Report on the Royal Navy remark books held at the Hydrographic Office, Taunton, UK

• Main Authors: WILKINSON, C., WARD, C., WILLIAMSON, Fiona
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2008
• Subjects: History
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cis_research/255; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/cis_research/article/1254/viewcontent/Report_on_the_Royal_Navy_Remarks_Books.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

The Royal Navy Remarks Books1 are presently held at the Hydrographic Office in Taunton. They are an under-used resource in the fields of naval and maritime history and climate research. The bulk of remarks books were kept on vessels engaged in exploration and hydrographic survey and they are most often associated with the development of marine charting and coastal mapping, but their scope goes well beyond this. For climate studies almost all of the remarks books after 1850, and a modest number before that date, contain frequent, usually sub-daily, observations of air pressure (SLP), air temperature (AT), and sea-surface temperature (SST). Along with this are observations of wind direction, wind force, and notes on ocean currents. Less frequently recorded were humidity and the specific gravity (density) of seawater. These remarks books therefore constitute an important source of early meteorological and oceanographic data.