Fellow of the Royal Society
Fellowship of the Royal Society is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of London judges to have made a'substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathematics, engineering science and medical science'. Fellowship of the Society, the oldest scientific academy in continuous existence, is a significant honour, awarded to many eminent scientists from history including Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Michael Faraday, Ernest Rutherford, Srinivasa Ramanujan, Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, Dorothy Hodgkin, Alan Turing and Francis Crick. More fellowship has been awarded to Stephen Hawking, Tim Hunt, Elizabeth Blackburn, Tim Berners-Lee, Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Atta-ur Rahman, Andre Geim, James Dyson, Ajay Kumar Sood, Subhash Khot, Elon Musk and around 8,000 others in total, including over 280 Nobel Laureates since 1900; as of October 2018, there are 1689 living Fellows and Honorary Members, of which over 60 are Nobel Laureates.
Fellowship of the Royal Society has been described by The Guardian newspaper as “the equivalent of a lifetime achievement Oscar” with several institutions celebrating their announcement each year. Up to 60 new Fellows and foreign members are elected annually in late April or early May, from a pool of around 700 proposed candidates each year. New Fellows can only be nominated by existing Fellows for one of the fellowships described below: Every year, up to 52 new Fellows are elected from the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth of Nations which make up around 90% of the society; each candidate is considered on their merits and can be proposed from any sector of the scientific community. Fellows are elected for life on the basis of excellence in science and are entitled to use the post-nominal letters FRS. See Category:Fellows of the Royal Society and Category:Female Fellows of the Royal Society; every year, Fellows elect up to ten new Foreign Members. Like Fellows, Foreign Members are elected for life through peer review on the basis of excellence in science.
As of 2016 there are around 165 Foreign Members, who are entitled to use the post-nominal ForMemRS. See Category:Foreign Members of the Royal Society. Honorary Fellowship is an honorary academic title awarded to candidates who have given distinguished service to the cause of science, but do not have the kind of scientific achievements required of Fellows or Foreign Members. Honorary Fellows include Bill Bryson, Melvyn Bragg, Robin Saxby, David Sainsbury, Baron Sainsbury of Turville and Onora O'Neill. Honorary Fellows are entitled to use the post nominal letters FRS. Others including John Maddox, Patrick Moore and Lisa Jardine were elected as honorary fellows, see Category:Honorary Fellows of the Royal Society. Statute 12 is a legacy mechanism for electing members before official honorary membership existed in 1997. Fellows elected under statute 12 include 4th Earl of Selborne. Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom such as Margaret Thatcher, Neville Chamberlain,Ramsay Macdonald and H. H. Asquith were elected under statute 12, see Category:Fellows of the Royal Society.
The Council of the Royal Society can recommend members of the British Royal Family for election as Royal Fellows of the Royal Society. As of 2016 there are five royal fellows: Charles, Prince of Wales elected 1978 Anne, Princess Royal elected 1987 Prince Edward, Duke of Kent elected 1990 Prince William, Duke of Cambridge elected 2009 Prince Andrew, Duke of York elected 2013Her Majesty the Queen, Elizabeth II is not a Royal Fellow, but provides her patronage to the Society as all reigning British monarchs have done since Charles II of England. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh was elected under statute 12, not as a Royal Fellow; the election of new fellows is announced annually in May, after their nomination and a period of peer-reviewed selection. Each candidate for Fellowship or Foreign Membership is nominated by two Fellows of the Royal Society, who sign a certificate of proposal. Nominations required at least five fellows to support each nomination by the proposer, criticised for establishing an old-boy network and elitist gentlemen's club.
The certificate of election includes a statement of the principal grounds on which the proposal is being made. There is no limit on the number of nominations made each year. In 2015, there were 654 candidates for election as Fellows and 106 candidates for Foreign Membership; the Council of the Royal Society oversees the selection process and appoints 10 subject area committees, known as Sectional Committees, to recommend the strongest candidates for election to Fellowship. The final list of up to 52 Fellowship candidates and up to 10 Foreign Membership candidates is confirmed by the Council in April and a secret ballot of Fellows is held at a meeting in May. A candidate is elected if she secures two-thirds of votes of those Fellows present and voting. A maximum of 18 Fellowships can be allocated to candidates from Physical Sciences and Biological Sciences. A further maximum of 6 can be ‘Honorary’, ‘General’ or ‘Royal’ Fellows. Nominations for Fellowship are peer reviewed by sectional committees, each with 15 members and a chair.
