A few days ago, a friend was arguing how anyone interested in history needed to know about the military to really understand history. It is a fair enough argument, but though many aren’t that interested in wars (mainly, myself), I still find the administration, finance and politics of navies and armies intriguing enough to write this post.
A lot is always talked about how Henry revitalised the navy and made England fit to be a naval power. We also know that Elizabeth’s success with the Armada was partly due to Henry’s interest in building a modernised navy. During his reign, plenty of money was poured into ship-building, devising naval strategies, buttressing up coastal defences and building of a navy. Henry inherited a total of just six warships when he took the throne, and he left 57 warships to his heir, along with 15 galleys or smaller ships.
A bit of Henry love 