The people—The boys—Manning—The divisions—The messes—The dress—The
King’s allowance—Grog—Marines
There were various ways of entering the Royal Navy, “through the
hawse-holes.” The greater number of our seamen were pressed into the
fleets from merchant-ships, or sent aboard by my Lord Mayor, or by
the sheriffs of the different counties. A large number volunteered in
order to get the bounty. But a certain percentage joined the fleet as
boys, either through the Marine Society, or from love of adventure.
The Marine Society sent a number of lads to sea in each year. Their
boys were generally between thirteen and fifteen years of age.
Some of them were “recommended” by magistrates for petty crime or
vagrancy. Some were beggars, or street Arabs, snatching their living
from the gutters. Some were errand-boys, horse-holders, shop-lads,
etc. Most of them were poor children, whose parents could not clothe
nor feed them. Some were apprentices, or charity boys, who were more
“inclined to hazard their necks than to live a sedentary life.” The
Marine Society gave these lads a brief preliminary training aboard a
ship in the Thames, under a boatswain and boatswain’s mate. They then
sent them to sea, in men-of-war, as ship’s boys or volunteers of
the second and third classes. As ship’s boys, they received £7 or £8
a year, which kept them in clothing till they were strong enough to
rank as seamen. A ship’s boy was generally put to all the dirty and
trivial work of the ship, such as cleansing the pigstys, hen-coops,
head, etc. A number of them were rated as servants to the midshipmen,
boatswains, warrant, gun-room and ward-room officers. These wretched
creatures lived the lives of dogs, particularly those allotted to the
midshipmen. Those who were not made servants were hunted about and
bullied by the sailors, who loved “to find the opportunity to act the
superior over someone.” Those who survived the brutality of their
shipmates, and failed to desert from the service, in time became
ordinary seamen, drawing 25s. a month.
[Illustration: TWO OF NELSON’S SAILORS]
A boy was allowed half the usual ship’s allowance of rum and wine. He
received pay for the half he did not draw. With the ration allowed to
him—half-a-gill of rum, and a quarter of a pint of wine a day—he was
able to get blind drunk, or to purchase little luxuries, just as he
pleased. If he got drunk, or in any other way transgressed the rules
of the navy, he was flogged, but with the boatswain’s cane instead of
with the cat. In action, he was stationed at a gun, with orders to
supply that gun with cartridges from the magazine. He was not allowed
to supply more than one gun with powder until the boys of some of
the guns were killed or wounded. In a hot engagement he was kept
running to and fro, over the bloody and splinter-scattered deck,
carrying the cartridges from the magazine. He was warned to carry
his cartridges under his coat, so as to avoid the flying sparks from
the touch-holes. If he tried to bolt away from the magazine into the
shelter of the orlop-deck the midshipman stationed at the hatchway
promptly shot him, or beat him back with the pistol butt. The boys
(with good reason) were generally berthed apart from the men. They
seem to have slung their hammocks in the sheet-anchor cable-tiers, or
on one of the upper gun-decks, according to the size of the ship in
which they sailed.
* * * * *
The true man-of-war’s man, or bluejacket, was said to have been
“begotten in the galley and born under a gun.” He was a prodigy,
“with every hair a rope-yarn, every tooth a marline-spike, every
finger a fishhook, and his blood right good Stockhollum tar.”
This kind of man-of-war’s man was rare. When he sailed aboard our
men-of-war he generally held some position of authority, as captain
of a top, or boatswain’s mate. We had never a ship’s crew of his
like, even at the beginning of the French wars, when our ships were
manned by the pick of the merchant-service. There were other kinds
of sailor, for the King was always in want of men, and a man-of-war
refused nothing.
The royal fleets were manned, as we have seen, by various expedients.
A certain proportion of the man-of-war’s men came to sea as boys,
and remained in the service all their lives, partly because they
were too strictly kept to escape, and partly because “once a sailor
always a sailor”—the life unfitted them for anything else. A large
number joined the navy because their heads had been turned by
patriotic cant; and very bitterly they repented their folly after a
week aboard. A number came willingly, from merchant-ships, attracted
by the high bounties or premiums, offered for seamen volunteering.
Some came willingly, deceived by those placards in the seaports,
which promised abundance of grog and plenty of prize-money to all
who entered. But the greater number came unwillingly, by the imprest
or quota, or from my Lord Mayor. The press-gang was especially
active in securing sailors from merchant-vessels. Very frequently
they stripped such ships of their crews and officers, leaving their
captains without enough hands to work the ships home. It was a
cruel hardship to the poor merchant-sailors; for often, on coming
to a home port, after a long voyage, they would be snatched away
before they had drawn their wages. Instead of enjoying a pleasant
spell ashore they would be hurried aboard a King’s ship, to all the
miseries of a gun-deck. It was the custom to say that a sailor was
better situated on a man-of-war than on a merchant-vessel; that he
had better food, better treatment, and better money. As a matter
of fact the merchant-seamen regarded the Royal Navy with dread
and loathing. There can be little doubt that the thought of the
press-gangs, and the fear of service in the navy, drove many of our
best merchant-seamen into American ships, where they were rather less
subject to impressment. In the war of 1812 a number of them fought
against, and often helped to defeat, the English frigates and small
men-of-war.
We live at a convenient distance from those times, and regard them as
glorious.—“The iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy.”
Man is always ready to ignore the pounds of misery and squalor which
go to make each pennyweight of glory. Our naval glory was built
up by the blood and agony of thousands of barbarously maltreated
men. It cannot be too strongly insisted on that sea life, in the
late eighteenth century, in our navy, was brutalising, cruel, and
horrible; a kind of life now happily gone for ever; a kind of life
which no man to-day would think good enough for a criminal. There
was barbarous discipline, bad pay, bad food, bad hours of work,
bad company,[22] bad prospects. There was no going ashore till the
ship was paid off, or till a peace was declared. The pay was small
at the best of times, but by the time it reached the sailor it had
often shrunken to a half or third of the original sum. The sailor
was bled by the purser for slops and tobacco; by the surgeon for
ointment and pills; and by the Jew who cashed his pay-ticket. The
service might have been made more popular by the granting of a little
leave, so that the sailors could go ashore to spend their money. It
was the long, monotonous imprisonment aboard which made the hateful
life so intolerable. When the long-suffering sailors rose in revolt
at Spithead, they asked, not that the cat might be abolished, but
that they might go ashore after a cruise to sea, and that they might
receive a little more consideration from those whose existence they
guaranteed.
Having secured a number of reliable sailors from the merchant-ships
and sailor’s taverns, the captains of men-of-war commissioning
filled up their complements by taking any men they could get. The
press-gangs brought in a number of wretches found in the streets
after dusk. It did not matter whether they were married men with
families, tradesmen with businesses, or young men studying for
professions: all was fish that came into the press-gang’s net. The
men were roughly seized—often, indeed, they were torn from their
wives by main force, and knocked on the head for resisting—and so
conveyed on board, whether subject to impressment or not. They could
count themselves lucky if their neighbours came to the rescue before
the press-gang carried them off. When once they were aboard they were
little likely to get away again, for though they had permission to
“state the case,” if they thought themselves illegally seized, the
letters of appeal were very seldom successful. The press-gangs were
sometimes rewarded with head money to make them zealous in their duty.
We have already described the Lord Mayor’s men. We will now describe
the “quota,” or “quota-bounty” men, such as manned our fleets from
1795-1797. It was found that neither the press nor the bounty
attracted men in sufficient numbers. Laws were passed by which the
English counties were compelled to furnish a quota of men according
to an established scale. The English seaports were put under a
similar contribution. The sheriffs of the counties, and the mayors
of the sea-port towns, at first found the arrangement by no means
a bad one. They were able to ship off their rogues, criminals,
poachers, gipsies, etc., without difficulty. After a time, when
the rogues had grown wary, they found it difficult to make up the
quotas. They had to offer bounties to induce men to come forward;
bounties in some cases amounting to more than £70. It was said of
the “most filthy creatures” who took advantage of the bounties that
“they cost the King a guinea a pound.” They came aboard coated with
filth, crawling with parasites, “so truly wretched, and unlike men,”
that the lieutenants must have been disgusted to receive them.
Criminals sentenced at the sessions were offered the alternative of
going to sea. The direct consequences were that our ships of war were
frequently manned by criminals and petty thieves, who stole from each
other, and skulked their work, and deserted when they could. The
lower gun-decks became the scene of nearly every vice and crime in
the calendar. Theft aboard ship was punished with cruel severity, but
these shore-going gentry robbed right and left, in gangs or singly,
as though their fingers were indeed fish-hooks. Dr Johnson was right
in wondering why folk came to sea while there were gaols ashore.
Perhaps no place has contained more vice, wickedness, and misery,
within such a narrow compass, than a ship of the line at the end of
the eighteenth century.
When a ship’s crew[23] had been brought aboard they were examined by
the first lieutenant, who lost no time in allotting them to their
stations. Elderly, reliable seamen, who knew their duty and could be
rated as able, were stationed on the forecastle to do duty about the
anchors, bowsprit, and fore yard. They were called sheet-anchor or
forecastle men, and next to the gunner’s crew and boatswain’s mates
they were the finest men in the ship. They took great pride in making
the forecastle the cleanest and trimmest place aboard. A visitor
anxious to learn the state of the discipline of a vessel had but to
go forward to her forecastle. If the forecastle were spotless, the
hammocks well stowed, the paint work and bright work brilliant, and
the ropes pointed and beautifully flemished, then the ship (he might
be quite sure) was in pretty taut order. A forecastle or sheet-anchor
man slept on the lower deck, far forward.
[Illustration: TWO OF NELSON’S SAILORS]
Having picked his forecastle men, a lieutenant had to select his
“topmen.” There were three divisions of topmen, one for each
mast—fore, main, and mizzen. The topmen had to work the three masts
above the lower yards. The lieutenant chose for the topmen all the
young, active seamen who had been to sea for three or four years.
Their work was very arduous, and very exacting. It was the hardest
work of the ship, and demanded the smartest men, yet no men were
more bullied than those to whom the duty fell. A topman lived in
continual terror. He was at all times under the eye of the officer
of the watch. His days were passed in an agony of apprehension
lest something should go wrong aloft to bring him to the gangway.
Smartness aloft was, to many captains, the one thing essential aboard
a man-of-war. A topman had to be smart, and more than smart. He had
to fly up aloft at the order, lay out on the yard, reef or furl, lay
in, and be down on deck again, before a boatswain’s mate could draw
his colt. The sailors raced “mast against mast” whenever sail was
made or shortened, and whenever a spar was struck or sent aloft.
They were not only smart, they were acrobatic. They were known to
run aloft and to run along the yards to the yard-arms, and this in
blowing weather, and with the ship rolling. But, no matter how swift
they were, the captain and lieutenant, who watched from the deck,
wished them to be swifter. It did not matter to these two flinty ones
whether the men were doing their best, and breaking their hearts
to do better. All _they_ cared for was the honour of the ship, and
perhaps a word from the admiral. Then it was:
“What are you doing on the yard, there? Are you all asleep there,
mizzentop? The main-topmen are nearly off the yard. Stow that bunt,
you crawling caterpillars, or I’ll stop the grog of the lot of you.”
Then the curses and blaspheming followed, with threats of the cat and
disrating. The poor fellows on the yard would redouble their efforts,
dripping with sweat as they pounded the heavy canvas into the skin.
That was the heart-breaking part of the business: doing one’s level
best and getting damned for one’s pains. Then, directly the job was
done, a wild rush from the yard took place. Many captains had the
savagery to flog the last man down, so that every man risked his
neck to get down quickly. In reefing top-sails this rule invariably
punished the best man—_i.e._ the man at the yard-arm or post of
honour. The captains do not seem to have considered that the last man
down was generally the first man up. Their cruelty caused the death
of many poor seamen, who fell from aloft while racing up or down, or
while working recklessly on the yard. An old sailor has told us of
a captain of a top who deliberately threw himself overboard rather
than suffer punishment for some slight irregularity aloft. “These men
are frequently punished,” says Jack Nastyface, “and are always in
dread when aloft lest they should be found fault with for not being
quick enough, for punishment is sure to follow, and sure enough their
conjectures are too true: for they are not only flogged, but their
grog is stopped.”
