"[Doughty] apparently wished to confine the enterprise to the Atlantic. Drake wanted to sail to the Pacific in accordance with his original plan. In the end, Drake knocked Doughty down and had him tied to the mainmast." (Norbert Elias Archive (part 1), Inv.-Nr. 507, p. 9, cited from Moelker 2004, p. 381);

"Finally, during the first half of the 18th century the professional skills of captains, too, increased. It was during this period that they were able to assume ... complete control of both nautical as well as military operations." (Norbert Elias Archive (part 1), Inv.-Nr. 508, pp. 18-19, cited from Moelker 2004, p. 381);

"In fact, lieutenants and other commissioned officers took over, in course of time, one after the other of the masters's functions until in the end the office of the master disappeared. The uneasy partnership between master and lieutenant ended with the victory of the latter ... Under Henry VIII, and to some extent also under Elizabeth, the seamen gained a fairly strong position. Under the early Stuarts, the gentlemen were in ascendant. They disappeared from the Navy with a few exceptions under the Commonwealth ... under Charles II and James II the gentlemen again gained ascendency over the seamen ... as in terms of influence and power, they were the favourites of the court." (Norbert Elias Archive (part 1), Inv.-Nr. 508, p. 20, cited from Moelker 2004, p. 382); 

"[The King] persisted in appointing courtiers, in spite of their professional shortcomings, as lieutenants, captains and flag officers in preference to professional seamen not only because he himself was by upbringing a courtier, but because he knew that in the country's internal struggle they were on his side, while the seamen ... had close links with the groups which, as he saw it, denied him his right as King. In fact, he was so confident of the success of his policy that, at the beginning of the civil war when Parliament tried to gain control of the Navy, he himself, for months, did very little to counter their activities. ... And it was not the fault of these gentlemen officers themselves that this policy failed." (Norbert Elias Archive (part 1), Inv.-Nr. 508, p. 25, cited from Moelker 2004, p. 382);

 


sources: 
Norbert Elias Archive (Marbach/BRD), 
René Moelker: Norbert Elias, marine supremacy and the naval profession, in: British Journal of Sociology (London/UK: Routledge & Kegan Paul), vol. 54 no.3 (2004), pp. 373-390