The Mariner's Mirror Podcast

In this episode Dr Sam Willis explores the Exeter Ship Canal which, with the exception of the Roman 'Fossdyke' in Lincolnshire, is the oldest manmade waterway in Britain. Canal building is usually associated with the canal mania which gripped Britain between 1790 and the 1820s as the early years of the industrial revolution both posed problems and created solutions for those wishing to travel and...

Today we have episode 7 of our Iconic Ships mini-series in which a curator of a historic ship makes a case for their ship being iconic, or a historian takes a ship from history but which sadly no longer survives and make a case for that ship being iconic.  HMS Bellerophon - known fondly as the Billy Ruffian - was a Third 74-gun ship of the line with one of the most extraordinary careers...

Today we have episode 6 of our Iconic Ships mini-series in which a curator of a historic ship makes a case for their ship being iconic, or a historian takes a ship from history but which sadly no longer survives and make a case for that ship being iconic. Today we have the magnificent - and surviving - warship from the great age of sail, USS Constitution, otherwise known as 'Old Ironsides'. A...

Today we have episode 5 of our Iconic Ships mini-series in which a curator of a historic ship makes a case for their ship being iconic, or a historian takes a ship from history but which sadly no longer survives and make a case for that ship being iconic. Today we have none other than HMS Belfast. Moored today just upstream of Tower Bridge, Belfast is a true icon of the London skyline and Tha...

In August 2014, a group of amateur divers revisited a known shipwreck from the seventeenth century but found that shifting tidal patterns had exposed much more of the wreck than had previously been seen, including a number of wooden luggage chests. Over the course of two days around a thousand items were brought up from the wreck, comprising silk textiles, women’s clothing, furnishing items and ob...

This episode opens up the fascinating world of maritime historical discovery. Dr Sam Willis meets Max Wilson from the Lloyds Register Foundation archives to explore some of the different types of document that you might come across conducting maritime research: from boiler plans, ship plans, stowage plans and rigging plans - to survey reports, casualty returns, correspondence, photographs and intr...

In the 18th and 19th centuries countless whaling ships set sail from Shetland for the Arctic. They brought back whales for their valuable oil, but left behind their music. Maurice Henderson, a fiddle player from Shetland, has been rediscovering these arctic whaling tunes and its surviving tradition in Greenland. Here he plays some of them, and discusses their history. For the video check out the M...

The fourth episode in our Iconic Ships series features three members of the curatorial team of the Cutty Sark arguing for the iconic status of their ship. At the time of her launch in 1869 the Cutty Sark was a state-of-the-art Tea Clipper designed to bring manufactured goods to China and return with Chinese tea as quickly as possible. She could carry well over 1,300,000 million lbs of tea. Soon th...

In the early years of the twentieth century commercial dredging removed a shingle beach from the tiny fishing village of Hallsands in South Devon. Soon high tides and storms washed everything away and all that is left now are the ruins of this maritime community. Dr Sam Willis meets maritime archaeologist Grant Bettinson from CITiZAN to find out more. The interview was filmed so do check out our Y...

Today we have Part 3 of our special episode on the Battle of Jutland because, on this day in history in 1916, the German and British battlefleets were coming to terms with the results of the largest naval battle of the First World War and one of the largest in history involving 250 ships and 100,000 men, and in which 25 ships of various sizes were sunk. Part 1 outlined the events and included a fa...

Today we have Part 2 of our special episode on the Battle of Jutland because, on this day in history in 1916, the German and British battlefleets met in the largest naval battle of the First World War and one of the largest in history involving 250 ships and 100,000 men. Part 1 outlined the events and included a fantastic interview with Dr Stephan Huck, head of the excellent German Naval Museum in...

Today we have for you Part 1 of our special episode on the Battle of Jutland because, on this day in history in 1916, the German and British battlefleets met in the largest naval battle of the First World War and one of the largest in history - involving 250 ships and 100,000 men. Parts 2 and 3 will follow in the coming days and will introduce you to a host of original eyewitness sources to the ba...

