Mercenary gentlemen? The transnational service of foreign quarterdeck officers in the Royal Navy of the American and French wars, 1775–1815

Abstract In the late eighteenth century, like most European fleets, British Royal Navy still employed some foreign officers. This phenomenon, almost completely unexplored, seemingly embodies a contradiction between national and transnational meanings of honour. Using archival printed sources, this article examines presence, or lack thereof, in four distinct categories ‘quarterdeck’ officer: commissioned officers, ‘young gentlemen’ (aspirant officers), surgeons assistant surgeons, final miscellaneous group fulfilling special tasks, sometimes ashore. The peculiar values attached to officer class, relative social occupational positioning these categories, serve test real motives behind ‘national’ acceptance exclusion: beyond opposing discourses gentlemanly professional cosmopolitanism on one hand, patriotic duty, loyalty emerging anti-mercenarism other, levels presence among navy officers should be explained mainly with reference supply demand international labour migration market. distinction natives foreigners was culturally politically meaningful wartime context, strategically deployed by various actors regulate access exclusion, but it can also operate as red herring for historian. has broader implications way which we conceptualize honour, patriotism nation at turn nineteenth century.