Nelson & His World

In the Nicolas editon, Volume 4, page 522 I found this letter from Nelson, he wrote to Captain Sutton,

Merton, November 12th, 1801

My dear Sutton,

Yesterday was a fagging day: 150 dined at the London Tavern, and I, being the Cock of the Company, was obliged to drink more than I liked; but we got home to supper; and a good breakfast at eight this morning has put all to rights again.

In one of the Hornblower sequels there is a mutiny going on. The captain of the ship orders to give the crew rum before forenoon. Which causes concern to Hornblower that the crew members may be feeling a bit light in their heads and not able to focus on doing their work as well as they should do anymore.

Since I will, for my work, attend a meeting tomorrow especially organised for family members of alcoholics, I wonder was the use of alcohol a big problem on the ships. Were sailors always punished for drinking too much, even if they were off duty and not misbehaving themselves?

Sylvia

Sylvia
Alcohol - or rather the misuse of alcohol - was a major problem. Doctor James Lind, writing in 1753 wrote: "The abuse of ...liquor, more especially the swallowing down large quantities of undiluted spirits is the of the most fatal consequence in every climate, and has been the bane of many thousand seamen".

Sir Gilbert Blane in 1789 wrote: "The abuse of spirituous liquors is extremely pernicious everywhere, both as an interruption to duty and it is injurious to heath. It is particularly so in the West Indies ..."

.. and in Surgeon Gillespie's journal (1790) he notes that " ...mutinies and outrages in our ships of war had never been heard of had the seamen been precluded from the use of spirituous liquors; how many excellent seamen and officers had been lost to themselves and the service of their country from the fatal habit of intoxication."

Most Capains Orders specifically warn against drunkeness, for example = " Any person getting drunk on duty will be severely punished" (Captains Orders, HMS Indefatigable 1812)

The punishment lists are dominated by flogging for drunkeness. For example, that of HMS Blake 1812/1813 -

Robert Alford drunkeness 6 lashes
Give Albro drunkeness 12 lashes
Alex Alexander smuggling wine onboard 24 lashes
John Alexander repeated drunkeness 24 lashes
William Barrett drunkeness 12 lashes
etc. etc. etc - the list goes on for several pages, dominated by punishment for being drunk

How did the sailors get access to alcohol? I should have thought that the stores were kept under lock and key and strictly guarded by armed Marines. To get drunk, they would presumably have to have got unauthorised access, perhaps involving violence or criminal damage which would also incur severe punishment?

Remember that there was a legal issue of liquor - usually of grog (rum mixed with water) issued every day at noon.

This was not issued individually, but by mess - i.e. a group of men would be issued with an amount of liquour sufficient for them all. All you had to do to build up a quantity would be to save some from the issue. I was in the Navy before the rum ration was stopped - 'hoarding' was still an illegal (but common) practice, so that on a 'special' day, such as a birthday, bottles of grog would miraculously appear...(these days they don't issue rum, but beer ... & although the rules say it must be drunk that same day...some still gets put aside)

It was also a common practice in the 18th/early 19th centuries, that when a ship was in harbour it was not uncommon for it to be invaded by a variety of people selling food, clothes etc. Alcohol was frequently (& illegally) traded.

Since the rum ration was clearly open to such abuse one wonders why it was ever permitted. I suppose the official ration was an effective 'daily sweetener' when shipboard life was so harsh and withdrawing it would have caused uproar.

Did ships also carry stores of 'small beer', the very weak beer that was drunk ashore because it was generally safer than the water supplies then available?

Small beer was always carried; 1 gallon was allowed per man per day.

The daily issue of liquor was actually an attempt to curb the amount of alcohol consumed. It was Admiral Vernon, who, in 1740 had ordered an official issue of watered rum to counter the personal stores of liquor that seamen would have. The strength and amount of grog was progressively reduced, but to have removed it would have threatened mutiny.

Nicholas Rodger (in The Wooden World) comments that "officers drank as much or more than their men, ...The amount of alcohol officers took onboard was prodigious".

There does however seem to be a dividing line - there was a difference between getting drunk at sea and in port. At anchor most people could get drunk, and would. At sea it was different - a man unable to turn out when when called to hand, reef or steer because he was drunk, would rapidly lose the sympathy of his mates and he would certainly be flogged.

All this is very interesting; thankyou.

As a matter of interest, was the rum issued to the navy weaker than rum that is sold today? This is true of other wines and spirits, I believe. William Pitt drank three bottles of port a day, but the port was weaker and the bottles smaller.

What about drunkenness/alcoholism amongst officers? Was it a serious problem? Presumably an officer unable to command through drunkenness would be just as much a threat to safety as a drunken seaman. And how would he be be dealt with?

Tycho,

The proportion of rum to water was normally one third rum, two thirds water. Petty officers and senior rates, presumably because they were more experienced, drank it neat.

