Top Ten Most Inspirational Sailors

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Me-and-Boo

Wow. I am way out of my league here.
I think of Thor Hyerdahl and Kon Tiki. The early navigators including Magellen and Cook. Along with Capt. Allnut, Humphrey Bogart in African Queen. Popeye (seriously). Astronauts, our mediums may be different but they are doing the same as we. And, my Uncle Roger.

That's what comes from having a country born effectively yesterday !!

[MacG]

You may delete many if you sort out the sailing for the sailing. A few handfuls will remain .....

[s/v Jedi]

Right, tell me about Anglo-Dutch wars, they don't tell us about those in school

William of Orange, Dutch Royalty, was King of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland after invading England with a Dutch army and fleet. This lead to England joining the Grand Alliance vs France.

Even before that there were many coalitions between the Dutch and English navies. Actions against the French, Spanish, Barbary states the most notable I think. Also, many Brits served on Dutch ships and vice versa. Captain Hudson was employed by the Dutch for example. Religion was very important; still is today.

Prizes just in books? Ha, read up on Cornelis Tromp, son of Maarten and Piet Heyn of course!

ciao!
Nick.

[maxingout]

Shackelton and Moitessier are at the top of my list.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

Right, tell me about Anglo-Dutch wars, they don't tell us about those in school

William of Orange, Dutch Royalty, was King of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland after invading England with a Dutch army and fleet. This lead to England joining the Grand Alliance vs France.

Even before that there were many coalitions between the Dutch and English navies. Actions against the French, Spanish, Barbary states the most notable I think. Also, many Brits served on Dutch ships and vice versa. Captain Hudson was employed by the Dutch for example. Religion was very important; still is today.

Prizes just in books? Ha, read up on Cornelis Tromp, son of Maarten and Piet Heyn of course!

ciao!
Nick.

William of Orange did not invade England. William was invited to become the new english monarch because the only other option was a catholic king in England, something which the English nobility had no interest in at the time. He also had a legitimate claim to the throne. There was almost no military action surrounding his accesion to the throne, and King James ran like a pansy at his approach. The entire "invasion" was arrainged in advance by English nobility, headed by John Churchill, later Duke of Marlborough, one of the most storied military figures in history and the head of James' armies. Perhaps we need to start a thread on naval military history.


On 30 June 1688—the same day the bishops were acquitted—a group of political figures known afterward as the "Immortal Seven", sent William a formal invitation.[66] William's intentions to invade were public knowledge by September 1688.[69] With a Dutch army, William landed at Brixham in southwest England on 5 November 1688.[70] He came ashore from the ship Brill, proclaiming "the liberties of England and the Protestant religion I will maintain". William had come ashore with approximately 11,000-foot and 4,000 horse soldiers.[71] James's support began to dissolve almost immediately upon William's arrival; Protestant officers defected from the English army (the most notable of whom was Lord Churchill of Eyemouth, James's most able commander), and influential noblemen across the country declared their support for the invader.[72]
James at first attempted to resist William, but saw that his efforts would prove futile.[72] He sent representatives to negotiate with William, but secretly attempted to flee on 11 December.[73] A group of fishermen caught him and brought him back to London.[73] He successfully escaped to France in a second attempt on 23 December.[73] William permitted James to leave the country, not wanting to make him a martyr for the Roman Catholic cause.[74]

[s/v Jedi]

@minaret, you need to study that a bit deeper and don't just use books written by English historians who tried to make history intead of just record it the fleet was there as was the army; follow the recorded financing (money trails don't lie) of he operation. The landing was at Brixton iirc. They marched to Whitehall and took it. The invitation thing was part of the conspiracy. Dutchman on the throne is tough to swallow for some, I understand that, no worries

ciao!
Nick.

[kaimusailing]

Enough of Europe history. The reason I mentioned Mau Piauilug earlier is that we are talking about inspirational sailors, not polititians or admirals. He was the last of the great line of polynesian navigators. We are greatful today for GPS that positions us with little effort. Just a few years ago, a fellow who could ascertain his position with a sextant was a navigator. When Pialiug got off the plane in Hawaii, they asked him where his island was. He pointed directly to the spot, thousands of miles away.

