#impressment

'Mr Blockhead pressing sailors in a tavern', riotous scene; study for an illustration to 'The Life of a Midshipman' by Frederick Marryat, 1820 (British Museum). A crowd attacks Royal Marines and sailors, including Royal Navy officers, after they threaten the locals with impressment.

Merchant wages were high in wartime, and the press gang was often necessary to get men into the navy. Popular myth suggests that this terrorised whole districts, and dragged unwilling landsmen into the fleet. In practice the members of the gang often lived in fear of their own safety, and they usually took only experienced men for the navy. Some gangs were based in seaport towns such as London, Liverpool, Hull and Newcastle. Others operated off the coast, stopping merchant ships and taking part of the crew off. Some gangs were members of the crews of warships at sea, some were based permanently on shore. It was a hard life for the officers and men of the gang, and in 1814 Lieutenant Forbes in Greenock wanted to be replaced ‘in consequence of the repeated insults I meet with in the streets of Greenock, and the mob having proceeded even up the stairs to the door of my lodgings . . . It is hard to say what so ferocious a people might do.’

'Press-gang at work, 1805': a cigarette card of the late 19th-early 20th century depicting the violent impressment of a seaman (NYPL).

In his semi-autobiographical novel The Naval Officer (Frank Mildmay), Frederick Marryat allows the defeated captain of an American privateer in the War of 1812 to present his point of view:

The conversation turned on the nature, quality and number of men in the privateer. “They are all seamen,” said Peters, “except the ten black fellows.”

“Some of them, I suspect, are English,” said I.

“It is not for me to peach,” said the wary American. “It is difficult always to know whether a man who has been much in both countries is a native of Boston in Lincolnshire, or Boston in Massachusetts; and perhaps they don’t always know themselves. We never ask questions when a seaman ships for us.”

“You have an abundance of our seamen both in your marine and merchant service,” said our captain.

“Yes,” said Green; “and we are never likely to want them, while you impress for us.”

“We impress for you?” said Captain T — ; “how do you prove that?”

“Your impressment,” said the American, “fills our ships. Your seamen will not stand it; and for every two men you take by force, rely on it, we get one of them as a volunteer.”

— Frederick Marryat, The Naval Officer

The captain applied to the port-admiral, and obtained permission to send parties on shore to impress seamen. The second and third lieutenants, and the oldest midshipmen, were despatched on shore every night, with some of the most trustworthy men, and generally brought on board in the morning about half a dozen men, whom they had picked up in the different alehouses or grog-shops, as the sailors call them. Some of them were retained, but most of them sent on shore as unserviceable; for it is the custom, when a man either enters, or is impressed, to send him down to the surgeon in the cock-pit, where he is stripped and examined all over, to see if he be sound and fit for his Majesty's service; and if not, he is sent on shore again.

— Frederick Marryat, Peter Simple

Soon afterwards, Ben the Whaler came in to inquire after my father, and I told him what had occurred; he was very indignant at my mother's conduct, and, as soon as the affair was known, so were all the tenants of Fisher’s Alley. When my mother went out, or had words with any of her neighbours, the retort was invariably, "Who sent the press-gang after her own husband?"

— Frederick Marryat, Poor Jack

It was quite possible for a good man pressed at sea to step straight into a petty officer's berth, or even straight onto the quarter deck. Pressed men rated midshipmen, or given warrants, were not unknown, and there was nothing to stop a pressed man rising as high in the Service as any other. The ship which manned a press tender generally kept the men she raised—if good, as an incentive, if bad, as a punishment. The good men were worth keeping, so it was worth rating a good man as highly as he deserved, lest he find means to go elsewhere. John Stevens, mate of the Neptune snow, was pressed in 1755 because of some ill-timed abuse of the press officer by her master. He petitioned either for his discharge, or to be allowed to serve in the Elizabeth whose captain offered to rate him midshipman.

— Nicholas A. M. Rodger, The Wooden World: An Anatomy of the Georgian Navy