The watering down of rum into grog was, as has been said, was ordered by Admiral Vernon and so named after the grogham coat he habitually wore. I believe he also had the nickname of 'old grog'. Another point about the rum ration, was that it was a small comfort against the strenuous work that the seamen had to do and they were often given an extra tot if any extra heavy job was done. This was known as 'splicing the main brace'.

The officers of course, being gentlemen, were rather more addicted to wine and other spirits. Of course some did get drunk, but it was rather frowned upon as not setting a good example to the crew, so I think most learned how to handle it.

Kester

We should perhaps temper this thread with the fact that the 18th/19th centuries were a hard-drinking age in general, particularly amongst the lower classes. I don't have any figures to hand, but remember reading of the excessive drinking of gin at that time which caused the authorities such problems.

Seen in this light, the question of drinking to excess in the navy does not seem that bad. It's rather like the topic of the issue of poor quality food, which has also been rather levelled at the navy, as if it were the only place that it happened. Luckily, enlightened historians have today put this in context, so it is not quite the 'black and white' question that it was regarded in the past.

Kester

Kester:

yes, you're right about the 18th century being a hard-drinking age. Hogarth's drawings of Gin Lane are graphic descriptions of alcoholic excess - though when you think of the miseries of the urban poor, it is not surprising they drowned their sorrows in drink.

The rich were equally hard drinking - see William Pitt's three bottles of port a day. This makes Nelson's abstemiousness all the more remarkable. He was famously dismissive of drunkards, and sacked one of his servant for drunkenness. I think Tom Allen at one point reminded him of the effect too much drink had on him. Maybe Nelson was aware of his low tolerance and guarded against over-indulgence.

This abstemiousness is just another aspect of his self-discipline: he was a moderate eater as well as drinker; walked seven miles a day on the quarterdeck; rose and retired early and was assiduous about administration, 'I am working like a horse at a mill,' he wrote to Emma, but never allowed paperwork to mount; and he was a ferocious stickler for punctuality, attributing his success to 'being quarter of an hour before my time.' And yet, unlike many disciplined people, he wasn't a killjoy - he was a generous host and good company by all accounts - and a little more relaxed over matters of the heart!

Hi
I am new to this forum, but I thought you might be interested in an excerpt from a letter written by Collingwood after the battle of Trafalgar regarding his wine:

"I have hardly a chair that has not got a shot in it… My wine broke in moving, and my pigs were slain in battle, and these are heavy losses."

Welcome to the forum!

Your remark about Collingwood's wine made me wonder where on earth they put it all. Officers' cabins on Victory are minute. Where would the wine be stored? Would there be limits on the amount each officer could take?

I don't suppose there was a specific prescribed limit, it was probably up to the captain. Coming home, there was perhaps more room available - Madeira was a popular port of call. In my researches I came across a letter from Lieutenant Norton Knatchbull to his brother Edward saying that Captain Mansfield, after escorting the West Indies convoy, was to call at Madeira to get some wine for his father, Sir Edward Knatchbull. (The brother in question later inherited the title and married Fanny Knight, Jane Austen's niece.)

On the question of how much officers drank, according to Mangin's journal, his mess bill in the Gloucester was £60 per year - rather a lot for someone on pay of just over £100 a year. The reason was that the officers in the ward room considered it 'not done' to drink less than half a pint of port and sherry per day. As a result they could only afford supplies of indifferent quality. Another lieutenant (with independant means) proposed increasing the ration to one pint, which would mean having 'to expend at least £40 for the nauseous purpose of swilling six glasses of sloe-juice mixed with sugar-of-lead'.

Source: Michael Lewis in 'A Social History of the Navy', quoting from NRS vol 91 'Five Naval Journals, 1789-1817'

Schoolmasters aboard ships seem to have been a notoriously drunken lot. James Anthony Gardner, in his 'Recollections' (reviewed on Book reports) mentions Andrew MacBride, schoolmaster in the 'Edgar' and, by all accounts a brilliant mathematician and 'a man of splendid abilities, but unfortunately given to drinking, though the goodness of his heart made him much respected..) On one occasion

'he got so drunk that Ned Moore (my worthy messmate) handed him a couple of tumblers of the juice of red pickled cabbage and told him it was brandy and water which he drank without taking the least notice. I believe it did him good as an aperient, for he was cruising about all night and next day, and could not imagine what it was that affected him so....'

In another, very interesting book I have recently come across, 'The Young Midshipman's Instructor' (1801) the author comments:

'I am sorry to say that drinking is too common a complaint made against schoolmasters in the navy, and that however it may be pleasing or useful to themselves in drowning care and thought, keeping out the cold or enjoying the society of their mess-mates, yet it is totally destructive of their authority over the young gentlemen who are placed under their direction.....

Inebriety at sea is ten times more criminal and dangerous that on shore, as the lives of a whole ship's company are sometimes at the mercy of a man in licquor.' (see Book Reports for more on this book.)