Masts And Timber Shortage In The 1770s

The navy coped with masts and timber shortages in the 1770s, 1803, and 1808 by importing wood products from other sources and searching for new sources. As the chief causes of these three timber shortages were completely different, the regions where the navy focused on as the source of woods were different in each case. In the 1770s, the cause of the shortage was the loss of the preliminary source of wood products in North America. In 1803, the failure to manage the dockyards and the outbreak of war caused the timber shortage. Then, the deficiency in 1808 resulted from the difficulty in importing goods from the Baltic areas, which were the main sources of masts and timber.
According to the statistics, the War of American Independence did not
In consequence of the navy’s attempt, Britain could construct the new measures to exploit forests in the empire. The loss of the Thirteen Colonies encouraged Britain to utilise Halifax as the distributor of Canadian woods and focus on shipbuilding in India. At the beginning, the navy regarded Canada as the small scale sources and made a little point of Canadian woods. However, due to the two shortages in 1803 and 1808, especially the latter, the significance of Canadian masts and timber raised. In addition, during this four decades the navy’s interest in shipbuilding in India increased. These three masts and timber shortages gave the navy the opportunity to emerge from the excessive dependence on the Baltic woods and focus on the procurement of goods within the
The transportation of wood products from Canada required much freight and time, but the navy succeeded to create the logistic network to make the transportation stable. The establishment of Halifax in 1749 resulted from the strategy in North America, but this naval base was quite suitable for the centre for the export of Canadian woods to Britain and the West Indies. As for India, the East India Company established reliable route from India to the mother country, and Bombay became the centre for shipbuilding in India. Halifax and Bombay contributed to the timber supply within the British Empire. In contrast, the navy could not construct the new appropriate logistic network connecting between Britain and sources of woods in Europe, Africa, and South America. The reliability of the transportation was quite important for the navy. Therefore, in spite of the short distance to Britain and British bases in the Mediterranean, the eastern Adriatic areas and the Black Sea did not gain the significant position in the British timber market. As the navy constructed the logistic network for exploiting forests in the empire thanks to Halifax and Bombay, the navy succeeded to cope with these three masts and timber