Members of the 10 sectional committees change every 3 years to mitigate in-group bias, each group covers different
Edward Belcher
Admiral Sir Edward Belcher was a British naval officer and explorer. Born in Nova Scotia, he was the great-grandson of Governor Jonathan Belcher, he was married to Diana Jolliffe, stepdaughter of Captain Peter Heywood, that marriage ending upon her application for legal separation for his having infected her with venereal disease. Belcher was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the second son of Andrew Belcher and entered the Royal Navy in 1812. In 1825, he accompanied Frederick William Beechey's expedition to the Pacific and Bering Strait as a surveyor. In 1836, he commanded a surveying ship in the British seas. Belcher took up the work, he was on board HMS Sulphur, ordered to return to England in 1839 via the Trans-Pacific route. Belcher made various observations at a number of islands which he visited, having been delayed by being despatched to take part in the war in China in 1840. On 25 January 1841, Commander Belcher landed on Possession Point at the north shore Hong Kong Island and made the first British survey of Hong Kong harbour.
After the war's end in 1842 he reached home and for his services was made a Knight Bachelor in the following year. He was engaged on HMS Samarang, in surveying work in the East Indies, the Philippines, Port Hamilton, other places, until 1847. In 1852 Belcher led largest Admiralty expedition to rescue Sir John Franklin, he was to look for his former surveying officer in Hong Kong, Sir Richard Collinson, Sir Robert McClure, whose ships had not been seen after entering the Bering Strait. He did a great deal of sledge exploration, rescued McClure and abandoned four of his five ships in the ice, he had five ships: HMS Assistance, HMS Resolute, the steam tenders Pioneer and Intrepid and the depot ship HMS North Star. Belcher and one tender were to enter Wellington Channel, where Franklin was thought to be, while Kellett was to go west to Melville Island and look for Collinson and McClure. North Star was to stay at Beechey Island as a supply base, he left the Nore in April 1850. By early winter Assistance and Pioneer were frozen in at Northumberland Sound to the north of Wellington Channel while Resolute and Intrepid were frozen in off Melville Island —the first ships this far West since Sir William Edward Parry in 1819.
A great deal of exploration was done by manhauled sledges. In April 1853 Leopold McClintock and others left Resolute on sledges and returned 105 days having covered 1,400 miles and discovered Prince Patrick Island. Another party discovered Robert McClure, whose ship was frozen in at Mercy Bay. Belcher went north by sledge and found a channel at the northern tip of Devon Island, hinting that Franklin might have used it to escape to Baffin Bay; when the ice broke up that summer, he pushed his ships up Wellington Channel and became trapped again. By February 1854, Belcher was becoming worried about the safety of his ships and men. In April he ordered Kellett to return by sledge to North Star. Belcher abandoned his two ships in late July. Aided by two ships that showed up at Beechey Island, the whole party returned to England. Belcher went through a court martial, automatic for any captain who had lost a ship, he was exonerated, but his sword was returned to him'without observation'. He never again received an active command.
Curiously Resolute broke free of the ice and drifted all the way to Davis Strait, where it was picked up by an American whaler. The American government graciously returned the ship to the United Kingdom, when many years the ship was broken up, its timbers were used to make a desk for the American president by way of a thank you; this Resolute desk, a gift from Queen Victoria, is still used today in the Oval Office. Following his last active service, Belcher was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1867, an admiral in 1872. Belcher is commemorated in Hong Kong through Belcher's Street, Belcher Bay and The Belcher's in Kennedy Town, his name is commemorated in the Belcher Islands, in the Canadian Arctic. He is commemorated with a plaque in the Admiralty Garden, CFB Halifax. A venomous seasnake, Hydrophis belcheri, is named in his honour. Belcher collected the holotype, housed in the Natural History Museum, London. Treatise on Nautical Surveying Narrative of a Voyage Round the World..
