Richard Vesey Hamilton's book Naval Administration provides a contemporary map of the Admiralty's machinery. Its first four chapters cover the overall system in fifty-eight pages, followed by six pages on the permanent secretary. Three chapters on the Controller's department then occupy another thirty-five pages. Separate discussions of contracts, naval intelligence, hydrography, transport, engineering works, and Greenwich Hospital show how many specialist functions supported the fleet. The page allocation demonstrates the Third Sea Lord and Controller's institutional weight inside an organization nominally led by the First Sea Lord.
Notable Point · 1:45:07-1:47:22
Vesey Hamilton maps the Admiralty's departments
Hamilton's own administrative manual reveals the scale of the Controller's department and the breadth of specialist work inside the Admiralty.