Daily Life in the Age of Sail: (The Greenwood Press ''Daily Life Through History'' Series)

343 Pages·2001·18.65 MB·English

by  Dorothy Denneen Volo

DAILY LIFE IN
THEAGE
OF SAIL
The Greenwood Press "Daily Life Through History" Series
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DAILY LIFE IN
THEAGE
OF SAIL
DOROTHY DENNEEN VOLO
AND JAMES M. VOLO
The Greenwood Press "Daily Life Through History" Series
GREENWOOD PRESS
Westport, Connecticut • London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Volo, Dorothy Denneen, 1949-
Daily life in the age of sail / Dorothy Denneen Volo and James M. Volo.
p. cm. — (The Greenwood Press "Daily life through history" series,
ISSN 1080-4749)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-313-31026-2 (alk. paper)
1. Seafaring life—History. 2. Navigation—History. 3. Sailing ships—History. I.
Volo, James M., 1947- II. Title. III. Series.
VK149.V65 2002
910.4'5—dc21 2001016186
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available.
Copyright © 2002 by Dorothy Denneen Volo and James M. Volo
All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be
reproduced, by any process or technique, without the
express written consent of the publisher.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2001016186
ISBN: 0-313-31026-2
ISSN: 1080-4749
First published in 2002
Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881
An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc.
www.greenwood.com
Printed in the United States of America
The paper used in this book complies with the
Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National
Information Standards Organization (Z39.48-1984).
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 21
Cover art: The age of sail permeated all aspects of life. Even common household items
often bore references to the sea. This period delft-style tile depicts an artist's rather fanci
ful interpretation of a lateen rigged coasting vessel. Note the lee boards.
Contents
Introduction vii
Chronology xi
1. Seaports 1
2. Sea Lanes 29
3. Navigation 49
4. Hull Down on the Horizon 63
5. The Crew 93
6. Shipboard Environment 119
7. Pastimes 135
8. Women and the Sea 155
9. The Great Trading Fleets of Europe 177
10. The Art of War at Sea 197
11. Pirates and Privateers 217
12. The Age of Fighting Sail 239
13. The American Revolution 265
14. The Sea and the States 283
Selected Bibliography 305
Index 311
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Introduction
The first and most obvious light in which the sea presents itself. . .
is that of a great highway.
—Alfred Thayer Mahan1
From ancient times to the nineteenth century, people came into contact
with no more complicated piece of machinery than a sailing vessel. The
wood from hundreds of trees was required to complete even small ships
in the eighteenth century. More than three miles of rope, some as small
as an inch wide and some the thickness of a man's leg, was needed to
support the rigging, set the sails, and control the vessel. The separate
labor-saving machines incorporated into the fiber of a ship were almost
numberless.
Although appearing immense when viewed from the quay side, even
the largest sailing vessel shrank to a mere splinter when floating in the
vastness of the ocean. In merchant vessels, the crew were usually
crowded into the forecastle or found space on the open well-deck on
which to curl up in a blanket. In warships, they had the dubious luxury
of berthing in the between decks encumbered only by the guns. A French
naval officer, when first going to sea, wrote in his journal, "Now we saw
nothing but sky and water and realized the omnipotence of God, into
which we commended ourselves/'2
For many of the most skillful seamen, sailing masters, and captains,
open-ocean navigation remained a profound mystery. Many seamen
Vlll Introduction
who regularly sailed from port to port in the Mediterranean Sea or along
the coasts of Africa and Europe utilized a good deal of "dead reckoning,"
judgment born of long experience, and luck in setting courses from place
to place once they left familiar local waters and landmarks.
The Portuguese first established a school for navigators in the fifteenth
century, and Spain set up a similar institution a century later. Italian
navigators dominated the discovery of the New World but faded
thereafter as prominent figures in the development of transoceanic trade.
The French were quick to produce up-to-date nautical treatises, instru
ments, and sea charts, and the Dutch were among the first to make trans
oceanic shipping a business. Strangely, the English, who would exit the
era as the dominant ocean-trading nation, were particularly backward in
accepting the new nautical sciences. As late as 1570, there were no
schools for navigators in England comparable with those on the Conti
nent. Not until the Armada fight in 1588 did the English take navigation
seriously.3
