Cockpit of a small sailing boat

In the Royal Navy, the term cockpit originally referred to the area where the coxswain was stationed. The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British armed services (and is therefore known as the Senior Service) The coxswain (ˈkɒksən is the person in charge of a Boat, particularly its navigation and steering This led to the word being used to refer to the area towards the stern of a small decked vessel that houses the rudder controls, also the common location of the ship's surgeon during a naval battle.

Fiction

In Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series of novels, set on Royal Navy ships during the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812, the cockpit plays a major role as Stephen Maturin's station in most of the battle scenes. Patrick O'Brian, CBE ( 12 December 1914 &ndash 2 January 2000; born as Richard Patrick Russ) was an English The Aubrey–Maturin series is a sequence of Historical novels — 20 completed and one unfinished — by Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic The Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815 involved Napoleon's French Empire and a shifting set of European allies and opposing coalitions The War of 1812 was fought between the United States of America and the British Empire, particularly Great Britain and her North American colonies Stephen Maturin (ˈmætyʊərˌɪn is a Fictional character in the Aubrey&ndashMaturin series of novels by Patrick O'Brian.