Letters of Marquee

jlckansas

What if a country started using Letters of Marquee in different periods from the 1900's onward? Would we see a rise in the use of light cruisers and more heavily armed against surface action destroyers?
 
Thande

Thande

Donor
Marque, not marquee. And it's hard to see how you could have effective letters of marque in the post-ironclad era: how would privateers have the cash and facilities to support an armoured steamship?
 

Father Maryland

Besides that Privateering was banned in the 1850s. Though quite a few nations including the US did not sign the accords that made it so.
 

Trotsky

Thande said:
Marque, not marquee. And it's hard to see how you could have effective letters of marque in the post-ironclad era: how would privateers have the cash and facilities to support an armoured steamship?
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Would they need to be armored? Wouldn't you rather run from a warship than engage it?
 

Teleology

Banned
Private commerce raiders sponsored by Great Powers?

Is this technologically feasible?

Could a one-ship privateering outfit upkeep a commerce raider?
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
Trotsky said:
Would they need to be armored? Wouldn't you rather run from a warship than engage it?
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Well, 36 knot cargo ships are pretty damned expensive too, even without armor. Need to be able to pick 'em up & put 'em down if you are running from a torpedo boat or a destroyer.

Privateers only made sense when the difference between the typical warship and the typical cargo ship was in how disciplined the crew was. The advent of steam propulsion, shell guns, and accurate gun laying, especially combined with wireless, put the concept to rest.

The IJN had this available in 1887.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_warship_Kotaka

The UK trotted this out in 1907 (4x1 4" guns and 34 knots)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Swift_(1907)

By 1909 the RN has these somewhat saner designs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beagle_class_destroyer


1918 saw this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_and_W_class_destroyer

and this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clemson_class_destroyer


Keep in mind that, as last as 1943 cargo ships were capable of 10-12 knots on a good day (except the big, extremely expensive, ocean liners). That means the 1887 Kotaka can run circles around one.
 

Maniakes

There were merchant vessels that were converted to impromtu warships by adding guns, which saw action as late as WWII. They had some value as escorts and commerce raider, but in both WWI and WWII they were simply stopgaps that were withdrawn from service once enough purpose-built warships were available.
 

Astrodragon

Thande said:
Marque, not marquee. And it's hard to see how you could have effective letters of marque in the post-ironclad era: how would privateers have the cash and facilities to support an armoured steamship?
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Now you've gone and spoilt it; I had this lovely vision of ships charging around sinking merchant ships while covered in big tents....:D:D
 

Don Lardo

Cook said:
In World War Two the German raider Kormoran sank HMAS Sydney, a light Cruiser.
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And was sank in return, something which a privateer operating under a letter of marque doesn't want to happen.

The Sydney/Kormoran story is both extremely odd and one we still know very little about despite Sydney's wreck being discovered. Most of Kormoran's crew survived and none at all from Sydney. For decades, the accounts of the battle told by Kormoran's surviving crew were generally discounted mostly because those accounts reflected rather poorly on Sydney's crew. When the discovery of the wreck confirmed the Kormoran's claims regarding the damage she caused to the light cruiser, the rest of her story has been reexamined.

There's a fairly exhaustive report on the 'net detailing the damage of the wreck and laying out what the investigators feel is the most plausible series of events aboard the cruiser leading up to and during the battle.

Anyway, seeing as a privateer wants to seize enemy ships and their cargoes in order to make a profit, merely sinking them isn't an option. Also, as others have already pointed out, advances in technology, especially radio, make attacking ships, let alone capturing them, very hazardous to the raider. This is perhaps the biggest reason why commerce raiding from the late 1800s onward evolved from "capturing by attack and/or threats" to "destroying by ambush".
 
Grey Wolf

Grey Wolf

Donor
Cook said:
In World War Two the German raider Kormoran sank HMAS Sydney, a light Cruiser.

http://www.findingsydney.com/sydney.asp
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There were a whole load of them in World War 2 - apart from the Kormoran, the Atlantis is the most famous.

The point is not to engage the enemy; you're a commerce raider, so raid commerce and keep away from the enemy.

Now, in WW2 these were state vessels, but was the same true of the WW1 era raiders such as the Seelowe?

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 

Alexius

Grey Wolf said:
Now, in WW2 these were state vessels, but was the same true of the WW1 era raiders such as the Seelowe?
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IIRC the WW1 German commerce raiders were also state warships. I have heard stories about the Goodyear blimp being issued a letter of marque in WW2, but that may be apocryphal.
 

anon_user

The closest I could see to letters of marque would be privateers serving as a sort of naval mercenary, using relatively inexpensive submarines and torpedo boats and being paid by how much shipping they sink. Possible, if not necessarily plausible, in the '20s and '30s; after that, not so much.

As for true privateers, no chance.
 
Grey Wolf

Grey Wolf

Donor
Alexius said:
IIRC the WW1 German commerce raiders were also state warships. I have heard stories about the Goodyear blimp being issued a letter of marque in WW2, but that may be apocryphal.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_Seeadler_(Windjammer)

Seeadler not Seelowe, my bad lol. It was apparently VERY much a state ship because it had been captured as a prize; I hadn't realised that

But as per the initial post, I think this is the only chance for such a way of operating - because of the treaty outlawing privateers then it presumably wasn't a way of thinking.

Without such an agreement, you might see such merchant raiders outfitted as private enterprises...

Best regards
Grey Wolf
 

Markus

Banned
Why not? German AMC were very effective and technically they were 15-16 knot merchant ships with a few guns. To keep the cost low, one could install old guns and have them under local control. That means no long range fire but that´s only needed for fighting warships and if that happenes the AMC is dead anyway.
 

Alexius

Grey Wolf said:
But as per the initial post, I think this is the only chance for such a way of operating - because of the treaty outlawing privateers then it presumably wasn't a way of thinking.
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Either that or use a country that didn't sign the treaty. The only major powers that didn't were the US and China. Some South American countries also didn't (including Bolivia which actually tried to issue letters of marque in 1879), and the only Asian countries to sign were the Ottoman Empire and Japan. No African countries signed- I know for a fact that Morocco, Liberia and Ethiopia were independent at the time.

So probably US or Chinese privateers would be the most likely...
 
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