The 1797 mutinies at Spithead and Nore are important in the history of the Royal Navy, not just because they are unique events as a challenge to authority within the service, but because they demonstrate two totally different approaches to what was, after all, considered a criminal action.

The earlier mutiny began at Spithead on 16 April and initially concerned rates of pay, which had been established in 1658, but which, because of inflation towards the end of the 18th century, had not kept pace with the cost of living - basically, the sailors wanted a pay rise.

Also, in 1761, the navy had begun “coppering” the bottom of ships’ hulls, covering the timber with thin sheets of the metal, which prevented them from fouling up as quickly.

As a result, ships did not have to return to base so often to have their hulls scraped clean, which meant that sailors were now spending a lot more time at sea and a lot less enjoying their traditional “shore runs”.

Further, because of the escalation of the war with the French, the navy had pressed thousands of “inshore” landsmen into service, and they did not mix readily with the career seamen, whether they had originally been volunteers or pressed men themselves.

This led to discontent among ships companies, which was often made even worse by the attitude and behaviour towards them of many of their officers; many officers initially had little seagoing experience and were regularly abusive and disrespectful to their men.

The Spithead mutineers elected a committee of delegates, which tried for two weeks to negotiate with the Admiralty; they focussed their demands on better pay, the abolition of the 14 ounce “Purser’s Pound”, whereby every ship’s purser was allowed to keep two ounces out of every pound of meat as a perk, and on the removal of certain unpopular officers. Surprisingly, neither flogging, nor impressment were mentioned, however.

The mutineers maintained regular naval routine and discipline aboard the sixteen ships involved, mainly with their regular officers going about their normal duties. They also allowed some ships to leave for patrol or convoy duties and promised, patriotically, to suspend the mutiny and put to sea immediately, if French ships were seen heading towards English shores.

In an atmosphere of mistrust and especially on the subject of pardons for the mutineers, the negotiations broke down and several minor incidents broke out aboard; a number of unpopular officers were sent ashore, whilst others were treated with deliberate disrespect.

Admiral Lord Howe’s active service may have finished, but he was still nominally the commander of the English Channel Fleet; more importantly, the sailors of the Royal Navy revered the illustrious 71-year-old naval hero and were prepared to trust his word.

Perhaps even more importantly, Howe was able to see the justice in the mutineers’ demands and, once the atmosphere had calmed down, he was able to negotiate a settlement that more or less satisfied them all, dealing with pay and disrespectful officers and abolishing the Pursers’ Pound - and obtaining royal pardons for all the mutineers.

Throughout the mutiny, the identity of the original leader of the mutiny was kept a secret and continued to be so, even after negotiations were completed. Rumour was that Valentine Joyce, a quartermaster’s mate aboard HMS Royal George, was the mastermind, but this was never confirmed.

More importantly, the dispute had been settled and the mutiny was officially called off on 15 May 1797, without further recriminations, and was afterwards played down and referred to as “The breeze at Spithead".

Compare this with the mutiny at Nore, in the Thames Estuary, which ended as a tragedy for many of those concerned, mainly because the mutineers approached the situation in a totally different way.

On 12 May, apparently having heard rumours that the Spithead mutineers were on the verge of obtaining a reasonable settlement of their demands, complete with pardons, the crewof HMS Sandwich seized control of their ship.

Almost immediately, the crews of several other ships in the vicinity followed their example, although several ships managed to slip away, despite being fired upon by the mutinous crews, in an effort to hold the mutiny together.

Unlike Spithead, where the ships were all part of one unified fleet, the ships at Nore were spread out along the river estuary, which made it very difficult to organise this mutiny, but delegates were quickly elected from each ship and Richard Parker, a formal naval officer and French sympathiser was elected “President of the Delegates of the Fleet”.

Parker, a former navigator, had been discharged from the navy in 1794, following a charge of insubordination brought by a senior lieutenant, but earlier in 1797 had accepted £20 to re-enlist as a seaman, in order to get himself out of debtors prison in Edinburgh.

He nearly never made it, though; such was his feeling of despair at the prospect of rejoining the service that he attempted

to commit suicide on his way to embarkation at Sheerness, by throwing himself overboard!

Now, however, Parker set about organising the committee and, on 20 May, a set of eight demands was presented to Admiral Buckner, which mainly involved pay and pardons, but which also demanded a modification to the Articles of War and which was then expanded to insist that the king dissolve parliament and make an immediate peace with France.

This wasn’t just mutiny now, but the beginnings of a full-scale social revolution, not dissimilar to the one that had earlier swept across France and there was no way that the Admiralty, or parliament, was ever going to accept such demands.

The mutineers now blockaded London, preventing merchant ships from entering the port, whilst the principal agitators began making plans to take their ships to France, alienating the regular sailors and losing many ships from the mutiny in the process.

Meanwhile, having settled the Spithead mutiny, the Admiralty were not minded to increase concessions above and beyond what had already been offered, especially as they could see that there were political ambitions at work in the background.

By now, supplies aboard the mutinous ships had more or less run out and, with more and more ships deserting the mutiny, the remaining mutineers were denied food; Parker then hoisted the signal to sail to France, but the remaining ships refused to follow.

The mutiny now collapsed and Parker was quickly arrested, tried and found guilty of treason. He was hanged from the yardarm of HMS Sandwich, the vessel where the mutiny had started, and a similar fate awaited 28 of the other principal mutineers.

Others were sentenced to be flogged, imprisoned, or transported to Australia - or all three - but the majority of the crews of the ships involved in the mutiny suffered no punishment at all.

Perhaps if the mutineers’ committe and Parker in particular, had been more reasonable in their demands and their overall approach, the Nore incident might have ended as peaceably as that at Spithead, but firing on other ships, blockading London and trying to tell king and parliament what to do?

No, not in 1797, not at a time when only landowners had the right to vote and where true democracy was still more than a century and a quarter in the future - and certainly not when Britain was engaged in what was probably the most desperate struggle it had ever had with its old enemy.