Narrative of the Voyage of H. M. S. Samarang, During the Years 1843–46.. The Last of the Arctic Voyages.. Horatio Howard Brenton.. European and American voyages of scientific exploration This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Belcher, Sir Edward". Encyclopædia Britannica. Cambridge University Press. Coleman, E. C.. The Royal Navy and Polar exploration: from Franklin to Scott. Stroud: Tempus.. The Royal Navy and Polar exploration. Stroud: Tempus. ISBN 0-7524-4207-4. Alexander, C.. The Bounty: the true story of the mutiny on the Bounty. New York: Viking.. The Bounty: the true story of the mutiny on the Bounty. New York: Viking. ISBN 0-670-03133-X. Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online Belcher's Arctic expedition and HMS Resolute Zoomable image of Belcher's Map of Hong Kong Works by Edward Belcher at Project Gutenberg Works by or about Edward Belcher at Internet Archive O'Byrne, William Richard. "Belcher, Edward". A Naval Biograp
Beechey Island
Beechey Island is an island located in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago of Nunavut, Canada, in Wellington Channel. It is separated from the southwest corner of Devon Island by Barrow Strait. Other features include Wellington Channel, Erebus Harbour, Terror Bay; the first European visit to the island was by Captain William Edward Parry. The island was named after the artist William Beechey by his son Frederick William Beechey, serving as Parry's lieutenant, it is the site of several significant events in the history of Arctic exploration. In 1845, the British explorer Sir John Franklin, commanding a new but ill-fated search for the Northwest Passage aboard HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, chose the protected harbour of Beechey Island for his first winter encampment; the site was not discovered until 1851, when American search vessels anchored nearby. In 1850, Edward Belcher used the island as a base. There are memorials to Franklin and other polar explorers and sailors on the island, including Joseph René Bellot.
In 1903, paying respect to Franklin, Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen stopped at the island at the beginning of his successful voyage in search of the Northwest Passage. In 1975, Beechey Island was declared a Territorial Historic Site by the government of the Northwest Territories. Since 1999, it has been part of the newly created Canadian territory of Nunavut. In 1993, five archaeological sites on Beechey Island and nearby Devon Island were designated as the Beechey Island Sites National Historic Site of Canada. Beechey Island is best known for containing three graves of Franklin expedition members, which were first discovered in 1850 by searchers for the lost Franklin expedition; the searchers found a large stone cairn, along with the graves of three of Franklin's crewmen – Petty Officer John Torrington, Royal Marine Private William Braine, Able Seaman John Hartnell — but no written record nor indication of where Franklin planned to sail the next season. In 1852, Commander Edward A. Inglefield arrived at Beechey, along with a physician Dr. Peter Sutherland.
John Hartnell's grave was opened, damaging his coffin, Hartnell's memorial plaque on the coffin lid was removed. During a expedition, a searcher named Thomas Morgan died aboard the vessel North Star on May 22, 1854, was buried alongside the three original Franklin crew members. In the 1980s, during two separate expeditions to Beechey, Canadian forensic anthropologist Dr. Owen Beattie examined the three bodies and found them remarkably well-preserved. Autopsies determined that lead poisoning were among the probable causes of death. Research, found through hair sample comparisons between the Beechey remains and those of expedition assistant surgeon and naturalist Harry Goodsir that the lead in the three men's remains, while indeed present at high levels now recognized as deleterious, was no higher than Goodsir's, thus evidently the result of exposure prior to the expedition, was unlikely to be responsible for their deaths. In the 1990s, due to the deteriorating condition of the Beechey grave markers, all markers were replaced with bronze memorials.
The explorers in Jules Verne's novel The Adventures of Captain Hatteras visit Beechey Island. In addition, Clive Cussler's novel, Arctic Drift, featured characters who would visit this island in the quest for Franklin's ships; the island is mentioned in Dan Simmons' novel, The Terror. The Columbia Gazetteer of North America Beechey Island in the Atlas of Canada - Toporama.
Baffin Island
Baffin Island, in the Canadian territory of Nunavut, is the largest island in Canada and the fifth-largest island in the world. Its area is 507,451 km2 and its population is about 11,000, it is located in the region of 70° N and 75° W. It was named by English colonists after English explorer William Baffin. Historians believe it is that Pre-Columbian Norse explorers from Greenland and Iceland knew of the island, they believe it is the site of Helluland, referred to in the Icelandic sagas (Grœnlendinga saga and the Saga of Erik the Red. Iqaluit, the capital of Nunavut, is located on the southeastern coast; until 1987, the town was called Frobisher Bay, after the English name for the bay on which it is located. That year the indigenous people voted to take their own nameTo the south lies Hudson Strait, separating Baffin Island from mainland Quebec. South of the western end of the island is the Fury and Hecla Strait which separates the island from the Melville Peninsula on the mainland. To the east are Davis Strait and Baffin Bay, with Greenland beyond.
