Hello, I am working on a project about naval warfare during Age of Sail. I know some basics but nothing in depth really - and that's my goal, to educate myself to achieve better result with my project.
Since I am not looking for high historical-accuracy, more likely to be inspired by history - I'll take any answers you will write down. What am I looking for? If there is any source from which I can study about this era - books, articles, videos, online PDFs, etc.
What exactly I need - anything really. Something where I can find out about what type of ammunition/gunnery ships were used (differences in nations, who used what, etc. - even unused prototypes), sailors roles in and off combat, ranks of officers and what their role was on the ship, what equipment was used (tools, specific weapons, etc.), what kind of life was on the ship (if there were any events during sailing - like, shows/theatres. How good was meal/chef, if there was any kind of profesional staff - surgerons, carpenters etc.), how ship comunicated during combat, if any nations had bigger advantage in technology (like, if one nation had better sails, other one better officers, etc.) or what kind of cargo ships usually had onboard and what it was good/used for. And for last question I have on my mind for now - which nations had in overall (during whole era) best Navy (Ships, officers, equipment, etc.)
As you can see, I am looking for anything what I could possibly use.
I am looking foward to your answers! Thank you very much.
Hi there - we're happy to approve your question related to your creative project, and we are happy for people to answer. However, we should warn you that many flairs have become reluctant to answer questions for aspiring novelists and the like, based on past experience: some people working on creative projects have a tendency to try to pump historians for trivia while ignoring the bigger points they were making, while others have a tendency to argue with historians when the historical reality does not line up with what's needed for a particular scene or characterization. Please respect the answers of people who have generously given you their time, even if it's not always what you want to hear.
Additionally, as amazing as our flair panel is, we should also point out that /r/AskHistorians is not a professional historical consultation service. If you're asking a question here because you need vital research for a future commercial product such as a historical novel, you may be better off engaging a historical consultant at a fair hourly rate to answer these questions for you. We don't know what the going rate for consultancy work would be in your locality, but it may be worth looking into that if you have in-depth or highly plot-reliant questions for this project. Some /r/AskHistorians flairs could be receptive to working as a consultant in this way. However, if you wish for a flair here to do this work for you, you will need to organize this with them yourselves.
For more general advice about doing research to inform a creative project, please check out our Monday Methods post on the subject.