Next in importance to the topmen were the men of the after-guard,
a company composed of poor seamen and landsmen, despised by all
the real sailors. The duties of the after guard were easy, if
dishonourable. They worked the after braces, the spanker, main-sail,
and lower stay-sails. It was their duty to keep the after parts
of the ship clean. At quarters they were stationed at guns on the
gun-deck, or as sail-trimmers, or as small-arm men, as the lieutenant
directed. The after-guard in a first-rate ship numbered about 90 men,
while the forecastle, fore and main tops were manned by from 60 to
70 each. A mizzentop needed fewer men, from 25 to 30 being the usual
number. The after-guards, marines, and waisters invariably manned the
capstans when anchor was weighed.
The largest division of a ship’s company, and the most ignoble,
was that of the waisters, the men stationed in the waist, the men
“without art or judgment,” who hauled aft the fore and main sheets,
and kept the decks white. They were the scavengers, swabbers,
pumpers, the doers of the ship’s dirty work, the pigsty keepers, and
ship’s sewer men. They were sometimes ordinary seamen who were strong
enough but too stupid to be stationed aloft. Generally they were
landsmen, unfit for other duties. They had charge of all the live
stock, if the ship carried any, and he that was “good for nothing
else” was “good enough for a waister.” Large ships generally carried
about twice as many waisters as after-guard men. In small ships the
proportion was more nearly equal.
Lastly, there were the idlers, or men with day duty, who stood no
watch at sea. Among these were the holders, who lived in the hold, in
perpetual semi-darkness, creeping about, on their queer occasions,
among the casks and stinks. Then there were the poulterers, who
fed the captain’s geese in the boats on the booms, or crammed the
chickens in the hen-coops. Then there were painters, in charge of the
port-red, yard-blacking, side-yellow, and white, with the oil for
mixing them and the brushes for laying them on. There were tailors,
who made fine clothes for the crew of the captain’s jolly-boat, and
did odd jobs, for payment, for the other members of the crew. There
were the mast men, one to each mast, to keep the ropes beautifully
coiled, and the brass on the fife-rails polished. There were butchers
to kill the live stock and fatten the pigs; barbers to clip and
shave; and hairdressers to dress the men’s queues, and comb out the
wigs of the officers. There was the lady of the gun-room—an old man,
who kept the gun-room clean. There were the ward-room cooks, and the
captain of the sweepers; the captain of the head, and the writer to
the first lieutenant; the loblolly-boys, and the sick-bay sentinels.
All of these had “all night in,” with the reservation that, if all
hands were wanted during the night, they should turn out with the
rest to the pressing duty on deck.
The topmen, forecastle men, after-guards, and waisters were divided
into two watches, larboard and starboard. They slept at night in
hammocks on the lower-deck, packed like sardines, row after row,
stretching across the ship from side to side. The hammocks during
most of Lord Nelson’s career were of a dull, brown colour, not
unlike the colour of a tanned sail. Afterwards they were made of
white canvas, or “twilled sacking,” which was kept white by frequent
washing. The hammocks were slung by cords to wooden battens or
cleats, nailed to the beams above the gun-decks. The rule was
“fourteen inches to a man,” but some ships afforded sixteen inches,
and one or two as much as eighteen. The petty officers, who slept
by the ship’s side, had each about two feet of space, as “they are
not to be pinched.” In practice, the rule was not so severe as it
sounds. In most ships the watches were berthed alternately, a man
of the larboard watch alternating with a man of the starboard watch
in each row of hammocks, so that at night every other hammock in
each row was vacant, and the pressure made more tolerable. In those
ships in which this rule was not observed the watches slept on their
respective sides, jammed together in great discomfort. The berthing
of the men on their respective sides of the ship had the further
disadvantage of putting the vessel out of trim, by bringing a great
weight to one side, instead of spreading it equably.
Each man had two hammocks, one in use and the other clean. Hammocks
were shifted and scrubbed once a week, and hung up to dry between the
masts. In the morning of each day, at half past seven, the sleepers
were roused from their blankets by the boatswain’s pipe, the pipes
of his mates, and the “All hands. Turn out and save a clue. Out or
down here. Rise and shine. Out or down here. Lash and carry.” Those
who snuggled into their hammocks for an extra minute were promptly
cut down, and beaten about the shoulders with colts or cobs. One was
expected to turn out at the first sound of the pipe. The sailors
generally slept “all standing, like a trooper’s horse”—that is,
without taking off many of their clothes. The clothes they did
take off they generally laid carefully under their pillows, lest
the thieves should get them during the night. On turning out, they
slung their clothes about them with all speed, and at once set about
lashing their hammocks into tight sausage-like rolls. This they
performed by a cord, called a hammock lasher. A correctly-lashed
hammock was secured by “seven turns.” Directly the seven turns were
passed the hammock was lowered on deck, the clues, or head and foot
supports, were carefully twisted under the lashing, and the sailor
slung the roll over his shoulder, and ran on deck to stow it. The
hammock nettings, where the hammocks were stowed, ran all round the
upper part of the ship, making a sort of bulwark, six or seven feet
high, for the protection of the marines and small-arm parties. The
quarter-masters, master’s mates, and midshipmen superintended the
stowing of the hammocks, and rejected every hammock too loosely
lashed to pass through a regulation hoop. Each division of the ship
stowed their hammocks in certain well-defined parts of the nettings,
as the forecastle men on the forecastle, the foretop men under the
fore-rigging, and the marines on the poop. Each hammock was numbered
on a white painted patch, with a few plain blue letters indicating
the station of its owner. During the daytime, in fine weather, the
hammocks were left in the nettings, exposed to the sun and wind. In
wet or foul weather they were covered with canvas covers, painted
white or yellow, and known as hammock cloths. At night, at about
7 or 7.30 P.M., they were piped down—_i.e._ removed from their
places in the nettings, and slung at their respective battens on
the berth-deck. The berthings, the places where the men slept, were
indicated by custom. The forecastle men slept forward; the foretop
men next to the forecastle men; then the main-top men, waisters,
and after-guard. The marines either slept aft, just forward of the
gun-room, or in the recesses of the orlop, forward of the after
cockpit. The idlers stowed themselves away among the men, towards the
ship’s sides, or in their little nooks below the gun-decks, in the
wings and tiers.