He sailed a native Hawaiian recreation sailing canoe from Hawaii to Tahiti, without navigational instruments of any kind. He used only his traditional knowledge that has been passed down for centuries in oral chants. He had never made this passage before.

His exploits encouraged several young people to begin the training to become traditional navigators, and so he may have singlehandedly carried on his tradition. Also, many crafts that had been left to be forgotten were now revived.

He is truly inspirational, because he revived an entire culture, and his navigation skills cannot be duplicated anymore, he is gone. We only have his students and GPS.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

Right, tell me about Anglo-Dutch wars, they don't tell us about those in school

William of Orange, Dutch Royalty, was King of England, Wales, Scotland Ireland after invading England with a Dutch army and fleet. This lead to England joining the Grand Alliance vs France.

Even before that there were many coalitions between the Dutch and English navies. Actions against the French, Spanish, Barbary states the most notable I think. Also, many Brits served on Dutch ships and vice versa. Captain Hudson was employed by the Dutch for example. Religion was very important; still is today.

Prizes just in books? Ha, read up on Cornelis Tromp, son of Maarten and Piet Heyn of course!

ciao!
Nick.

The Dutch actually were major contributors to the development of the Barbary pirates as they based a part of their fleet in tripoli in their war against the Spanish. Several Dutch crews introduced the pirates to their far superior ships and some converted to Islam. They in effect became renegade Dutch working for the pirates some became quite infamous and one Dutch man ended up admiral of the pirates fleet.

As van de Capellen and the Dutch and Barbary pirates well by 1816 the Dutch were a completely spent naval force and were just a puppet of the british, sorry. The zenith of Dutch naval power was the 17 and 18th century. The Brits ruled the 19th century and the ditch never again challenged it's naval might.

As to Hudson, he was an adventurer and explorer, he was never a naval officer. He took his payment from who ever offered it.

As to the grand alliance well it was just everyone against Louis. There were as many catholic states in it anyway.

Under William since he was ruled of both countries? Yes cooperation did take place but William did no favours to the Dutch or it's navy. He clearly put his interests in British before his home country. I don't think you'd find fans of the house of orange in the Dutch navy !

I'm not denying that some limited opportunistic alliances occurred from time to time. But in the main in the 17 and 18th century they were primarily antagonists. The Dutch bring clearly superior during this period( in the main). Ultimately it was British that decimated Dutch naval power for good.

What our new world friends will take of this meander into European naval history remains to be seen, but those boys could sail that's for sure. ( as to why the majority of Dutch with such a glorious naval past are doing tootling up and down their canals and not put on the high seas I don't know !!!!, perhaps bad memories of the channel or something keep them at home !!!)

[SurferShane]

Originally Posted by MacG

@ SurferShane

How come that I never heard of him? Must be a fantastic man - most equal to Chichester and maybe more remarkable since his boat is of the simplest design and equipment.
That might, however be part of the story.
Actually great!

Like I was saying, I only discovered David Lewis through finding his book "Ice Bird" at a second hand store. What I really found inspiring was his sense of adventure and honest writing style. Since reading the book, I have been lucky enough to meet another "mature" sailor who had the pleasure of meeting him a number of times. I have lent the book to a friend and the first thing he said to me afterwards was "How amazing is David Lewis?".

I am sure his writings about the Polynesians and early navigational methods. Likewise, I am just as sure that there are many other inspirational works by other sailors sitting on dusty second hand book shelves waiting to be re-discovered.

[Astrid]

Wasn't Sebastian Cabot one of the first to attempt explore the NW Passage around 1508?

[MacG]

@Astrid

I am talking about someone who did the job in the '60s. I just can' t remember his name. He sailed from East to West in one go.

[s/v Jedi]

@goboating, minaret etc. : let's make a separate thread, we're too far off topic here.

Edit: just opened it in general sailing forum; my iPad app doesn't support direct links so I can't linkt it here...

cheers,
Nick.

[steamgoat]

My inspirations from the '70s
Moitessier
Eric $Susan Hiscock
Robin Lee Graham
Rosie Swale
Shane Acton
John Guzzwell

[ADMPRTR]

How about Leif Ericson who discovered NA 500 years before Columbus?

[Factor]

Ahem - no one needed to discover the americas - they weren't lost, had people living there and everything. Thats like saying Cook discovered Australia. He was in fact about 40,000 years too late.