Sam Willis

Dr Sam Willis is one of the world's leading authorities on the sailing navy and was awarded a Ph.D. in Naval History for his thesis on Command and Tactics in the 18th-century Navy. He is an Honorary Fellow at the University of Exeter's Centre for Maritime Historical Studies and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Sam was presenter of the BBC series Shipwrecks and has consulted on maritime painting for Christie's and the BBC, spending 18 months as a Square Rig Able Seaman, sailing the tall ships used in the Hornblower television series and the award-winning film Shackleton. He is the author of Fighting at Sea in the Eighteenth Century: The Art of Sailing Warfare and Fighting Ships 1750-1850.