For meals, the sailors divided themselves into messes, of from four
to eight members apiece. They always messed apart from the marines,
for the “guffies,” or “jollies,” were not very popular among them.
Each mess had a narrow mess table, which could be hooked up, out
of the way, to the beams above, when not in use. At meal times the
mess tables were fixed between the guns, so as to swing with the
pitch of the ship. Each sailor had a knife, spoon, and hook-pot, an
earthenware bowl, and a platter. The knife he always wore about his
person, in a belt or lanyard. The other crockery he kept in a wooden
tub, called a mess kid, which was secured to the ship’s side. When
the ship went into action these tubs were hurried below, out of the
way, or flung bodily overboard. The crockery had to be supplied at
the sailor’s own cost. If “a sudden lurch,” during meal times, sent
the crockery flying he was forced to purchase tin or wooden ware
from the purser, to use till he could buy new china. The messes were
very friendly and cheery little parties. They liked to be trim and
neat, and to make a brave show with their gear. They hated to be
seen using the purser’s crockery. Each was presided over by that
member of the mess who acted as mess cook for the week. The mess
cook had to receive the provisions for the mess from the purser, at
the daily issuing of victuals. He had to deliver the meat, peas and
oatmeal to the cook in good time. On duff-days he mixed the duff in
a handkerchief, whistling a tune while he stoned the raisins (if any
were issued), so that none should suspect him of eating them. At tea
or supper time he drew the grog for the mess, from the sacred tub
under the care of the master’s mate. What was more, he drew a “cook’s
portion,” or double allowance, for himself, with which he could buy
himself all manner of little luxuries. This extra tot of grog made
the post of mess cook to be much desired by all hands. It amply
compensated them for the trouble and anxieties of the office.
In some ships the berths, messes, or spaces between the guns were
separated and shut off by small screens of canvas for the greater
privacy. At night they would be let down to form little shut-off
apartments for the privileged petty officers who slept there. The
members of each mess were expected to keep their berth scrupulously
clean, free from grease spots, biscuit crumbs, and any mess of
oatmeal or soup. One of the men of each mess cleaned up after a meal,
to remove any disorder of the kind. A man who found himself among
uncongenial messmates had permission to change his mess on the first
Sunday in each month. This regulation was very wise and humane, and
was much esteemed by the sailors. It was customary to speak to the
first lieutenant before making the change, giving some reason for
the proposed alteration. Some men, who could not agree with their
comrades through some fault of temperament, went from mess to mess,
till they had disgusted all hands. They then messed alone, as best
they could, in out-of-the-way nooks. Quarrelsome and loose-tongued
persons, and all those suspected of being white mice, were ostracised
in this way. The mess was the one pleasant place aboard where a man
could talk freely and cheerily. A man who violated the sanctity of
such a place, by quarrelling, privy gambling, political talk, or
incitement to mutiny, was not fit to remain in the community. His
presence was a danger to all concerned. The petty officers generally
messed in those parts of the lower-deck where they slung their
hammocks. The sailors were free to make chums where they would, and
to mess where they pleased. They availed themselves of the liberty to
some extent, but it must be remembered that party spirit always ran
very high aboard these ships. A forecastle man affected to despise
a topman; a topman despised an after-guard man, and called him a
“silk stocking gentleman,” or a “gentleman’s son,” while a member of
the after-guard looked down upon a waister, and called him a “Jimmy
Dux,” or farmer. All four grades united in despising the marines,
calling them “the pipeclays,” the “guffies,” the “jollies,” “the
johnny-toe-the-liners.” Sailors pretended to have a strong dislike
for the members of the sea regiment. They affected to hate them so
heartily that they could hardly be induced to use pipeclay, or to
learn the platoon.
The “berth” was not only the place where the seaman ate his meals;
it was in many ships the place where he kept his belongings. In
frigates, the seamen and marines were allowed to carry small sea
chests to sea, one chest to every two men, each chest to lie in its
owners’ berth, but the permission was cancelled if the chests were
insecurely fastened to the side of the ship. In action, of course,
these chests were struck down into the hold, out of the way. In
line-of-battle ships the decks were kept too strictly to allow of sea
chests being carried. The sailor kept his gear in a painted black
canvas bag, big enough to hold his very limited wardrobe. In some
line-of-battle ships he was allowed to keep his bag in the berth. In
others he had to keep it in a rack in the wings on the orlop-deck,
to which access might be had at certain times. In these ships a
sailor generally kept a change of clothes in his hammock, so that if
he were drenched during the night-watch he might put on dry things
when he came below, without waiting till the racks were opened. Some
captains were very careful to see that the bags were dried in the sun
after heavy weather. Others were needlessly careful to have them all
properly numbered, and painted (or even pipeclayed) alike. It was
necessary to keep a very strict watch upon the bags, for all the
ships swarmed with thieves, and a bag left about the decks, or left
unguarded, was swiftly emptied. Any article left loose upon the deck,
and found by a ship’s corporal or boatswain’s mate, was taken to the
quarter-deck, and exposed to the ship’s company. If the owner claimed
it he had his grog stopped, or weakened. If the owner did not claim
it it was sold at the next sale of dead men’s effects.
[Illustration: A HORSE MARINE]
The sailor’s kit was a very simple affair. He had a hammock, with or
without a “donkey’s breakfast,” or straw mattress, covered by two
thick blankets. Pillow and hammock stretcher were merely matters of
personal taste. Sheets were unknown, save in some of the sick-bays.
