Naval Impressment Research Articles

The Wars of 1812

The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World. By Denver Brunsman. Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights in the War of 1812. By Paul A. Gilje. The War of 1812: Writings from America’s Second War of Independence. Edited by Donald R. Hickey.

Denver Brunsman. The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World. Early American Histories series. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2013. Pp. 376. $29.95 (cloth).

Denver Brunsman. The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World. Early American Histories series. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2013. Pp. 376. $29.95 (cloth). - Volume 53 Issue 1

Book Review: The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World

Book Review: The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World

Book Review: Denver Brunsman: The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World

Book Review: Denver Brunsman: <i>The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World</i>

The evil necessity: British naval impressment in the eighteenth-century Atlantic world

The evil necessity: British naval impressment in the eighteenth-century Atlantic world

Anti-Impressment Riots and the Origins of the Age of Revolution

AbstractThis essay details the relationship between anti-impressment collective actions, the American Revolution, and the age of revolution. Naval impressment represented the forcible coercion of laborers into extended periods of military service. Workers in North American coastal communities militantly, even violently, resisted British naval impressment. A combination of Leveller-inspired ideals and practical experience encouraged this resistance. In turn, resistance from below inspired colonial elites to resist British authority by contributing to the elaboration of a political discourse on legitimate authority, liberty, and freedom. Maritime laborers stood on the front lines in the struggle for freedom, and their radical collective actions helped give meaning to wider struggles around the Atlantic world.

Politicians, Merchants, and Colonial Maritime War: The Political and Economic Background of the American Act of 1708

During the War of the Spanish Succession (1702–13), there were attempts to support colonial maritime war by legislation, and the American Act of 1708 can be seen as their culmination. Historians who study privateering or colonial history have referred to this act in several contexts, such as reform in prize administration, naval impressment in American colonies, and Spanish‐American trade. However, the political and economic interests behind this act have not been fully investigated. By examining the process of the enactment of the American Act together with antecedent attempts to promote colonial maritime war in parliament, this article reveals the political and vested interests involved in the act, the relations between them, and the influence they had on the content of the act. This analysis will show the complex interaction between politics, trade, and colonial maritime war in the early‐18th‐century American colonies.

Nicholas Rogers.The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and Its Opponents in Georgian Britain. Hambledon: Continuum, 2007. Pp. 184. $34.95 (cloth). - David Syrett.Shipping and Military Power in the Seven Years’ War: The Sails of Victory. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2008. Pp. 160. $69.95 (cloth).

Nicholas Rogers.The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and Its Opponents in Georgian Britain. Hambledon: Continuum, 2007. Pp. 184. $34.95 (cloth). - David Syrett.Shipping and Military Power in the Seven Years’ War: The Sails of Victory. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2008. Pp. 160. $69.95 (cloth).

Northern Exposure: Resistance to Naval Impressment in British North America, 1775–1815

Abstract: Focusing on resistance, this article examines naval impressment in British North America from 1775 to 1815. Although neglected in Canadian historiography, press gangs sparked urban unrest and political turmoil in seaports such as Halifax, St John's, and Quebec City. Impressment reached into most coastal areas of British North America by the early nineteenth century and its sailors and inhabitants employed a range of strategies to resist it. They also confronted it directly, sometimes with violent results. Press gang riots in St John's in 1794 and Halifax in 1805 led to a prohibition on impressment on shore for much of the Napoleonic Wars. Popular protest served as the catalyst for official resistance to the British Navy and had a lasting impact on civil–naval relations in the North Atlantic world. While the study of popular disturbances in Canadian history usually begins in the mid-nineteenth century, this paper shows that they were important in earlier generations as well. This was often the result of tensions caused by imperial warfare and quarrels with military personnel.

Northern Exposure: Resistance to Naval Impressment in British North America, 1775–1815

Abstract: Focusing on resistance, this article examines naval impressment in British North America from 1775 to 1815. Although neglected in Canadian historiography, press gangs sparked urban unrest and political turmoil in seaports such as Halifax, St John's, and Quebec City. Impressment reached into most coastal areas of British North America by the early nineteenth century and its sailors and inhabitants employed a range of strategies to resist it. They also confronted it directly, sometimes with violent results. Press gang riots in St John's in 1794 and Halifax in 1805 led to a prohibition on impressment on shore for much of the Napoleonic Wars. Popular protest served as the catalyst for official resistance to the British Navy and had a lasting impact on civil–naval relations in the North Atlantic world. While the study of popular disturbances in Canadian history usually begins in the mid-nineteenth century, this paper shows that they were important in earlier generations as well. This was often the re...

The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and its Opponents in Georgian Britain (review)

The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and its Opponents in Georgian Britain (review)

Book Review: The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and Its Opponents in Georgian Britain

Book Review: The Press Gang: Naval Impressment and Its Opponents in Georgian Britain

Habeas Corpus and Military and Naval Impressment, 1756–1816

At the start of the Seven Years War in 1756, there occurred an unexpected increase in the demand by impressed soldiers and sailors for habeas corpus. This increased usage occurred in spite of the fact that habeas corpus was a deficient mechanism of judicial review: the scope of review was limited to formal defects appearing on the face of the return; it was unclear whether there was jurisdiction to issue the writ during the extensive times that the court was out of term; and there was no power to issue process of contempt in vacation for disobedience of the writ. Notwithstanding these defects (and the rejection by the House of Lords in 1758 of a habeas corpus bill drafted in order to remedy those faults) the custom of using habeas corpus as an anti-impressment remedy flourished within the navy (and, during the short periods of statutory military conscription, within the army); in the late eighteenth century it was impressed sailors who made up the largest constituency using the writ. This account describes the scope of review and procedure regulating impressment-related habeas corpus.

The Effects of the Battle of Sluys upon the Administration of English Naval Impressment, 1340-1343

The Effects of the Battle of Sluys upon the Administration of English Naval Impressment, 1340-1343