Who Asked: Celebrity Guest-Stumper, Scott Westerfeld, author of the Uglies and Midnighters series, and of Peeps and The Last Days
Novel: Leviathan (out in 2009)
About the Book: The setting is 1914, when the simmering conflict between the adherents of Darwinist technologies and those of machine power threatens to enflame all of Europe. Brought together in the terrible crash of a vast living airship, two young heroes uncover a secret which may help stop the Great War.
Answer: During the First World War, most of the British airships were used by the Royal Navy for scouting purposes, and to counteract the submarine threat in costal waters. (The army seems to have favored airplanes). Speaking of the Royal Navy Reserves, the Royal Navy site says, “A number qualified as pilots and flew aircraft and airships with the Royal Naval Air Service and thousands of officers and ratings served ashore in the Royal Naval Division in the trenches of the Western Front and at Gallipolli, whilst maintaining their service naval customs, ranks, and traditions such as wearing beards and using naval language in their general parlance (often to the chagrin of their senior officers from the Army).”
Which means that most airships would have used Royal Navy Ranks. Wikipedia has a chart of comparative military ranks for World War I that has been replicated on a number of sites, including answers.com and reference.com. According to this chart, naval ranks would have been, in descending order:
Admiral of the Fleet
Admiral
Vice-Admiral
Rear-Admiral
Commodore 1st Class
Commodore 2nd Class
Captain
Commander
Lieutenant-Commander
Lieutenant
Sub-Lieutenant
Second Officer/Mate
Commissioned Warrant Officer/Midshipman/Boatswain
There was a good bit of slang surrounding this part of history. For instance, the blimp-style airships themselves would have been called “battlebags” by the crew, and “pigs” by the local civilians.
This sounds like it’s going to be a great book!
I can’t wait to read it.
Thanks for playing Stump the Librarian!
Amber
Web Resources
- Airship on Wikipedia
(Please remember that anyone can add to or edit a Wikipedia article.) - Royal Navy: World War I
Print Resources
- Battlebags: British Airships of the First World War by Ces Mowthorpe
