Ships & Ways of Other Days

by E. Keble Chatterton

Hutchinson wrote one of the most interesting books on seamanship which it has ever been my pleasure to read. His complaint was that too many men were so devoted to the methods which they had been accustomed to, that they could not be prevailed upon to try others which were better. There certainly was a good deal of ignorance about in this eighteenth century. Some men, he says, endeavour to make ships perform impossibilities, as, for instance, backing their craft astern to clear a single anchor when the wind is right aft against the windward tide; or trying to back a ship with sails so set as to prevent her shooting ahead towards a danger when laid-to; or driving broadside with the wind against tide, not knowing that a ship driving on either tack will always shoot forward the way her head lies, in spite of any sail set aback. He complained, too, of the neglect of sea officers’ education. One may add that the only training which naval officers received at this time was by going to sea. They came from the shore to the quarter-deck and picked up what knowledge they could. It is true that, in 1727, George II established a Naval Academy at Portsmouth. But it was a very exclusive institution, and open to only a few of the sons of the nobility and gentry. Therefore it languished through neglect before very long, but in 1806 was raised to the dignity of a Royal Naval College.

Collier Brig.

As seen by E. W. Cooke at the beginning of the nineteenth century. In the time of Hutchinson these collier brigs were slightly different and carried spritsails. But on the whole the brigs of both periods were very similar.

The eighteenth-century midshipman of the Royal Navy was a man of low social standing. His age varied from ten to forty-five, the older men having been promoted from before the mast. Mere boys, who knew but little about the ways of a ship, and in any case had had but little training, were given the rank of lieutenant. The country had so much fighting on hand that it badly needed men. Forty thousand men were voted in 1705, justices of the peace being authorised to seek out seamen and deliver them to the press-gangs. Whilst penalties were threatening for those who concealed seamen, rewards were held out to those who should discover and help to arrest them. Landsmen being eligible, it was not surprising that a raw, incompetent lot of gaol-birds had to do service for their country on the seas. But they were not even healthy of body. One has only to read Anson’s “Voyage Round the World.” Among the men that were sent to him by the authorities, thirty-two out of one batch of 170 were straight from the hospital and sick-quarters. Of the soldiery he was to carry, all the land forces that were to be allowed him were 500 Chelsea pensioners, consisting of men invalided for age, wounds, or other infirmities.

But there were some very fine fellows in two branches of the merchant service. Hutchinson calls attention to these: “Those seamen in the coal and coasting trade to the city of London, are the most perfect in working and managing their ships in narrow, intricate, and difficult channels, and in tide ways; and the seamen in the East India trade are so in the open seas.” “The best lessons for tacking and working to windward in little room,” he remarks elsewhere, “are in the colliers bound to London, where many great ships are constantly employed, and where wages are paid by the voyage, so that interest makes them dexterous.” The mainmast of such craft stood further aft than was customary. Therefore they had a strong tendency to gripe, and so they often used their spritsail and all head sail for going to windward and making them manageable. In narrow channels, when the wind was blowing so strongly that all hands could not haul aft the fore sheet, this had to be done by the capstan. These little brigs had no lifts to the lower yards, no foretop bowlines, but short main bowlines, and snatch-blocks for the main and fore sheets. The main braces led forward so that the main and maintop bowlines were hauled and belayed to the same pin. “We have ships,” he says, “that will sail from six to nine miles an hour, upon a wind, when it blows fresh and the water is smooth, and will make their way good within six points of the wind, in still water, a third of what they run by the logg.”

The accompanying illustration shows the well-known manœuvre of boxhauling, which Hutchinson was most anxious to teach his brother seamen. For the benefit of the non-nautical reader, I may explain that this is a method of veering a ship when the sea is so bad that she cannot tack, and is dangerously near the lee shore. Boxhauling, insisted Hutchinson, is the surest and best method of getting a ship under command of helm and sails in a limited space. “There is a saying amongst seamen,” he adds, “if a ship will not stay you must ware her; and if she will not ware, you must box-haul her; and if you cannot box-haul her, you must club-haul her—that is, let go the anchor to get her about on the other tacks.” Every maritime officer to-day has written across his mind in imperishable letters the five L’s—“log, lead, look-out, latitude, and longitude.” In Hutchinson’s day the sailor had only three of these, and he quotes the great Halley as emphasising the importance of the three L’s—lead, latitude, and look-out. For the difficulty of the longitude was still unsolved.

Boxhauling.

Hutchinson relates that on one occasion he saved his ship from foundering in Mount’s Bay only by boxhauling, as here indicated. Fig. 2 shows that as soon as the ship ceased coming round in stays, the foresheet was hauled aft, the headsails trimmed flat, whilst the sails were slacking, and the helm put hard alee. She then made a stern board. Thus gathering way, she turned short on her heel till she filled main and maintopsails the right way. The helm was then put hard aweather, so that the ship got headway with the sails trimmed, as in Fig. 1. Later on she was able to turn to windward, as in Fig. 3, far enough off the lee shore so as to weather the Lizard.