1 Rocky islands turned warships into kindling
The difficulty of determining longitude claimed thousands of sailors’ lives, but one shipwreck influenced the British government in particular.
Disaster struck on the evening of 22 October 1707, as Admiral Cloudesley Shovell approached the English Channel with a fleet of five large ships.
Shovell was convinced that the fleet was off the coast of Brittany, far from the rocky south coast of England. He was
