Forgetting the setbacks of the American Revolutionary War, in 1793 the Royal Navy embarked on an almost unprecedented era of yictories at sea, producing a considerable appetite for pictures of every incident, great or small. A thriving trade in prints and engravings grew up, suplemented by wattercolours and oils by celebrated artists. Besides these 'public' works, many officers - and indeed members ofthe lower deck - kept personal jopurnals and sketchbooks, illustrated with surprisingly accomplished drawings and watercolours, often depicting the everyday aspects of wartime life at sea that were ignored in the more celebratory artistic media, These sources form a rich vein that have been barely touched in previous publications, but which this book uses to full effect. Despire numerous defeats, the French nayy continued to dispute command of the sea in the period 1793-1797, and the early years of the war abound with fleet engagements, including dramatic victories against the Spanish at St Vincent and the Dutch at Camperdown, between which the navy endured the shocking events of the Great Mutiny, potentially the most dangerous moment of the whole war. This volume is the first of five covering the whole of the French Revolutionary, Napoleonic and 1812 Wars based on contemporary images, a series depicting the reality, of warfare under sail in a depth never previously attained.