Admiralty: Encyclopedia II - Admiralty - History

Admiralty - History

The office of Admiral of England, or Lord Admiral and later Lord High Admiral was created in around 1400. In 1546 King Henry VIII established the Council of the Marine, later to became the Navy Board, to oversee administrative affairs of the naval service. Operational control of the Navy remained the responsibility of the Lord High Admiral, who was one of the nine Great Officers of State.

In 1628, Charles I put the office of Lord High Admiral into commission and control of the Royal Navy passed to a committee in the form of the Board of the Admiralty. The office of Lord High Admiral passed a number of times in and out of commission until 1709, after which the office was almost permanently in commission (the last Lord High Admiral being the future King William IV in the early 19th century). .

The members of the Board of Admiralty were known as the Lords Commissioners of Admiralty. The Lords Commissioners were always a mixture of admirals, known as Naval Lords or Sea Lords, and civilian lords, normally politicians. The president of the Board was known as the First Lord of the Admiralty, who was a member of the Cabinet.

After 1806, the First Lord of the Admiralty was always a civilian, while the professional head of the navy came to be (and is still today) known as the First Sea Lord.

In 1831 the Navy Board was abolished as a separate entity and its duties and responsibilities were given over to the Board of Admiralty.

In 1964 the Admiralty was subsumed into the Ministry of Defence along with the War Office and the Air Ministry. Within the expanded Ministry of Defence are the new Admiralty Board, Army Board and Air Force Board, each headed by the Secretary of State for Defence. As mentioned above, there is also a Navy Board in charge of the day-to-day running of the Royal Navy.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "History", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki