Chapter · 1:46:29-1:59:58

The Nore mutiny becomes a strategic crisis

Unlike Spithead, the Nore mutiny acquired political demands and threatened trade through the Thames, eroding its own support.

Notes

The Nore movement began with some familiar grievances but its delegates also demanded changes to the Articles of War, dissolution of Parliament, and peace with France. Those political demands made the Admiralty treat it as a revolutionary threat, and Erasmus Gower assembled a fifty-vessel loyal flotilla in the upper Thames to protect London. The mutineers' attempt to restrict shipping effectively blockaded the country's principal port and destroyed much of their potential public support. Talk of taking ships to France then drove sailors away from a leadership whose selection and true direction remain uncertain. The movement collapsed when crews refused the signal to sail and some departing ships were fired on by fellow mutineers.