For foul weather he had a short wrap-rascal coat of “rug” or frieze,
and a leathern or thick felt or tarred canvas apron, reaching below
the knee. Sea boots, coming to the knee or thigh, were never worn
by the seamen. In foul weather they wore their ordinary low shoes,
with extra thick woollen stockings and knee-breeches, a rig no more
uncomfortable than the sea boot, and fully as effective in keeping
the legs dry. In fine weather, when ashore, the sailor usually wore
a short, round, very smart blue jacket, with a row of flat gold
or bright brass buttons down the right side and on the cuffs. His
trousers were either of blue cloth, or of white duck, cut extremely
loose, and a shade too long, so that they nearly covered the feet.
These garments were kept in position by a sheath-knife belt, or
by a black silk handkerchief knotted round the waist. The stockings
were frequently of good white silk, for a sailor loved to have fine
silk stockings. The shoes were not unlike our modern black dancing
pumps, save that big silver buckles took the place of silk bows.
The shirt was the least stereotyped article of dress. A shirt or
jersey of blue and white horizontal stripes was popular. A white
shirt with large red or blue spots had many admirers. Some wore plain
red or plain blue, and some may even have worn white. The throat
of the shirt had a loose, unstarched collar, which was worn open,
in the Byronic manner. Round the throat, very loosely knotted, was
a fine black silk handkerchief, the ends of which dangled over the
lapels of the waistcoat. The waistcoat was generally of scarlet
kerseymere, cut very low and very long. Canary-yellow waistcoats
were common, and some wore spotted or striped ones. It depended
mostly on the stock committed to the purser for his slop-room. The
sailors were very fond of decorating both jacket and waistcoat with
coloured ribbons, which they sewed down the seams, to give a more gay
effect. For the ordinary work about decks they wore white duck or
blue cloth trousers, and blue, green or red serge, duck, or flannel
frocks. A jacket of a coarse yellow stuff appears in some pictures,
in conjunction with striped trousers (blue and white). For hat, the
usual wear ashore was a little low tarpaulin hat, kept black and
glossy with tar and oil, and cut in a shape dimly resembling the
top-hats worn by our bishops and busmen, but with a more knowing
rake. This hat had often a broad black ribbon dangling from it,
bearing the name of the ship in white letters. When at work aboard
the sailor sometimes wore a painted straw hat, with black silk
ribbons flung rakishly “over the left eye.” More often he wore a fur
cap, or a battered, soft, shore beaver, or a low-crowned felt hat,
with the brim curled up. Woollen tam-o’-shanters were sometimes worn,
but the fur cap was the most popular headgear during working hours.
The fur cap had flaps, which could be unbuttoned and let down so as
to protect the ears. Some sailors wore a sort of turban, made of a
red or yellow handkerchief, twisted about the head. Others wore a
sort of woollen nightcap or jacobin cap. The headgear, whatever it
was, was nearly always worn well to the back of the head, as though
it balanced “on three hairs.” The narrow-minded have judged that this
fashion sprang from the natural levity and savagery of the mariners.
As a matter of fact, a sailor found it difficult to wear his hat in
any other way. He was continually looking aloft or running aloft or
working aloft, and it would have been impossible for him to wear his
headgear in any other position. One cannot run up rigging with a hat
jammed down over one’s eyes.
[Illustration: A FRIGATE IN CHASE, BEFORE THE WIND]
It must be remembered that this outfit varied with the individual.
Only those who bought from the slop chest wore “uniform.” Those who
brought decent shore-going clothes aboard were generally free to
wear them, though some captains insisted that their men should all
wear frocks or shirts of the same colours. The shore-going dress we
have indicated was certainly worn by the smartest of our sailors, for
Captain Brenton describes some poor fellows coming up for trial, as
“tall and athletic, well dressed, in blue jackets, red waistcoats,
and trousers white as driven snow,” with “their hair like the tail
of a lion,” hanging “in a cue down their back ... the distinguishing
mark of a thoroughbred seaman.”
The days of which we write were the days of clean-shaving. Officers
and men alike shaved their cheeks and upper lips. A hairy man was
not to be tolerated. But though the men shaved themselves daily they
liked to wear their hair long, either falling down the shoulders in
a mass, or braided into a queue, with some grease and black silk
ribbon. It is not known when the use of the pigtail became general,
it seems to have been borrowed from the French. It may possibly
have been borrowed from the marines, who wore pomatum-stiffened
pigtails, or pigtails stiff with grease and flour, during this
period. From 1800 to 1815 the pigtail seems to have been popular,
after that time it gradually fell into disuse. The sailors dressed
each other’s queues, turn and turn about. It took an hour “to dress
and be dressed.” It is not known whether the sailors ever used flour
to whiten the queues when plaited, but probably they wore them plain.
Those who had but little hair made false queues of teased-out
oakum, which was a sufficiently good imitation to pass muster. Many
sailors, who did not care for pigtails, wore most ravishing curls
or love-locks over their ears, like the ladies in a book of beauty.
A number of them wore earrings, “of the most pure gold,” which
they bought from the Jews at Portsmouth. They wore them less for
decoration than for a belief they held that their use improved the
sight. Some captains forbade the use of earrings on the ground that
they were un-English.
The food issued to the sailors was nearly always bad, and sometimes
villainous. The following table gives the scale of provisions
generally issued:—
+—————————+———————+————+————+—————+—————+———————+—————+——————+——————+
| |Biscuit|Beer|Beef| Pork|Pease|Oatmeal|Sugar|Butter|Cheese|
| | lbs. |gal-|lbs.| lbs.|pints| pints | oz.| oz. | oz. |
| | avoir.|lons| | | | | | | |
| +———————+————+————+—————+—————+———————+—————+——————+——————+
|Sunday | 1 | 1 | .. | 1 | ½ | ... | ... | ... | ... |
|Monday | 1 | 1 | .. | ... | ... | ½ | 2 | 2 | 4 |
|Tuesday | 1 | 1 | 2 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
|Wednesday| 1 | 1 | .. | ... | ½ | ½ | 2 | 2 | 4 |
|Thursday | 1 | 1 | .. | 1 | ½ | ... | ... | ... | ... |
|Friday | 1 | 1 | .. | ... | ½ | ½ | 2 | 2 | 4 |
|Saturday | 1 | 1 | 2 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
| +———————+————+————+—————+—————+———————+—————+——————+——————+
| | 7 | 7 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1½ | 6 | 6 | 12 |
+—————————+———————+————+————+—————+—————+———————+—————+——————+——————+
The provisions were nearly always issued on a reduced scale. It was
the general custom to mess the men “six upon four,” an arrangement
by which six men received, and lived upon, the allowance of four
men. The sailors were allowed certain moneys for the food withheld
from them; this allowance was called “savings money.” The food was
of bad quality, and by no means liberally given. The sailor’s chief
standby was the sea air, which somehow never fails, even aboard
modern merchant-men. The biscuit was the most liberal ration, for
few sailors ate the whole of the allowance, even on the reduced
proportion. That which they could not eat they either returned to
the purser, in exchange for savings money, or held as an asset, to
exchange for fruit and the like when the ship arrived in a foreign
port. The biscuit was cooked in the royal bakeries, attached to the
dockyards—70 biscuits, weighing 4 oz. apiece, were made each minute
in these works. They were round, thick, well-browned biscuits,
stamped with a perforator in the centre, so that the centre was
much more compressed, and therefore tougher, than the remainder.
