John Knox Laughton
Encyclopedia
Sir John Knox Laughton Kt (23 April 1830–14 September 1915) was a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 naval historian
Naval history
Naval history is the area of military history concerning war at sea and the subject is also a sub-discipline of the broad field of maritime history....

 and arguably the first to argue for the importance of the subject as an independent field of study. Beginning his working life as a mathematically-trained civilian instructor for the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, he later became Professor of Modern History at King's College London
King's College London
King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...

 and a co-founder of the Navy Records Society
Navy Records Society
The Navy Records Society was established in 1893 as a scholarly society to publish historical documents that illustrated the history of the Royal Navy. Professor Sir John Knox Laughton and Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge were the key leaders who organized the Society, basing it on the model of earlier...

. A prolific writer of lives, he penned the biographies
Biography
A biography is a detailed description or account of someone's life. More than a list of basic facts , biography also portrays the subject's experience of those events...

 of more than 900 naval personalities for the Dictionary of National Biography
Dictionary of National Biography
The Dictionary of National Biography is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published from 1885...

.

Family

Laughton was born in Liverpool on 23 April 1830, son of a former Master Mariner
Master mariner
A Master Mariner or MM is the professional qualification required for someone to serve as the person in charge or person in command of a commercial vessel. In England, the term Master Mariner has been in use at least since the 13th century, reflecting the fact that in guild or livery company terms,...

. He married twice and had 10 children including Vera Laughton Mathews
Vera Laughton Mathews
Dame Elvira Sibyl Marie Laughton Mathews, DBE , born Elvira Sibyl Marie Laughton, was one of the first officers of the Women's Royal Naval Service and served from just after the inception of the WRNS in 1918 until it was disbanded in late 1919...

.

Academic career

Laughton was educated at Caius College, Cambridge, graduating BA (34th wrangler) in 1852. He served with the Royal Navy as a civilian shipboard instructor teaching mathematics, science and navigation, and saw combat in the Baltic and Far East campaigns. In 1866 he finished his sea days by going ashore to teach at the Royal Naval College
Royal Naval Academy
The Royal Naval Academy was established at Portsmouth Dockyard as a facility to train officers for the Royal Navy. The founders' intentions were to provide an alternative means to recruit officers and to provide standardised training, education and admission.-Training:In 1773, a shore side...

 in Portsmouth
HMNB Portsmouth
Her Majesty's Naval Base Portsmouth is one of three operating bases in the United Kingdom for the British Royal Navy...

. When the College moved to Greenwich in 1873, Laughton moved with it to become the Head of the Department of Meteorology
Meteorology
Meteorology is the interdisciplinary scientific study of the atmosphere. Studies in the field stretch back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not occur until the 18th century. The 19th century saw breakthroughs occur after observing networks developed across several countries...

 and Marine Surveying
Marine surveyor
A Marine Surveyor is a person who conducts inspections, surveys or examinations of marine vessels to assess, monitor and report on their condition and the products on them. Marine Surveyors also inspect equipment intended for new or existing vessels to ensure compliance with various standards or...

.

In the 1870s he turned more and more to teaching and lecturing on history, delivering a now famous lecture to the Royal United Services Institute
Royal United Services Institute
The Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies , officially still known by its old name, the Royal United Services Institution, is a British defence and security think tank. It was founded in 1831 by The Duke of Wellington.RUSI describes itself asIt won Prospect Magazine's...

 (RUSI) in 1874 on the importance of actually analysing historical events, rather than merely reporting events chronologically. This was a new idea at the time and would not have been seen then as stating the obvious, as perhaps it would today. With this new approach, Laughton ‘acted as a catalyst for [the] entire intellectual development’ of naval history as an independent discipline.

During his time as a lecturer in naval history, Laughton was undoubtedly an influence on the more famous naval historian-strategists of his age – Alfred Thayer Mahan
Alfred Thayer Mahan
Alfred Thayer Mahan was a United States Navy flag officer, geostrategist, and historian, who has been called "the most important American strategist of the nineteenth century." His concept of "sea power" was based on the idea that countries with greater naval power will have greater worldwide...

, Julian Corbett
Julian Corbett
Sir Julian Stafford Corbett was a prominent British naval historian and geostrategist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, whose works helped shape the Royal Navy's reforms of that era...

 and Herbert Richmond
Herbert Richmond
Admiral Sir Herbert William Richmond KCB was a prominent naval officer, who also served as Vere Harmsworth Professor of Imperial and Naval History at Cambridge University and Master of Downing College, Cambridge...