The final instalment of our 3-part special on the Battle of Tsushima explores the Japanese perspective of the battle including a consideration of the extraordinary growth of the Imperial Japanese Navy both before and after Tsushima. Dr Sam Willis speaks with Kunika Kakuta . Kunika is a final year PhD student in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London and specialises in the relations...

Part 2 of our 3-part special on the Battle of Tsushima explores the Russian perspective of the battle with a reading of the diary of Captain Vladimir Semenoff. Semenoff was a well known Russian naval officer who served in several positions throughout the course of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. His presence during the siege of Port Arthur and later during the Baltic Fleet's long voyage to Ts...

The Battle of Tsushima was the decisive naval action between Japan and Russia that effectively ended the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5 and one of the most important naval battles in history. It was the first in which radio played a major part; the action that demonstrated the power of the all-big-gun battleship, leading to HMS Dreadnought of 1906 and the Anglo-German dreadnought race; the first tim...

On this day in 1940, the British Expeditionary Force and other Allied troops were evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk, to save them from the rapidly approaching German forces who had just launched their lightning invasion of northern Europe. It was one of the most challenging and significant amphibious operations and evacuations in history. The planners of Operation Dynamo first estimated that 4...

A very special episode in our new Iconic Ships series, published on the anniversary of the loss of HMS Hood in 1941. HMS Hood is without doubt one of the Royal Navy’s most famous ships. A battle-cruiser, laid down in 1916 and launched in 1918, she was the largest battle cruiser ever built and the largest warship of any type in the world for twenty years. She enjoyed a correspondingly hig...

This week Dr Sam Willis speaks with Timothy Heck, the Deputy Directing Editor at the Modern War Institute at the United States Military Academy in West Point. They discuss the changing nature of amphibious operations in history and its relevance to the present day. What can the US Marine Corps today learn from amphibious operations in the past? Like DDay in WW2 or Gallipoli in WW1? How are other l...

This week Dr Sam Willis explores the heart-warming story of maritime pets by speaking with Pat Sullivan from the excellent Museum of Maritime Pets . There is a centuries-old tradition of animals living on or near water, and collaborating with man (and woman) in both peace and war. Pat has spent a great deal of time documenting these animals' contributions and promoting the safe and humane treatmen...

This episode has been inspired by the tragedy of the Nanggala, a submarine of the Indonesian navy that disappeared earlier this month with 53 crew members on board and only 72 hours of oxygen to keep them alive. After 5 days of searching Nangala was found at a depth of more than 800 meters, split into three sections. This has led to a great deal of discussion in the press about submarine design. I...

Estuaries and creeks around the coast of England are littered with the remains of watercraft which have been deliberately abandoned when they are no longer deemed useful. The extent of this is astonishing. In 2013 a survey identified at least 199 assemblages of hulked vessels all around the English coastline and this is by no means the complete record.  In recent years many have been ide...

Regular listeners will know that over the past few months we have been reading extracts from the logbook of the whaler Swan of Hull at the start of each episode (with the exception of the Iconic Ships and Great Sea Fights special series). The Swan became trapped in the ice off the west coast of Greenland in the autumn of 1836. These readings come from a transcription of the logbook held in the arc...

Dr Sam Willis presents episode 2 of our new Iconic Ships series, looking today at the history of the Mayflower . This new Iconic Ships series has been conceived as an opportunity for curators of famous historic vessels to make a case for their surviving vessel and also for historians to make a case for a historic vessel that no longer survives. In this episode we hear from Kathryn Gray from the Un...

This is the first of a new sub-series of podcast episodes: ‘Iconic Ships’. The series has been conceived as an opportunity for curators of famous historic vessels to make a case as to why their ship is iconic, but it is also open to historians to make a case for a historic vessel that no longer survives. Once we have sufficient entries we will open this up to the public and run a poll. We start wi...

Inspired by the recent BBC series 'The Terror', a chilling tale based on one of polar exploration’s deepest mysteries, Dr Sam Willis explores the history HMS Terror . The TV series is set on the Terror’s last and fateful voyage when, in 1845, under the command of Sir John Franklin and alongside another ship, HMS E rebus , Terror sailed into the ice off the west coast of Greenland in search of the...