The centre was generally the last piece eaten. It was known as a
“reefer’s nut.” Often enough it was hove overboard. Most biscuits
were made of mixed wheat and pea-flour, with sometimes a base
addition of bone-dust. The pea-flour generally worked itself into
yellow lumps and veins, of an incredible hardness, which could not
be bitten through until the biscuit had become soft through long
keeping. When the biscuit did become soft, it took to itself an
unpleasant, musty, sourish taste, and began to attract, or to breed,
weevils. On a long passage, in a hot climate, the “bread” became
unspeakably bad, and as full of maggots as it could hold. Re-baking,
in the ship’s ovens, sometimes remedied the evil, but the most common
custom was to leave the creatures to their quiet, and to eat the
biscuit at night, when the eye saw not, and the tender heart was
spared. Now and then the mess cooks made savoury dishes out of the
ship’s biscuit, by soaking it in water, and frying it with little
strips, or gobbets, of pork fat. Or they enclosed it in a canvas
bag, and pounded it, with crows or marline-spikes, till it was as
fine as coarse flour. They then mixed it with chopped-up meat, and
bribed the cook to bake it. Sometimes they mixed the pounded biscuit
with pork-fat and sugar, and made a delectable cake. The cook would
always consent to bake these little delicacies, for some small
consideration, such as a little grog from the mess he obliged, or a
little piece of the dainty.
The badness of the meat may be guessed from the fact that the sailors
spoke of it as junk, or old condemned hemp rope. It may not have
been bad when cut up and put in cask, but there was an invariable
rule in the navy that “the old meat should be eaten first.” A ship’s
company had to start a cruise upon the old meat returned from various
ships and routed out from the obscure cellars of the victualling
yards. Frequently it had been several years in salt before it came
to the cook, by which time it needed rather a magician than a cook
to make it eatable. It was of a stony hardness, fibrous, shrunken,
dark, gristly, and glistening with salt crystals. It was “believed to
be salt horse, resembling very much a piece of mahogany, and often
quite as sapless.” It looked as unwholesome as meat could look.
Strange tales were told about it. Old pigtailed seamen would tell of
horseshoes found in the meat casks; of curious barkings and neighings
heard in the slaughterhouses; and of negroes who disappeared near
the victualling yards, to be seen no more. Whatever meat it may have
been, the salt beef was certainly abominable. It could, perhaps, have
been made eatable by long soaking in the steep tub, but no meat for
the messes was ever soaked for more than twenty-four hours. The salt
pork was generally rather better than the beef, but the sailors could
carve fancy articles, such as boxes, out of either meat. The flesh
is said to have taken a good polish, like some close-grained wood.
The beef was sometimes chopped up fine, and used for the flavouring
in “sea pies,” or “dry hashes”—two dishes the sailors sometimes made
for themselves, and persuaded the cook to dress. The meat ration was
not only bad, but extremely small. The 4-lb. pieces with which the
casks were filled were not by any means pure meat. They were mostly
bone, fat, and gristle. The pound of flesh, as issued to the sailor,
was often seven-tenths uneatable. The fat was dirty, and provocative
of scurvy. The bone and the gristle could only be thrown overboard.
At best, a sailor could but hope to find a few salt fibres of meat,
hidden away snugly—like good deeds in a naughty world—under layers
of evil-looking fat. They were not enough to give the poor mariner
a feeling that he had had meat for dinner. But if he wished to have
meat for supper, “to make him taste his wine well,” he had to save
some from his midday meal. Some were even so provident as to remember
the starvation breakfast, and to stint themselves at tea and dinner
in order to have a feast the next morning. Those who did not care
for grog were the lucky ones, for these had always half-a-pint of
rum with which to buy the meat of the drinkers. Many were the little
bargains made about the mess tables, at the blessed supper time, when
the roll of the drum had sent aft the mess cooks to the tub. “Bill,
I’ll swop my whack of beef to-morrow for half yours.” “Joe, I’ll give
you my pea-soup for your grog.” “Tom, I’ll mix your duff for you if
you’ll give me just a nip,” etc. etc.
The mess cook, who acted as carver and parter of the food, was at
all times most equitable in his duty. While he cut up the meat, or
divided the allowance, whatever it was, he ordered one of the mess to
turn his back, and shut his eyes. When a whack or portion had been
cut or placed on a plate he called out: “Who shall have this?” The
blindfolded man then pronounced the name of one of the messmates,
and the portion, whether too big or too small, was at once allotted
to the man thus named. The system was as fair as any that could be
devised.
The pea-soup, which was issued on salt pork days, was “somehow
always good.” It was generally eaten hot, but some preferred to save
it till the evening, when they took it cold, as a relish to the
grog and biscuit. The “burgoo,” “skillagolee,” or oatmeal gruel,
issued to the men for breakfast, was invariably bad. The greatest
proportion of it went to the pigstys, as uneatable by mortal man.