The Foxe Basin, the Gulf of Boothia and Lancaster Sound separate Baffin Island from the rest of the archipelago to the west and north. The Baffin Mountains run along the northeastern coast of the island and are a part of the Arctic Cordillera. Mount Odin is the highest peak, with an elevation of at least 2,143 m, although some sources say 2,147 m. Another peak of note is Mount Asgard, located in Auyuittuq National Park, with an elevation of 2,011 m. Mount Thor, with an elevation of 1,675 m, is said to have the greatest purely vertical drop of any mountain on Earth, at 1,250 m; the two largest lakes on the island lie in the south-central part of the island: Nettilling Lake and Amadjuak Lake further south. The Barnes Ice Cap, in the middle of the island, has been retreating since at least the early 1960s, when the Geographical Branch of the Department of Mines and Technical Surveys sent a three-man survey team to the area to measure isostatic rebound and cross-valley features of the Isortoq River.
Conversely, in the 1970s parts of Baffin Island failed to have the usual ice-free period in the summer. Baffin Island has been inhabited for over 3,000 years, first by the pre-Dorset, followed by the Dorset, the Thule, ancestors of the Inuit who have lived on the island for the last thousand years. In about 986, Erik Thorvaldsson, known as Erik the Red, formed three settlements near the southwestern tip of Greenland. In late 985 or 986, Bjarni Herjolfsson, sailing from Iceland to Greenland, was blown off course and sighted land southwest of Greenland. Bjarni appears to be the first European to see Baffin Island, the first European to see America beyond Greenland, it was about 15 years that the Norse Greenlanders, led by Leif Erikson, a son of Erik the Red, started exploring new areas around the year 1000. Baffin Island is thought to be Helluland, the archaeological site at Tanfield Valley is thought to have been a trading post; the Saga of Erik the Red, 1880 translation into English by J. Sephton from the original Icelandic'Eiríks saga rauða': "They sailed away from land.
Thence they sailed away from Bjarneyjar with northerly winds. They were out at sea two half-days, they came to land, rowed along it in boats, explored it, found there flat stones, many and so great that two men might well lie on them stretched on their backs with heel to heel. Polar-foxes were there in abundance; this land they gave name to, called it Helluland." In September 2008, the Nunatsiaq News, a weekly newspaper, reported that Patricia Sutherland, who worked at the Canadian Museum of Civilization had archaeological remains of yarn and cordage, rat droppings, tally sticks, a carved wooden Dorset culture face mask depicting Caucasian features, possible architectural remains, which indicated that European traders and settlers had been on Baffin Island not than 1000 CE. What the source of this Old World contact may have been is unclear and controversial. So, as Sutherland said, if you believe that spinning was not an indigenous technique, used in Arctic North America you have to consider the possibility that as "remote as it may seem," these finds may represent evidence of contact with Europeans prior to the Vikings' arrival in Greenland."
Sutherland's research led to a 2012 announcement that whetstones had been found with remnants of alloys indicative of Viking presence. In 2018, Michele Hayeur Smith of Brown University, who specializes in the study of ancient textiles, wrote that she does not think the ancient Arctic people, the Dorset and Thule, needed to be taught how to spin yarn "It's a pretty intuitive thing to do." Journal of Archaeological Science, August 2018:"... the date received on Sample 4440b from Nanook indicates that sinew was being spun and plied at least as early, if not earlier, than yarn at this site. We feel that the most parsimonious explanation of this data is that the practice of spinning hair and wool into plied yarn most developed within this context of complex, Arctic fiber technologies, not through contact with European textile producers. Our investigations indicate that Paleoeskimo communities on Baffin Island spun threads from the hair and from the sinews
Siege of Sevastopol (1854–55)
The Siege of Sevastopol lasted from October 1854 until September 1855, during the Crimean War. The allies landed at Eupatoria on 14 September 1854, intending to make a triumphal march to Sevastopol, the capital of the Crimea, with 50,000 men; the 56-kilometre traverse took a year of fighting against the Russians. Major battles along the way were Alma, Inkerman, Tchernaya and Sevastopol. During the siege, the allied navy undertook six bombardments of the capital, on 17 October 1854. Sevastopol is one of the classic sieges of all time; the city of Sevastopol was the home of the Tsar's Black Sea Fleet, which threatened the Mediterranean. The Russian field army withdrew; the siege was the culminating struggle for the strategic Russian port in 1854–55 and was the final episode in the Crimean War. During the Victorian Era, these battles were memorialized; the Siege of Sevastopol was the subject of Crimean soldier Leo Tolstoy's Sebastopol Sketches and the subject of the first Russian feature film, Defence of Sevastopol.
