Spithead Mutiny

April 15, 1797

Royal Navy sailors at Spithead, underpaid for decades and underfed for years, refused to sail. They ran their grievances with parliamentary discipline. Pitt's government, afraid of revolutionary contagion, gave in - higher pay, better food, pardon. A second mutiny at the Nore soon afterward was put down by hangings. The Spithead settlement quietly improved conditions for a generation of sailors whose loyalty would be tested at Trafalgar.