. Mahan, who has been described as ‘one of Laughton’s disciples’, wrote of him that 'He probably knows more naval history than any English speaking man living’. In 1885 he left the Royal Navy to accept the position of Professor of Modern History at King's College, London. He succeeded in convincing the Admiralty
Admiralty
The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the Kingdom of England, and later in the United Kingdom, responsible for the command of the Royal Navy...

 to allow limited public access to their archives. Together with Admiral Cyprian Bridge Laughton co-founded the Navy Records Society
Navy Records Society
The Navy Records Society was established in 1893 as a scholarly society to publish historical documents that illustrated the history of the Royal Navy. Professor Sir John Knox Laughton and Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge were the key leaders who organized the Society, basing it on the model of earlier...

 in 1893. He was the Society’s first Secretary, and was knighted for his work in 1907.

Laughton died at the age of 85 on 14 September 1915 and was buried at sea in the Thames Estuary
Thames Estuary
The Thames Mouth is the estuary in which the River Thames meets the waters of the North Sea.It is not easy to define the limits of the estuary, although physically the head of Sea Reach, near Canvey Island on the Essex shore is probably the western boundary...

 from the decks of HMS Conqueror
HMS Conqueror (1911)
HMS Conqueror was an Orion class battleship of the Royal Navy. She served in the 2nd Battle Squadron of the Grand Fleet in World War I, and fought at the Battle of Jutland, 31 May 1916, suffering no damage....

.

Legacy and Influence

Laughton's contributions to naval history were largely forgotten until the pioneering work by Professor D. M. Schurman
D. M. Schurman
Donald Mackenzie Schurman was a professor of history at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, and also served at the Royal Military College of Canada. In the Festschrift published in his honour in 1997, the editors hailed D. M...

, The Education of a Navy: the Development of British Naval Strategic Thought, 1867-1914 (1965) first brought them out. Professor Andrew Lambert
Andrew Lambert
Andrew Lambert BA , MA, PhD, FRHistS is a British naval historian, who is currently Laughton Professor of Naval History in the Department of War Studies at King's College London.-Early life and education:...

 has since added to this with a work, The Foundations of Naval History: John Knox Laughton, the Royal Navy and the Historical Profession.

The obvious question arising from any study of Laughton is, if he was so influential and important, why is he not as well known as his ‘disciples’? Unlike Mahan and Corbett, Laughton never wrote a major work, and the body of work that he did leave behind is now very difficult to come by. The measure of his significance comes by looking at the people he influenced and the institutions which he left behind after his death. Through 'long-term influence and personal contact' with other thinkers in the field and British admirals, he managed to sow the seeds in influential people’s minds that naval history was a subject worth studying, something which had relevance and bearing on modern naval affairs. The Naval Records Society remains a key part of the discipline of naval history.

In recognition of his importance, King’s College Department of War Studies has named its naval history chair as the Laughton Professor, and naval historians in the department belong to the Laughton Naval History Research Unit.

Honours

  • Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath
    Order of the Bath
    The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...

     in 1907
  • Chesney Gold Medal in 1910
  • Professor
    Professor
    A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...

    ship, granted in 1885 by King’s College London

See also

  • Rear-Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan
    Alfred Thayer Mahan
    Alfred Thayer Mahan was a United States Navy flag officer, geostrategist, and historian, who has been called "the most important American strategist of the nineteenth century." His concept of "sea power" was based on the idea that countries with greater naval power will have greater worldwide...

     USN
    United States Navy
    The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

  • Sir Julian Corbett
    Julian Corbett
    Sir Julian Stafford Corbett was a prominent British naval historian and geostrategist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, whose works helped shape the Royal Navy's reforms of that era...

  • Rear-Admiral Stephen Luce
    Stephen Luce
    Stephen Bleecker Luce was a U.S. Navy admiral. He was the founder and first president of the Naval War College, between 1884 and 1886.-Biography:...

     USN
    United States Navy
    The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

  • Admiral Sir Herbert Richmond
    Herbert Richmond
    Admiral Sir Herbert William Richmond KCB was a prominent naval officer, who also served as Vere Harmsworth Professor of Imperial and Naval History at Cambridge University and Master of Downing College, Cambridge...

     RN
    Royal Navy
    The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...


External links

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