It was issued by the Government at the instance of some medical
adviser, who thought that it would act as a “corrective” to “acid and
costive humours.” The oatmeal was of a pretty bad quality to begin
with, but by the time the cook had wreaked his wicked will upon it,
by boiling it in his coppers with the unspeakable ship’s water, the
mess had become disgusting beyond words. Few of the sailors could
eat it in its penetrating, undisguised nastiness, and, according to
a naval surgeon, it was “cruel to expect them to do so.” In later
years, after Trafalgar, a small proportion of molasses, or butter,
was issued with the oatmeal, to be eaten with it, to render it less
nauseous. Without the butter and molasses it was fitter for the
pigstys than for men. Many messes would not draw the ration, but
preferred to have the money for it at the end of the cruise. Another
favourite breakfast dish was Scotch coffee, or burnt ship’s biscuit
boiled in water, to a thick blackish paste, and sweetened with sugar.
There was also a ration of very villainous cocoa, with which the
sailors received a little brown sugar. On one of these dishes the
jolly sailor had to make his breakfast. He seldom received anything
else at that meal, save the biscuit in the mess’s bread barge, unless
he had deprived himself of dinner and supper the day before in order
to have a bite of meat. At the beginning of each cruise in home
waters he received a very small allowance of ship’s butter. This was
kept in a mess tin, and equally shared. It was of poor quality, as
butter, and grew a great deal worse as the days passed. After a month
or two at sea it was at its very worst. It was then solemnly routed
out and inspected, condemned as putrid, and given to the boatswain
for the anointment of shrouds and running rigging. For dinner the
men received their salt beef and pork, their pea-soup, and their
occasional duffs. On two days a week (if not more frequently) they
held a fast, receiving no meat. These days were known as “banyan”
days—a “banyan” being a thin kind of duck frock, suitable for the
tropics, but uncomfortable elsewhere. For supper they sometimes
received a ration of strong ship’s cheese, the most abominable stuff
imaginable. It would not keep at sea. It smelt very horribly, and,
what was worse, it bred long, thin, red worms before it had been a
month in the ship’s hold.
Though the solids were not very choice the liquids were sometimes
really good. The water was bad—so bad that few could drink it without
disgust—but one drank no water aboard ship so long as the beer held
out. The water was generally river water. We note that the river
water “about London” was reckoned especially good. It was carried
to sea, not in iron tanks, as it is carried nowadays, but in wooden
casks, not over clean. Sometimes the casks were found to be old oil
casks. The water invariably became putrid after standing in cask for
a few days. It then grew sweet again, and fit to drink, but after
standing and working for several weeks in the hold it became thick
and slimy, full of “green grassy things,” besides being stagnant and
flat. At this stage in its development it was generally tapped for
the ship’s company. At the beginning of a voyage the company drank
beer—small beer, of poor quality, not at all the sort of stuff to put
the souls of three butchers into one weaver. It was bad beer, but it
was perhaps better than the water. At anyrate it gave a new taste to
the mouths of the poor seamen, who got very tired of the perpetual
salt food and biscuit. The beer generally lasted for a month, during
which time no wine or spirits was issued. In port the sailors used
to fortify the ship’s beer with rum or brandy, making a very potent
drench called flip, which was popular among their lady friends, who
used to smuggle aboard the necessary spirits. If the sailors wanted a
drink at any time during the night-watch they used to go to a small
cask called a scuttle butt, in which fresh water was kept. A tin cup
was secured to the cask, so that the men might drink in comfort. No
one was allowed to draw fresh water from this cask for the purpose of
washing his clothes.
[Illustration: THE LEE ROLL]
When all the beer had been expended, the captains allowed the issue
of wines or spirits. A pint of wine, or half-a-pint of rum or brandy,
was considered the just equivalent of a gallon of beer. The wine in
use was of very ordinary vintage. It was often purchased abroad,
and varied with the port of purchase. The sailors seem to have
preferred white wine. They disliked the red wines issued to them in
the Mediterranean. They called them “Black Strap.” To be stationed
in the Mediterranean was “to be black-strapped.” Their favourite
wines were two cheap Spanish wines: “rosolio” and “mistela,” the
latter a fiery white wine, affectionately known as “Miss Taylor.”
But when the beer had gone, and the wine had been drunken, there was
yet “the sailor’s sheet anchor”—grog. At noon each day, when spirits
were being served, “the fifer was called to play ‘Nancy Dawson,’
or some other lively tune,” to give notice that the tub was ready.
The cook of each mess attended with a flagon, in which to fetch the
precious fluid to his mates. The noon allowance was one gill of pure
navy rum mixed with three gills of water, a little lemon acid, as
an anti-scorbutic, and a dash of sugar. The supper allowance was
issued in the same proportions, though without the sugar and lemon
juice. Grog time was the pleasantest part of the day. With a gill
of good spirits beside, or inside, him a sailor thought foul scorn
of the boatswain’s mate, and looked upon the world with charity.
He was not allowed to drink, or to receive, his beloved liquid in a
dram (_i.e._ neat), but by the exercise of a little patience he was
able to obtain a most decided feeling from its imbibition. A gill was
not enough to turn an old seaman’s head, but by saving up the gill
till supper, and adding to it the second gill, with any third gill
purchased or acquired from a shipmate, the oldest sailor found it
possible to believe himself an admiral. Often enough at this stage
he found it difficult to lie on the deck without holding on. It is
not wonderful that so many men got drunk aboard the King’s ships at
this time. For about a month before Christmas day, which was always
held as a general holiday and feast of Bacchus, the sailors saved up
their grog, half-a-gill a day, till they had enough to paralyse every
sentient thing below-decks. The officers kept clear on Christmas day,
for “a wet Christmas” was a very lively experience. Nearly every man
aboard got into “a state of beastly intoxication.” Drunken men lay in
heaps under the hatches, where they had fallen. The lower-deck became
a picture of hell. It was no unusual thing to find two or three men
dead when the decks were cleared the next morning. The allowance of
grog was certainly too large. The sailors were ashamed to allow any
of the ration to remain undrunken. They preferred to be flogged at
the gangway rather than to waste the good liquor. “In hot climates,”
says Captain Hall, “I really do not think it an exaggeration to say
that one-third of every ship’s company were more or less intoxicated,
or at least muddled and half stupefied, every evening.” It seems
curiously hard that men so eager to get drunk should have been so
urgently encouraged to drink, and so brutally punished for drinking
the drink allowed to them.