The Battle of Balaklava was made famous by Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade" and Robert Gibb's painting The Thin Red Line. A panorama of the siege itself was painted by Franz Roubaud; the Jamaican and English nurses who treated the wounded during these battles were much celebrated, most famously Mary Seacole and Florence Nightingale. The allies landed at Eupatoria on 14 September 1854; the Battle of the Alma, considered the first battle of the Crimean War, took place just south of the River Alma in the Crimea. An Anglo-French force under Jacques Leroy de Saint Arnaud and FitzRoy Somerset, 1st Baron Raglan defeated General Alexander Sergeyevich Menshikov's Russian army, which lost around 6,000 troops. Moving from their base at Balaklava at the start of October and British engineers began to direct the building of siege lines along the Chersonese uplands to the south of Sevastopol; the troops prepared redoubts, gun batteries, trenches. With the Russian army and its commander Prince Menshikov gone, the defence of Sevastopol was led by Vice Admirals Vladimir Alexeyevich Kornilov and Pavel Nakhimov, assisted by Menshikov's chief engineer, Lieutenant Colonel Eduard Totleben.
The military forces available to defend the city were 4,500 militia, 2,700 gunners, 4,400 marines, 18,500 naval seamen, 5,000 workmen, totalling just over 35,000 men. The Russians began by scuttling their ships to protect the harbour used their naval cannon as additional artillery and the ships' crews as marines; those ships deliberately sunk by the end of 1855 included Grand Duke Constantine, City of Paris, Empress Maria, Yagondeid, Konlephy, steam frigate Vladimir, steamboats Thunderer, Danube, Odessa and Krein. By mid-October 1854, the Allies had some 120 guns ready to fire on Sevastopol. On 5 October 1854 the artillery battle began; the Russian artillery first destroyed a French magazine. British fire set off the magazine in the Malakoff redoubt, killing Admiral Kornilov, silencing most of the Russian guns there, leaving a gap in the city's defences. However, the British and French withheld their planned infantry attack, a possible opportunity for an early end to the siege was missed. At the same time, to support the Allied land forces, the Allied fleet pounded the Russian defences and shore batteries.
Six screw-driven ships of the line and 21 wooden sail were involved in the sea bombardment. After a bombardment that lasted over six hours, the Allied fleet inflicted little damage on the Russian defences and coastal artillery batteries while suffering 340 casualties among the fleet. Two of the British warships were so badly damaged that they were towed to the arsenal in Constantinople for repairs and remained out of action for the remainder of the siege, while most of the other warships suffered serious damage due to many direct hits from the Russian coastal artillery; the bombardment resumed the following day, but the Russians had worked through the night and repaired the damage. This pattern would be repeated throughout the siege. During October and November 1854, the battles of Balaclava and Inkerman took place beyond the siege lines. Balaclava gave the Russians a morale boost and convinced them that the Allied lines were thinly spread out and undermanned, but after their defeat at Inkerman, the Russians saw that the siege of Sevastopol would not be lifted by a battle in the field, so instead they moved troops into the city to aid the defenders.