Notwithstanding the habit of maritime historians to ascribe certain
technological or exploratory events to individual nation-states, it was the
accumulated experiences of the sailors of many nations, through their
encounters with helpful or contrary winds, adverse tides and helpful
currents, dangerous obstacles and reassuring landmarks, that dictated
the most commonly used sea routes. The sea lanes established between
the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries connected natural resources, sup
pliers, seaports, cities, and markets over remarkably wide expanses of
ocean.
The economics of the age of sail was truly global. Englishmen drank
French wine; Frenchmen used spices from the Dutch East Indies; Dutch
men cooked in Spanish olive oil; and Spaniards ate salted cod from New
England. Sugar moved from the New World to the Old, Asian silks were
sold in the markets of Italy, and African slaves were torn from their
homes to labor in the American wilderness. For the European nations
taking part in the economic expansion of the sixteenth through nine
teenth centuries (1588-1815), sea power was the fundamental principle
that could determine whether empires would rise or fall. Overwhelming
sea power, and the quest to maintain or regain it, proved a decisive factor
in the history of all of Europe during the period.4
In this regard, naval and maritime historians have bowed to the most
influential of their number, Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, USN. As
president of the Naval War College in 1886, Mahan prepared and gave
a series of lectures that were the basis for the book The Jnfluence of Sea
Power upon History. Rewritten and carefully revised before its publication
in 1890, this book has continued to exert a widespread influence of its
own. It remains Mahan's best-known and most-quoted work. It has fur
nished authoritative guidance for a period in history filled with transi-
Introduction IX
tions and new departures in international affairs—a kind of gospel,
furnishing facts for every discussion of naval procedures and supplying
a sound basis for all thought on maritime policy for more than a century.
According to one of his biographers, "His writings will retain a value
little affected by the lapse of time."5
In modern times, no period has generated such a huge catalog of his
torical fiction as that of the age of sail. Pirates and buried riches came to
life in Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Jsland and Rafael Sabatini's Cap
tain Blood. Herman Melville's Moby Dick and Billy Budd brought the daily
life of seamen to the public. Stories of naval fleets in action on the high
seas have captivated readers for many decades. Among the most popular
authors of seafaring yarns are Patrick O'Brian (20 volumes), Alexander
Kent (23 volumes), Dudley Pope (18 volumes), and Richard Woodman
(13 volumes).
However, C. S. Forester remains the dean of maritime novelists. Cecil
Scott Forester's first naval adventure, Beat to Quarters, was published in
1937. Herein Forester introduced Horatio Hornblower, a fictional char
acter so beloved by readers that many believed him to be an authentic
person. For the next three decades, Forester filled out the life of Horn-
blower in eleven volumes from his days as a midshipman to his admir
alty, possibly mirroring the real life of Admiral Sir Edward Pellew.
Millions have thrilled to the exploits of the indomitable Hornblower, and
Forester has become the standard by which all authors of naval fiction
are now measured. No other author has proved so well equipped to
dramatize the sea battles and mesmerize the armchair admirals of the
reading public. The durability of his work more than thirty years after
his death attests to Forester's continuing and particular popularity.
In researching the age of sail, the authors of this history have tried to
separate the facts from the fiction and the politics from the policies. They
have incorporated the words of mariners from the period wherever pos
sible. However, most ordinary seamen put few of their thoughts on
paper. Charles Nordhoff and Richard Henry Dana, Jr., are notable ex
ceptions. As educated men, officers tended to write about contemporary
events in journals and letters and to produce memoirs in their retirement
as did Captain Samuel Samuels and admirals Thomas Hardy and Cuth-
bert Collingwood. Naval administrators and heads of state have also left
a wealth of material. Admiralty Secretary Samuel Pepys, for instance,
left more than 15,000 letters written at the end of the seventeenth century
for historians to consider.
The hundreds of surviving documents, bills of lading, customs re
ceipts, and logs of most merchant vessels are abysmally dull and were
composed of largely repetitive details about stowing cargo, changing
weather, shortening sails, and altering course. Those of warships are sim
ilarly boring. "A sea battle which, when written up in a historical novel,