ABSTRACT
The function of the English navy during the Hundred Years’ War was to provide English kings with armed transports for carrying soldiers, horses, and other military baggage to the Continent. Control of the Channel by systematic destruction of enemy fleets was never a factor in English strategic planning. Although the defeat of the French fleet at the Battle of Sluys in 1340 did give England uncontested use of the Narrow Seas for thirty years, Edward III did not fight the battle for that purpose. The inadequacies of the impressment system had imperiled Edward’s Continental ventures. After Sluys, he moved swiftly to combat some of the evils and laxity in impressment administration. Edward III had no real appreciation of the value of sea-power as such, but there can be no doubt that he realized that the transport of his armies and the continuation of the Continental war would depend upon the ability of his government to impress great numbers of ships.
