions were so inflexible in regards to the use of the line that a British fleet had never won a single tactical victory against a fleet of comparable strength in the century before the Battle of the Saintes in 1782^[10] when Admiral George Rodney disobeyed the Instructions to win decisively.