Royal Naval Coast Volunteers

[3] Recruitment into the RNCV was limited to "seafaring men or others "deemed suitable for the service in which such volunteers may be engaged".

[4] In return each volunteer had to undertake 28 days training per year under the supervision of the Coastguard.

[1] Some RNCV members were called up into the navy and served during the Crimean War in the Baltic fleet.

[7] Despite these changes an 1858 Royal Commission commented that RNCV men "were not seamen in the true acceptation of the word, but boatmen, fishermen and longshoremen" and criticised their training limitations as not including working with sails aloft.

[8] The establishment of a Royal Naval Reserve formed from professional seamen robbed the RNCV of purpose and in 1873 it was disbanded with remaining volunteers passing into a successor reserve body the Royal Naval Artillery Volunteers.

HMS Fisgard (seen in the middle of the image) was the headquarters of the RNCV at Woolwich.