Ensigns, or: What is that Flag?

[AThompson]

Hi, all.

I'm wondering; The British Royal Navy had multiple ensigns at one point; blue, white and red, depending on the admiral or station of the ship in question I believe.

I wonder, did any other nation have multiple naval ensigns? If so, why? I don't even know why the RN had three ensigns.

[marcelo_malara]

duplicte

[marcelo_malara]

Hi, all.

I'm wondering; The British Royal Navy had multiple ensigns at one point; blue, white and red, depending on the admiral or station of the ship in question I believe.

I wonder, did any other nation have multiple naval ensigns? If so, why? I don't even know why the RN had three ensigns.

The big fleets of the age of sail, after the introduction of the line of battle about 1650, were divided in three divisions, the main, the van and the rear, The command of the fleet was given to an admiral, he commanded the whole fleet and the main division. Second in command of the whole and commanding the van was the vice admiral. And third in command of the whole and commanding the rear was (adequately named) the rear admiral. Each had its own flag.

For sure the Dutch used a similar system. Do not know other navies, but there were not many that could bolsters such a number of ships. Mr Byron Angel is knowledgeable about the era and can add more to this.

[NCC1717]

An example for the French in the 18th Century:
"For large fleets divided into squadrons, the admirals of the van displayed a flag horizontally divided, white over blue, admirals of the center squadron displayed the white flag, and admirals of the rear squadron had plain blue flags."

From here:
https://tmg110.tripod.com/royfr8.htm

[AThompson]

An example for the French in the 18th Century:
"For large fleets divided into squadrons, the admirals of the van displayed a flag horizontally divided, white over blue, admirals of the center squadron displayed the white flag, and admirals of the rear squadron had plain blue flags."

From here:
https://tmg110.tripod.com/royfr8.htm

That's interesting, thank you. I've never seen any of those ensigns. Every painting or artwork you see of a French warship during the Revolution/Napoleonic period just shows a tri-colour ensign, but that link shows a white flag with a tri-colour in the canton. I wonder what's happening there, then.

Tangent: NCC1717, that's Yorktown, isn't it?

[NCC1717]

AThompson, regarding your tangent.

I have always used the names and hull numbers from the Franz Joseph Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual rather than the other sources due the the large numbers of Gamescience DN/CA/DD/Scout and Tug models I have built. In that book 1717 is the Defiance. I also wrote computer games in the 70's and 80s using that name.

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/St ... cal_Manual

https://ncc1717.com/model-railways/star ... s-by-type/