[Royal Navy, 1704.] Printed House of Lords paper comprising Admiralty tables headed ‘A Monthly Account of Cruizers [Home-Convoys], from the First of January, to the First of November.’

A scarce piece of naval ephemera. Six copies on COPAC: Chetham’s Library, Lambeth Palace, NLS, Oxford, Society of Antiquaries and BL. According to ESTC, the journals of the House of Lords state that it was ‘presented to the House on 17 January 1705, and ordered to be printed 5 February 1705’. In landscape on one side of a folio sheet of watermarked laid paper, folded into a two-page bifolium. The table on the recto of the first leaf of the bifolium is headed ‘A Monthly ACCOUNT of the Home-Convoys, from the First of January, to the First of November.’ The second table, on the verso of the second leaf, has the same heading, except for the substitution of ‘Cruizers’ for ‘Home-Convoy’. Both tables are laid out by the month, from January to October, with four columns: Names [of ships]; Date of Orders; Station; Observation. At the foot of each page is a table listing the names of the ships and the number of days of service (with the addition of the station in the case of the cruisers). The seven ships in the home convoys are: Rupert, Winchester, Monk, Bristol, Bonadventure, Pendennis, Poole. The twenty-two cruisers are: Revenge, Oxford, Warspight, Expedition, Elizabeth, Rupert, Medway, Gloucester, Falmouth, Moderate, Mary, Deptford, Rochester, Chatham, Falkland, Assistance, Worcester, Triton, Hector, Maidstone, Dunwich. Observation in home convoy table, March 1704, regarding ‘Assistance / 15 Febr. / Convoy to Holland’: ‘This Ship is neither Convoy or Cruizer, for the Account of her is so Confused, that it doth not appear she did any Service.’ On the blank reverse of the first leaf is a ten-line manuscript note in a contemporary hand, reading: ‘Mr Oston rent / is 200 - 6 / and thare is a

/ fiften acors of wod / Land beside there is / Mr freeman / he is one of the Excecters / I think he Leus in Basenhall Street / thare is a small hous at Lamdon west and a barn / thare’. See Image