I now began to keep regular and methodical accounts of the sickness and mortality in the fleet, though in a manner more imperfect and less accurate than was afterwards adopted. I was embarked on board of the Sandwich, where the Commander in Chief had his flag, so that I was always present with the main body of the fleet, whether at sea or in port.
A form of monthly returns[2] was adopted, which, as well as other points of method, was afterwards improved.
After collecting the returns for each month, I made abstracts of them in tables; in one column of which the complement of each ship is set down, in order to form calculations of the comparative prevalence and mortality of different diseases at different times. One of the abstracts is here inserted, ([Table I].) by way of specimen, and the proportional result of them for fourteen months is set down in another table, ([Table II].)
Though this last exhibits a tolerably just view, yet it may be remarked, as one imperfection, that there was no distinction made at this time in my returns between the killed and those who died of disease; so that in the month of May, which stands first, the proportion is too high; for there were sixty-four killed, and two hundred wounded, in the two actions of that month.
TABLE I.
ABSTRACT of RETURNS,
1st June, 1781.
Transcriber’s keys:
A Complement.
B Sick and Wounded on Board.
C Sent to the Hospital in the course of last Month.
D Dead on Board in the course of last Month.
| SHIPS’ NAMES. | A | B | C | D |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sandwich | 732 | 28 | 36 | 2 |
| Barfleur | 767 | 133 | 22 | 1 |
| Gibraltar | 650 | 67 | 88 | 10 |
| Triumph | 650 | 7 | 9 | 2 |
| Centaur | 650 | 45 | 26 | 5 |
| Torbay | 600 | 31 | 57 | 5 |
| Monarch | 600 | 62 | 14 | 2 |
| Terrible | 600 | 85 | 24 | 1 |
| Alfred | 600 | 57 | 38 | 1 |
| Russel | 600 | 44 | 134 | 7 |
| Alcide | 600 | 42 | 35 | 1 |
| Shrewsbury | 600 | 30 | 23 | 5 |
| Invincible | 600 | 50 | 63 | 9 |
| Resolution | 600 | 107 | 54 | 3 |
| Ajax | 550 | 20 | 10 | 2 |
| Princessa | 560 | 88 | 40 | 5 |
| Belliqueux | 500 | 19 | 0 | 1 |
| Prince William | 500 | 25 | 14 | 2 |
| Panther | 420 | 16 | 6 | 0 |
| Triton | 200 | 5 | 1 | 0 |
| Hyena | 200 | 11 | 0 | 0 |
| Cyclops | 200 | 5 | 2 | 0 |
| Total | 11979 | 977 | 696 | 64 |
The main body of the fleet lay at Barbadoes till the 6th of June, and the men had recruited extremely by their stay there; for vegetables, fruit, and other refreshments, can be procured at an easier rate, and in much greater plenty, at this island, than any other on the station.
The fleet arrived at St. Lucia the next day after it sailed from Barbadoes, and remained there till the 18th of June. The whole of this month was showery at this island, though it is not accounted the common rainy season; for more rain falls here than at any of the other islands at that time in our possession, being the most mountainous, as well as the most woody and uncultivated, of them all. These rains produced some increase of sickness, but very little, when compared to what took place at the same time in the army on shore, and in the ships refitting at the Carenage. There died about this time from fifty to fifty-five men every week in an army of not quite two thousand men.
The difference in point of health between the Carenage (which, as the word implies, is the place where ships go to be hove down, or otherwise repaired) and Gros-Islet Bay, where the main body of the fleet lay, affords a striking proof of the effects of situation. The Carenage is a land-locked creek, with a marsh adjacent to it, whereas the other is a road open to the fine air of the sea, the only land sheltering it to windward being a small, dry island, consisting of one hill, of half a league in circumference, and some of the cliffs of the main island of St. Lucia.