Greenwich Maritime Museum

The Greenwich Maritime Museum! I learned that it is one of the largest maritime museums in the world. I loved walking into the building and seeing all of the artifacts and items on display. Some of the items can be seen on their website here. One of the most impressive was Prince Frederick’s gilded barge. It was built in 1732 and used for royal occasions on the Thames. Our main purpose on the trip was to visit the library of course. The library in the museum is Caird’s Library, named for Sir James Caird, the museum’s benefactor. The library that we toured is the original library from the 1930s, which is currently undergoing a re-development project. The library has been open to the public since 1937, and has never been an internal library to the museum. They are currently open to the public three days a week, which allowed them to give a tour to our large group on a closed day. This gave us more freedom to move around and discuss items of interest without bothering library patrons. When the new facility is opened the library will resume its normal operating hours six days a week. The library contains many artifacts of historical interest, such as: immigration papers, navigation papers, items on piracy, astronomy, voyages and exploration, naval architecture, and genealogical information.

Before entering the library we moved through the rotunda, which was an original part of the museum. It is constructed entirely of beautiful marble, and was designed by Edwin Lutyens. The rotunda contains a bust of Sir James Caird. This part of the building will remain untouched during the re-development. The library is a joint service facility, housing both the library and the archives. There are two staff members on at a time, one for library services and one for archival services. There are twelve staff members altogether. The library receives 3,000-4,000 visitors per year. The new library is being redesigned to accommodate more people comfortably. The amount of written inquiries received by the library has steadily increased over time, and has continued to rise with the library’s decreased hours. Items in the archive catalog are classified as modern and rare, with modern items dating from 1850 to the present, and rare items dating before 1850. The archives contain 100,000 modern items and 8,000 rare items. Currently the library has two offsite storage facilities, but the new facility will have larger onsite storage capabilities. Many of the items housed in the archives require an archival specialist, such as the maps and charts.

We were able to view and even handle some of the items from the archive catalog. We viewed an atlas from 1686, which the English copied from a Spanish atlas. I liked seeing the crew list of the Caledonia dated from 1810 or 1811, which showed that many of the crew were not suited for the important task of blockading the French fleet in their harbor. The list of crewmembers included: four hairdressers, seven miners, five farmers, 267 agricultural workers, and six bricklayers. A set of signals taken from the U.S. frigate Chesapeake was a very important find for the British. The book was weighted with lead shot so that it could be tossed overboard if the ship was captured, but this was never accomplished and the British captured both the frigate and the signals. This resulted in all of the U.S. signal codes having to be changed. We read a letter from Admiral Nelson to his wife, Frances, from 1801, and her letter of response. He was openly living with another woman, and desired to end their marriage. She wrote back to his prize agent, telling him that she refused to give up. This was quite a scandal at the time, and all of this gossip was in the newspapers. My favorite item was a journal written by a minister who joined the navy as a chaplain in 1812. He was forty years old at the time. His writing was humorous, and gave an interesting view of military life. He even illustrated his journal! I saw a picture that he drew of the boatswain carrying the rope he used to “wake up” the crew in the morning. I love items like this, because they give life to historical figures. The entries in the journal could have been written yesterday!