The number of course depended on the size of the ship, and for the Henry Grace à Dieu they were thus distributed[327]:—Master —; master’s mate, 4; four pilots, 16; four quartermasters, 12; quartermaster’s mates, 4; boatswain, 3; boatswain’s mate, 1½; cockswain, 1½; cockswain’s mate, 1; master carpenter, 3; carpenter’s mate, 1½; under-carpenter, 1; two caulkers, 3; purser, 2; three stewards, 3; three cooks, 3; cook’s mates, 1½; two yeomen of the stryks, 2; their mates, 1; two yeomen of the ports, 2; their mates, 1. The officers’ pay was the same as that of the men, but they received in addition either these dead shares, reckoned at five shillings each, in the proportion shown here, or ‘rewards’ of so much a month. The Peter Pomegranate may be taken as a representative ship, as the Henry carried some officers unknown in the smaller vessels. In the Peter the master obtained one pound ten shillings a month of twenty-eight days; the master’s mate and quartermasters ten shillings; the boatswain twelve shillings and sixpence; master gunner, carpenter, purser, steward and cook, ten shillings, and gunners six shillings and eightpence. Surgeons were paid ten shillings and thirteen shillings and fourpence, and pilots twenty and thirty shillings a month, but neither were always carried.[328] Within certain limits, however, officers’ wages vary considerably, depending on the number of dead shares allotted among them, which, again, was subject to the size of the ship, an indication of the commencing division into rates. But before Henry’s death the formula of pay ran ‘dead shares and rewards included’ for an average, exclusive of captains, of eight shillings a month[329] all round, so that the old system was beginning to be discarded.
For many years of the reign some sort of uniform in the shape of ‘coats’ or ‘jackets’ was supplied to the men, but its exact character is nowhere described. When the Mary Rose and Peter Pomegranate were brought round from Portsmouth to the Thames thirty-five coats in green and white were provided, but as the cost was 6s 8d apiece these could only have been for the officers.[330] Sir Edward Howard, by his agreement in 1512, had to furnish the sailors with them at 1s 8d each, and he appears to have charged for 1616 besides 1812 for the soldiers.[331] Masters and pilots had sometimes coats of damask, every coat containing eight yards.[332] In 1513, we find references to 1244 mariners’, gunners’, and servitors’, jackets,[333] and to 638 coats of white and green cloth, 13 of white and green camlet, 4 of satin, and one of damask.[334] Although indications of uniform for the men have been noticed under Edward IV and Henry VII, the provision was much more liberal when Henry ascended the throne. He had at first an overflowing treasury wherewith to minister to his love of display and carry out more completely a custom he may also have thought useful from the point of view of health and of making the men proud of the royal service. But the allusions to seamen’s clothes are few after the first years. The system appears to have lasted, although perhaps not continuously, until his death, since in 1545 the writer of an estimate of naval charges asks if 1800 seamen are to have coats at two shillings each.[335]
Sick and Wounded Men.
Sick men appear to have been kept in pay if landed for that reason, because when Sir Thomas Wyndham proposed to send such members of his crew ashore, the council preferred that he should keep them on board as they would only be receiving pay uselessly on land and might not come back.[336] Those discharged disabled from wounds sometimes received a gratuity; in 1513, sixty men of the Mary James sent home in that condition were given twopence a mile conduct money, the usual rate being a halfpenny a mile, and a gift of £20 among them.[337]
Until 1545, there is no record of exceptional disease in fleets, but in September of that year the plague broke out in the English ships, although as the French were suffering even more and were eventually compelled by it to disband their fleet, it did not adversely affect the result of the operations. In August there were many men sick which was ascribed ‘to the great hete and the corrupcion of the victuall by reason of the disorder in the provision and the strayte and warm lying in the shippes.’[338] On the 28th August Lisle wrote to Paget that there was much illness, ‘those that be hole be veray unsightlie havyng not a ragg to hang uppon ther backes.’ On 3rd September, Lisle landed at Treport in Normandy, and sacked and burnt the town, and it is not until after that date that the word ‘plague’ is used and the terrible disease raged virulently. On 4th September there were 12,000 effective men, soldiers and sailors; on the 13th, 8488, so that in little more than a week 3512 ‘were sick, dead, or dismissed,’[339] By 11th September, Lisle was back at Portsmouth and wrote to the king that the ships were generally infected. Although the fleet was then broken up, it seems to have lingered on in the vessels kept in commission through the winter as there are references to it in the following April.
Captains.
The captains of men-of-war were still usually military officers or courtiers who made no attempt to work the ship. They were for the most part, persons holding appointments in the household, but towards the end of the reign, the new feeling that the sea was as important as the land as a field of national effort had trained officers who were almost professional seamen. These men belonged to the class who would earlier have been content to command soldiers during a voyage, but who were now continuously occupied in commanding ships at sea or in attending to administrative details ashore. Nominally a captain’s pay was one shilling and sixpence a day, but there were frequently extra allowances. In 1513, Walter, Lord Ferrers, captain of the Sovereign received five shillings and two pence a day ‘by way of reward’ over and above his one shilling and sixpence,[340] and Sir William Trevilian of the Gabriel Royal, three shillings and fourpence a day. On the other hand captains who happened to belong to the troop of ‘King’s Spears’ were paid ‘out of the King’s cofers’ and took nothing from the navy expenses.[341] The King’s Spears were a troop of Horseguards, fifty in number, formed by Henry shortly after his accession. Each of them was attended by an archer, man-at-arms, and servant, ‘they and all their horses being trapped in cloth of gold, silver, or goldsmith’s work.’ Eventually want of money led to the disbandment of this force.
In 1545 the demand for captains exceeded the supply for the smaller ships, the circumstances perhaps promising neither fame nor prize money. The official total of men-of-war and armed merchantmen under Lisle’s command was 104 ships, the strongest fighting fleet as yet sent to sea. About some of these he wrote,
‘As concernynge the meane[342] shippes I know noon other waye (I meane those that come out of the west parties and such of London, as were victuallers that want capitaignes) but to place them with meane men to be their capitaignes as serving men and yomen that be most mete for the purpose.’[343]
‘Meane men’[344] here signifies those of moderate social status, and serving men the confidants or attendants of noblemen, and who were frequently gentlemen themselves.