Toward the end of November, a winter storm ruined supply lines. Men and horses starved in the poor conditions. While Totleben extended the fortifications around the Redan bastion and the Malakoff redoubt, British chief engineer John Fox Burgoyne sought to take the Malakoff, which he saw as the key to Sevastopol. Siege works were begun to bring the Allied troops nearer to the Malakoff. In a foretaste of the trench warfare that became the hallmark of the First World War, the trenches became the focus of Allied assaults; the Allies were able to restore many supply routes. The new Grand Crimean Central
Admiral (Royal Navy)
Admiral is a senior rank of the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, which equates to the NATO rank code OF-9, outranked only by the rank of admiral of the fleet. Royal Navy officers holding the ranks of rear admiral, vice admiral and admiral of the fleet are sometimes considered generically to be admirals; the rank of admiral is the highest rank to which a serving officer in the Royal Navy can be promoted, admiral of the fleet being in abeyance except for honorary promotions of retired officers and members of the Royal Family. King Henry III of England appointed the first known English Admiral Sir Richard de Lucy on 29 August 1224, he was followed by a Sir Thomas Moulton in 1264, he held the title of Keeper of the Sea and Sea Ports he was succeeded by Sir William de Leybourne, as Admiral of the Sea of the King of England being appointed in 1286 Admiral of the Navy he held the rank of admiral until 1294 serving under King Edward I of England; as the English Navy was expanding towards the end of the thirteenth century, new appointments of admirals with specific administrative and geographic responsibilities were created, Sir John de Botetourt was appointed Admiral of the North in 1294 this command lasted until 1412.
In the same year the king appointed Sir William de Laybourne the dual commands of Admiral of the South, Admiral of the West. The first royal commission as Admiral to a naval officer was granted in 1303. By 1344 it was only used as a rank at sea for a captain in charge of fleets. In 1364 the post of Admiral of the North and West was created until 1414. Beginning in 1408 these admirals responsibilities were absorbed by the office of the High Admiral of England and Aquitaine leading to a centralized command the process ended in 1414. In 1412 the Admiral of the Narrow Seas was established until 1413, it was in abeyance until 1523 when it was revived on a more permanent basis until 1688. In Elizabethan times the fleet grew large enough to be organised into squadrons; the squadron's admiral flew a red ensign, the vice admirals white, the rear admirals blue on the aft mast of his ship. As the squadrons grew, each was commanded by an admiral and the official ranks became admiral of the white and so forth, however each admirals command flags were different and changed over time.
The Royal Navy has had vice and rear admirals appointed to the post since at least the 16th century. When in command of the fleet, the admiral would be in either the lead or the middle portion of the fleet; when the admiral commanded from the middle portion of the fleet his deputy, the vice admiral, would be in the leading portion or van. Below him was another admiral at the rear of the fleet, called rear admiral. Promotion up the ladder was in accordance with seniority in the rank of post-captain, rank was held for life, so the only way to be promoted was for the person above on the list to die or resign. In 1747 the Admiralty restored an element of merit selection to this process by introducing the concept of yellow admirals, being captains promoted to flag rank on the understanding that they would retire on half-pay; this was the navy's first attempt at superannuating older officers. They were assigned to shore-based administrative roles, such as commander of a port or commissioner of one of the Royal Dockyards.
During the Interregnum, the rank of admiral was replaced by that of general at sea. In the 18th century, the original nine ranks began to be filled by more than one man per rank, although the rank of admiral of the red was always filled by only one man and was known as Admiral of the Fleet. After the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 the rank of admiral of the red was introduced; the number of officers holding each rank increased throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries. In 1769 there were 29 admirals of various grades. Thereafter the number of admirals was reduced and in 1853 there were 79 admirals. Although admirals were promoted according to strict seniority, appointments to command were made at the discretion of the Board of Admiralty; as there were invariably more admirals in service than there were postings, many admirals remained unemployed in peacetime. The organisation of the fleet into coloured squadrons was abandoned in 1864; the Red Ensign was allocated to the Merchant Navy, the White Ensign became the flag of the Royal Navy, the Blue Ensign was allocated to the naval reserve and naval auxiliary vessels.