The sailors who did not care for grog were generally able to purchase
tea or cocoa from those who were less squeamish. Tea and cocoa
were not regular rations, but most ships carried them, to issue to
the sailors in lieu of the bad cheese sometimes given for supper.
A tea drinker could count on getting a quarter of a pound of tea
a week when the cheese had become uneatable. All sailors received
a weekly half-pint of vinegar, and the temperance man used to buy
up the allowance of the mess, and brew a cool drink for himself by
mixing the vinegar with water. This brew, tea, and cocoa, were the
usual temperance drinks. Few men cared to drink the ship’s water
undisguised.
It must be remembered that the scale of provisions was often modified
by substitutes. Once a week, at least, the beef ration was reduced
to one pound, and an equal weight of flour issued with it, to enable
the men to make a duff, doughboy, or pudding. Sometimes raisins and
currants were given with the flour, but more often the flour was
merely mixed with fat, and boiled till it looked like pipeclay,
when it was considered cooked. Beans were sometimes given instead
of pease. Rice was often given instead of oatmeal, cheese, pease,
or ship’s biscuit. Sugar was sometimes given instead of butter;
barley instead of oatmeal, and oil instead of cheese. In port, fresh
beef, mutton, and vegetables were always given to the company, if
such articles were readily obtainable. A captain generally tried to
vary the provisions issued, as far as he could, for the monotony of
alternating pork and beef, both salt and dry, is very unpleasant.
The sailors get to crave for a fresh taste, a violent taste, strong
enough to clear the mouth of the unpleasant taste with which one
wakes in one’s hammock. A landsman can hardly imagine the pleasure
of sucking a lump of sugar after a month on salt victuals. It was,
perhaps, as much the sameness of the ship’s provisions as the
emptiness of the life which sent the sailors to the grog jack for
solace. In port they turned at once to the most strongly-flavoured
articles their money could buy. They bought red herrings and onions,
good honest stuff, which one could really taste. They drank any
villainous compound they could find, from Riga balsam and eau de
Cologne to mixed vitriol and cider. Perhaps it was to obtain a fresh
taste that they chewed so much strong plug tobacco. They would
sometimes chew oakum when the supply of tobacco failed. Some of the
sailors had a craving for slush, the melted salt fat from the beef
and pork. When a ship’s copper was tallowed, or when the topmen were
greasing down the rigging, the men had to be watched, and prevented
from swallowing the stuff, which was very deleterious, and highly
productive of scurvy.
The mess cooks, who did the cooking and carving, also did the
washing-up. On Sundays they cleaned the mess tables, and laid out
the crockery for inspection. If a mess cook spoiled the duff, or
failed to keep the gear clean, he was tried by a jury of mess
cooks, gathered “by hoisting a mess swab, or beating a tin dish
between-decks forward.” The punishments these juries inflicted were
of the usual brutal kind.
In addition to the complements of sailors, all ships of war carried a
proportion of marines, under their proper officers. The sea regiment
was founded at the end of the seventeenth century, not as a permanent
force, but as a force in which the King’s seamen could be trained.
In the first years of the marines they were really young sailors,
who went aloft, did the musketry exercise, and joined in the working
of the ship. Gradually they lost their sailor craft, and became more
and more a military body. They came to be employed less as sailors
than as ship’s police, a sort of armed guard, ready to repress any
mutiny among the tarry-breeks. They were then messed and berthed
apart from the sailors, who began to despise them, as an inferior
and useless race. In the war years of the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries the marines were employed as checks upon the
seamen. All ships of war carried them, the proportion varying from
about 170 officers and men, in a first-rate, to 140 or 130, in a
third-rate, and a dozen, in command of a sergeant, in a 10-gun brig.
The proportion of marines was therefore about one to every four
sailors and idlers. They were usually on friendly terms with the
sailors, in spite of the sailors’ contempt for pipeclay. Many marines
were so eager to learn the sailors’ duty that they were allowed to go
aloft. In some ships they were allowed to furl the main-sail. When
at sea they helped the after-guard in various light duties. They
stood sentry-go outside the captain’s cabin, magazine hatchways, and
in various other parts of the ship, such as the galley door while
dinner was cooking. In action they fell in with their muskets on the
poop, quarter-deck, and gangways, to gall the enemy’s sail-trimmers
and topmen, and to give a hand at the braces, if occasion arose. A
marine private was dressed in the scarlet tunic of a soldier, with
white tight breeches and black Hessian boots. His hat was a sort of
top-hat, made of black felt, with gold lace round the brim, a narrow
gold band round the crown, and a smart cockade on the left side. A
black japanned cartridge box was slung behind him, on two pipeclayed,
crossed shoulder-straps. The marine officer wore a smart scarlet
tail-coat, with elaborate cuffs and lapels, tight white breeches,
low shoes, and silk stockings. In peace time, when not attached to a
ship, the marines were not disbanded, but sent to barracks. They were
a standing force. When a ship was commissioned they were usually
the first part of the crew to come aboard. It was generally their
fortune to do all the dirty work connected with the fitting out of
the ship. They were at all times subject to the same discipline as
the sailors. If they transgressed the rules of the service they were
flogged at the gangway like the sailors. They stood no watch at sea,
save the occasional sentry-go at the magazines and cabins. They were
always berthed far aft on the berth-deck,[24] where they would not
be disturbed by the changing watches. Their officers messed in the
ward-room, and had little cabins on the lower or orlop deck.
FOOTNOTES:
[22] “In a man-of-war,” says Edward Thompson, “you have the collected
filths of jails: condemned criminals have the alternative of hanging
or entering on board.... There’s not a vice committed on shore that
is not practised here; the scenes of horror and infamy on board a
man-of-war are so many and so great that I think they must rather
disgust a good mind than allure it.”
[23] The pay of an able seaman, such as a topman or forecastle hand,
was 33s. a month. An ordinary seaman received 25s. 6d. The landsman
2s. 6d. or 3s. a month less. Until 1797 the pay given was about a
third of that quoted above.
[24] Or on the orlop.