This website is dedicated to my naval wargaming hobby.

About Me

I live in coastal California and enjoy spending my time on a variety of hobbies (including going out on the water in real boats), so this site will only get updated once in a while.

My interest in naval history actually knows few bounds, but time and resources limit the periods and types of actions I can play, so this site reflects that. Here you will find mention only of the periods I've spent time developing into gaming pursuits.

Why is this site called The Yellow Admiralty?

It's a double entendre.

During Age of Sail, the British Royal Navy used the colors of admirals' flags as a visual indication of rank - an admiral of the blue was outranked by an admiral of the white, who was outranked by an admiral of the red.

An admiral's rank was permanent, promotion was in order of seniority (by the original promotion date to post-captain), and there was a limit to the number of admirals in existence, which meant promotion to higher rank was blocked for admirals until someone above died or voluntarily retired. This created a problem: an incompetent admiral who refused to retire could not be removed from his office to make it available to a more promising junior officer.

To circumvent this institutionalized Peter Principle, the Admiralty invented a new rank of admiral "without distinction of a squadron" (i.e., no command authority) and half pay, essentially a "promotion" into forced retirement. Such an admiral was given a yellow flag, and thus became an "admiral of the yellow", or more succinctly, a yellow admiral.

The color yellow is also identified with cowardice in American culture, making "yellow admiral" a beautifully sarcastic description of a wargamer commanding fleets of small model ships far from real danger or even real seas.

Of course, there never was such a thing as an entire admiralty for yellow admirals. Until now.