The 18th- and 19th-century British Navy maintained a positional rank known as port admiral. A port admiral was a veteran captain who served as the shore commander of a British naval port and was in charge of supplying and maintaining the ships docked at harbour; the problem of promoting by seniority was well illustrated by the case of Provo Wallis who served for 96 years. When he died in 1892 four admirals under him could be promoted. By request of Queen Victoria, John Edmund Commerell became Admiral of the Fleet rather than Algernon Frederick Rous de Horsey, who as senior active admiral nearing the age limit would customarily have received the promotion. All these younger men would die at least a decade before de Horsey. In the time before squadron distinctions were removed or age limits insti
Lloyd's of London
Lloyd's of London known as Lloyd's, is an insurance and reinsurance market located in London, United Kingdom. Unlike most of its competitors in the industry, it is not an insurance company; these underwriters, or "members", are a collection of both corporations and private individuals, the latter being traditionally known as "Names". The business underwritten at Lloyd's is predominantly general insurance and reinsurance, although a small number of syndicates write term life assurance; the market has its roots in marine insurance and was founded by Edward Lloyd at his coffee house on Tower Street in c. 1686. Today, it has a dedicated building on Lime Street within which business is transacted at each syndicate's "box" in the underwriting "Room", with the insurance policy documentation being known traditionally as a "slip"; the market's motto is Fidentia, Latin for "confidence", it is associated with the Latin phrase uberrima fides, or "utmost good faith", representing the relationship between underwriters and brokers.
Having survived multiple scandals and significant challenges through the second half of the 20th century, most notably the asbestosis affair, Lloyd's today promotes its strong financial "chain of security" available to promptly pay all valid claims. At the end of 2018 this chain consisted of £53.5 billion of syndicate-level assets. In 2018 there were 84 syndicates managed by 55 managing agencies that collectively wrote £35.5bn of gross premiums on risks placed by 303 approved brokers. Around 50 per cent of premiums emanated from North America, 30 per cent from Europe and 20 per cent from the rest of the world. Direct insurance represented around 70 per cent of the premiums covering property and casualty, while the remaining 30 per cent was reinsurance; the market collectively reported a pre-tax loss of £1bn for 2018, resulting from above-average major claims and a weak investment environment. The market began in Lloyd's Coffee House, owned by Edward Lloyd, in around 1686 on Tower Street in the City of London.
This establishment was a popular place for sailors and ship-owners, Lloyd catered to them with reliable shipping news. The coffee house soon became recognised as an ideal place for obtaining marine insurance; the shop was frequented by mariners involved in the slave trade. Historian Eric Williams notes: "Lloyd's, like other insurance companies, insured slaves and slave ships, was vitally interested in legal decisions as to what constituted'natural death' and'perils of the sea'." Lloyd's obtained a monopoly on maritime insurance related to the slave trade and maintained it until the early 19th century. Just after Christmas 1691, the small club of marine insurance underwriters relocated to Lombard Street; this arrangement carried on until 1773, long after the death of Edward Lloyd in 1713, when the participating members of the insurance arrangement formed a committee and underwriter John Julius Angerstein acquired two rooms at the Royal Exchange in Cornhill for "The Society of Lloyd's". The Royal Exchange was destroyed by fire in 1838.
It was rebuilt by 1844. In 1871, the first Lloyd's Act was passed in Parliament which gave the business a sound legal footing. Around that time, it was unusual for a Lloyd's syndicate to have six backers. A marine underwriter named Frederick Marten is credited for first identifying this issue and creating the first "large syndicate" of 12 capacity providers. By the 1880s Marten's syndicate had outgrown many of the major insurance companies outside Lloyd's. A subsequent Lloyd's Act in 1911 set out the Society's objectives, which include the promotion of its members' interests and the collection and dissemination of information. On 18 April 1906 a major earthquake and resulting fires destroyed over 80 per cent of the city of San Francisco; this event was to have a profound influence on building practices, risk modelling and the insurance industry. Lloyd's losses from the earthquake and fires were substantial though the writing of insurance business overseas was viewed with some wariness at the time.
While some insurance companies were denying claims for fire damage under their earthquake policies or vice versa, one of Lloyd's leading underwriters, Cuthbert Heath, famously instructed his San Francisco agent to "pay all of our policy-holders in full, irrespective of the terms of their policies". The prompt and full payment of all claims helped to cement Lloyd's reputation for reliable claim payments and as an important trading partner for US brokers and policyholders, it was estimated that around 90 per cent of the damage to the city was caused by the resultant fires, as such since 1906 fire following earthquake has been a specified insured peril under most policies. Heath is credited for introducing the now used "excess of loss" reinsurance protection for insurers following the San Francisco disaster. Heath's background was that he became an underwriting member of Lloyd's in 1880, upon reaching the minimum age of 21, on J. S. Burrows' syndicate. Within a year he was underwriting for himself on a three-man syndicate, in 1883 he opened a brokerage business.
In 1885 he wrote the first fire reinsurance contra
United Kingdom
Royal Navy
