Fly the Red Ensign Honour the Merchant Navy
For the brave men and women who kept — and still keep — Britain supplied.
3 September
Our charitable work Our history since 1850Raise the flag
The Royal Naval Association encourages all branches and members to fly the Red Ensign in recognition of the brave men and women of the Merchant Navy.
Their service has been vital to our nation’s history, security and prosperity. Let us honour their legacy and show our support by proudly raising the flag that represents Britain’s merchant seafarers.
Fly the Red Ensign.
Honour the Merchant Navy.
the Merchant Navy’s flag
marked every year
Memorial, no grave but the sea
still arrives by sea
Why 3 September?
On 3 September 1939, within hours of Britain declaring war on Germany, the passenger liner SS Athenia was torpedoed in the Atlantic. She was the first British ship lost in the Second World War, and 128 passengers and crew died with her. The war at sea had begun before most people at home had finished reading the morning papers.
For the six years that followed, merchant crews ran the gauntlet of submarines, mines and aircraft to carry the food, fuel and munitions the country could not survive without. They were civilians. They were not armed. They went anyway, voyage after voyage, and tens of thousands of them never came home. On the Tower Hill Memorial in London, almost 36,000 merchant seafarers and fishermen of both world wars are named as having no grave but the sea.
Merchant Navy Day was established in 2000 to give that service the recognition it had long gone without, and the date was fixed to 3 September to bind it to the Athenia and to everyone who followed her. Since 2015, The Seafarers’ Charity has asked councils, organisations, businesses and households across the country to mark the day in the simplest and most visible way there is: by flying the Red Ensign.
The work has not stopped, either. Around 95% of everything Britain imports and exports still comes and goes by sea, carried by crews most of us will never meet.
We opened for seafarers, and we still work for them
The Royal Maritime Hotel began life in 1850 as a Sailors’ Home — somewhere safe, warm and decent for seafarers coming ashore in Portsmouth. More than 175 years later, we are still a registered charity doing a version of the same job, and the merchant navy remains one of the communities we exist to support.
Every stay, every dinner, every wedding and every function held here helps fund that work for serving personnel, veterans, merchant seafarers and their families. On 3 September the Red Ensign flies here, as it does at branches, town halls and homes across the country.
How to mark the day
Fly the flag
Raise the Red Ensign on 3 September — on a flagpole, at a branch, outside a business or in a window at home. It is the oldest and plainest way of saying thank you, and it is the one thing everybody can do.
Pause and remember
Take a moment for the crews lost at sea in both world wars, and for those still at sea today. If you have a merchant seafarer in the family, tell someone their story — most of these names are only remembered because somebody kept saying them.
Share it
Post a photograph of your ensign flying and tag us. The point of the campaign is visibility — the more flags people see, the harder the Merchant Navy is to overlook.
To those who kept us supplied
Fly the Red Ensign. Honour the Merchant Navy.
Come and see the hotel that has been looking after seafarers since 1850 — or find out how staying, dining or celebrating here supports our charitable work.
Support our workRoyal Maritime Hotel · 75–80 Queen Street · Portsmouth · PO1 3HS · Portsmouth Royal Maritime Club CIO · Registered Charity No. 1205660
