The Big Blockade

Edward Keble Chatterton (1878-1944) was a sailor and prolific writer who is best known for non-fiction works. His voyages across the English Channel, to the Netherlands, around the Mediterranean and through the French canals led to many articles and books. Joining the R.N.V.R. at the outbreak of the Great War he commanded a motor launch flotilla, leaving the service  as a Lieutenant Commander. In 1918 he was appointed to the Naval section of the Official History Committee, where he worked until 1922.

Unquestionably one of the most important and vivid nautical authors of the past century using both first hand accounts from the people that were there at the time, and having the opportunity to access to official documents .Chatterton recorded the maritime history of Britain at its most momentous point of change, from sail to steam, from the advent of the submarine to the carrier.

Many historians attribute the seemingly sudden collapse of Germany and her Central Powers allies in 1918, not to defeats on the battlefields of the western front, but to the disastrous cumulative effects of the British blockade of Germany’s ports and coastline. E. Keble Chatterton pieces together the tightening blockade on Germany from private letters, personal conversations and diaries of those who saw action.