Originally Posted by
Union Jack
Quite amusing to see all the theories projected in a 14 year old thread until finally Reefrat comes up so quickly with the simple answer that would have made most sense to the senior officers who would have dictated the requirement in the design of the first purpose-built aircraft carriers, and could or would not have been aviators themselves in that era. The captain's sea cabin in virtually every reasonably large power-driven vessel is on the starboard side for precisely that reason so that, when called up by the officer of the watch regarding a close quarters navigational situation, they can if necessary look out and promptly see for themselves what's what on the "danger" side.
All the aviation related theories, however technically commendable, are therefore very much downstream.
I would also suggest that, contrary to Ivor's suggestion, the Andrew Miller connotation is fairly widely known in the Royal Navy.
Jack
Back in a post in April 2006 I linked to the USN History site with the same explanation of the island location.
Still to be referenced on
page 18, along with fascinating mention of electric powered ships earlier in the article
