Nelson & His World

In the Nicolas edition 5, page 205 I found this letter written by Nelson

To Captain ….. His majesty’s sloop …..

Victory, off Toulon, 16th September 1803

Sir,
An officer belonging to his Majesty’s Sloop …. Under your command, having boarded a vessel from Tunis, which, consequently, placed the said Sloop under the most strict quarantine, and you, having last evening, immediately after such communication, sent an officer on board the Victory, and this morning come yourself, without previously acquainting me of such circumstance, and thereby endangering the health of the Victory’s Ship’s company, and that of the whole fleet under my command, I desire to acquaint you that such conduct is highly reprehensible and unoffercerlike, and that you will hold yourself ready to answer (when called upon) for it accordingly, I am etc.

If ships were in quarantine for a longer period, how was food and water brought to them. Did the ships/sailors doing so, end up in quarantine themselves?

How did officers prevent the crew from getting bored, if the quarantine lasted for weeks?
Sylvia

What an interesting question! I did some investigating and found that the word 'quarantine' comes from the Italian 'quaranti giorni' - forty days, this period being thought sufficient to establish whether there was disease on board. Ships in quarantine had to fly a distinctive flag - I have been unable to establish whether it was a yellow square or a square consisting of two black and two yellow squares. Nor have I found any information about what happens if quarantine is extended. Presumably, this would happen only if there was disease on board. I wonder how the port authorities resolved the humanitarian problem of getting supplies to affected ships.

I think quarantine periods varied enormously from around 3 days up to 40 days, and often perhaps somewhere in the middle? Ships with a 'clean bill of health', issued in the originating country might have a shorter quarantine period. Getting supplies to a ship in quarantine was not a problem - that was allowed (presumably provided no-one went on board?). Unloading goods from the ship was not allowed. Even letters from a ship in quarantine were (sometimes/always?) fumigated before being allowed ashore.

re. the flag - The 1805 Quarantine Act of 1805 specified that a ship approaching the British coast and liable to quarantine must display "...a large yellow flag of six breadths bunting at the main top mast head". The 1806 amendment qualified this, by stating that a vessel actually having "...the plague or an infectious distemper" onboard should display a "yellow and black flag, of eight breadths bunting at the main mast head"

Further reading of the Act shows that ships under quarantine were to be directed to special anchorages, and "all persons, ships, boats and vessels may be prohibited, by order in council, to go within the limits of any station assigned to ships without clean bills of health".

The Act seems to make no mention of provisioning or supporting the ships actually in quarantine, except where the there were actually cases of the "plague or other infectious distemper" onboard. In this case, then the local magistrate had the power, with the approval of the Secretary of State, to ensure that "...such measures may be taken for the comfort and support of the crew and passengers onboard".

Otherwise, I think that the ship would have to sit in the quarantine anchorage for a few days, supporting themselves, until given clearance to enter harbour.

Presumably practice varied in different countries and at different times?

Here is an example of Nelson in the Victory at Sardinia treating quarantine as more or less a formality, and sending a letter (and some newspapers) to Keats arriving from Algiers.

TO CAPTAIN KEATS, H.M. SHIP SUPERB.
Victory, January 15th, 1805.
My dear Keats,
Many thanks for your Telegraph message, and I am sorry that, for form's sake, I must consider you, at least for one day, in Quarantine; but I think if Dr. Scott will go with one of your Officers to the shore, and state to the Governor and Officers of Health, that you have been as many days in Quarantine as you have been from Algiers, that the place is healthy, and you are healthy, with such winning ways as Dr. Scott knows so well how to use, I have no doubt but that you will have pratique; and let your Officer say that I have examined the state of the Ship, and find her proper to have pratique, &c. &c., which I am ready to certify if the Governor wishes it; then I shall hope to have you to dinner ; but if they will not give you pratique, I shall to-morrow. Ever, my dear Keats, your much obliged,
NELSON AND BBONTE.
I send you some late Papers.

I am not quite clear on 'pratique' - is it permission to enter port while still in quarantine?

"I am not quite clear on 'pratique' - is it permission to enter port while still in quarantine?"

Not quite, pratique is the clearance to enter harbour when quarantine is over. Apparently some ports had Pratique Masters, the officials who granted a ship pratique after they had spent their time in isolation.

I have just acquired a copy of the Gentleman's Magazine for 1799. The January edition contains an interesting article by Dr Benjamin Moseley, well known for his Treatise on Tropical Diseases, in which he expresses some opinions on contagion which, in the light of our knowledge, are alarmingly wrong-headed. 'Importing epidemics, and the existence of contagion in pestilential diseases are contrary to the opinion I ever had, and still maintain.' He concludes:

'Quarantine, always expensive to commerce and often ruinous to individuals, is a reflexion on the good sense of countries. No pestilential fever was ever imported or exported; and I have always considered the fumigating [of] ships' letters and shutting up the crews and passengers on vessels on their arrival from foreign places, for several weeks for fear they should give diseases to others, which they have not themselves, as an ignorant, barbarous custom'.

Hehe - I could have told you that, Mum The only reason that I know this is that I studied early modern Venice, and the first formal system of quarantine was introduced in the 1400s to protect Venice from plague and leprosy - hence the Italian. Venice was one of the leading trading states at the time, so the practice was widely known and copied.