Pembroke Dockyard and the Old Navy: A Bicentennial History

The Royal Dockyard at Pembroke Dock produced over 250 warships for the Royal Navy, including five royal yachts, between its founding in 1814 and its closure after the First World War. Prior to this, no ocean-going ships had ever been built on the south shores of Milford Haven, where the most complex piece of machinery used was the horse-drawn plough. Yet within twenty years Pembrokeshire men were building major British warships and they did so for the next hundred years. This long century, from the Napoleonic Wars until after the First World War, covered all the major changes in warship design and construction, from wood to iron and then steel, and from sail to steam, and paddle wheel to screw propulsion. In this authoritative and splendidly illustrated work, naval historian Lawrie Phillips, who was born and bred just outside the dockyard walls, tells the story of this royal yard, its ships and the Pembroke men who built them. AUTHOR: Naval historian LAWRIE PHILLIPS was born and raised in Pembroke Dock and has had a lifelong interest in the old Royal Dockyard and the ships it built. He travelled widely in his thirty-five year-long career with the Ministry of Defence and he served as Fleet Public Relations Officer, Head of Media Operations at the Permanent Joint HQ, Head of Publicity at the MOD and Director of Public Relations in Hong Kong. He is author of The Royal Navy Day by Day (The History Press), the Royal Navy’s standard naval history reference book. Lawrie Phillips is a former lieutenant commander RNR and lieutenant colonel, Royal Engineers (V).