I’d like to take you to a land far away…A land without smart phones, PCs, tablets, Facebook, texting or email.

A land where letters ruled.

This land is the past.

My Doctoral research; ‘Any mail for me?: A study of selected correspondences between ship and shore in the years 1793 and 1815’ reveals reflections on the wooden world  through the letters of individuals in different elements of the maritime sphere.

It shows how their correspondence reflects the thoughts and feelings of a broad range of seafaring individuals effectively de-anonymising ‘Jack Tar’ in his various guises.

Caches of correspondence held in the Caird Library at the National Maritime Museum  at Greenwich have identified a spread of individual letter writers but 

correspondence needs to be placed within the context of the postal system as it related to both civilians and naval personnel. 

At the start of this period the existing postal service of the Royal Mail relied heavily on the ability of the recipient to pay the delivery charge and there are letters from seamen instructing the senders to ensure the post was paid at the point of posting.

Commanding officers of Royal Navy ships were aware of the effect on seamen’s morale of failure to receive mail because of not being able to afford the postage.

 In October 1785 when in command of the Boreas Nelson wrote to the Post-Master General in England regarding what he saw as the unfairness of the current postal rates which had the effect of many serving people being unable to pay for any letters addressed to them. He wrote: ‘The enormous price of letters received in this country is so very far above whatever a petty officer can afford to pay, much more the poor Seaman…since my serving here I have paid much more largely for letters than my fortune will allow of, for the Comforts of the Seamen hearing from their Wives and families, and at this moment are laying in the Post Office at St Johns near 100 letters which they can never afford to pay for; nor have I the means to relieve their distress….’ 

Eventually with the passing of the Postal Act of 1795 the Penny Post was introduced which enabled members of the armed forces but not commissioned officers, warrant officers or midshipmen to send single sheet letters pre-paid for 1 penny with the same rate applied to letters being sent to them.

Very few letters remain sent from shore to ship for all sorts of reasons. 

Wooden ships during the wars with France between 1793 and 1815 were not well suited to the safe storage of letters. They were damp places in an alien environment and all things were subject to rot or even being eaten by rats…Not to mention the risk of being destroyed through enemy action.

Here are two stories told by the selected letters sent from ship to shore by a Sergeant of the Royal Marines and a Quarter Gunner.

A TALE OF TWO GREATCOATS

The following vignette is taken from a cache of 29 letters written by Thomas Merrick a Sergeant in the Royal Marines between the years 1806 and 1814 to his nephew in Penrith. Taken as a whole they provide a picture of the realities of life as a Marine and his moves from ship to ship.

As opposed to Royal Navy seamen Royal Marines were entitled to be issued with a complete new uniform every year at no cost to themselves and they were free to keep their old one to do with as they wished. 

Greatcoats were issued when they were stationed in cold climes especially the Baltic………Not necessarily Scotland….

In the winter of 1808 Sergeant Merrick was serving in HMS Ardent a 64 gun third rate moored at Leith, Scotland. The ship had seen serious fighting duties during its lifetime but was now relegated to being a guard ship or a troop transport.

A significant part of Merrick’s duties was that of guarding the ship and the anchorage mainly to prevent either prisoners escaping or seamen deserting. This duty was carried out in a ship’s boat being rowed around the moorings regardless of the weather conditions.

On 21st December 1808 Sergeant Merrick wrote to his nephew in Penrith asking him to send among other things including a dictionary ‘my Large Coat as this is a wild climate and having a deal of duty in Boats and I am deficient of such a Necessary Article….’

His next letter to his nephew is dated 1st January 1809 in which he writes; ‘I Received your letter in due course and Last Night I Received the Coat with the Dictionary and a Pair of Stockings….’

Remember the dates from writing the first letter to getting his Greatcoat…. Nine days over Christmas and New Year…. The journey from Leith to Penrith is 126 miles each way over largely unmade roads…..This was well before the days of Amazon or ‘click and collect’. Well done the Royal Mail!

Thomas Merrick was fortunate that his request for his greatcoat was satisfied so quickly to keep him warm while on guard duty…….But….Greatcoats were not always so much of a highly  helpful item of clothing…….

We have seen the importance of the greatcoat to Sergeant Merrick simply to keep him warm and now we look at a Quarter Gunner and a Seaman rated as a landsman on HMS Victory.

HMS Victory was basically a floating gun platform best known as the flagship of Lord Nelson at the battle of Trafalgar and commanded by Captain Masterman Hardy.

It was technically described as a 104 Gun first rate ship of the line. 

Overall length 227 ft or 69m

Beam 52ft or 16m

Draft 28ft or nearly 9m

Height from waterline to top of the mainmast 205ft or 62m

Powered by 6,500 sq yards or 5,440 sq metres of sails and had a top sailing speed of 11knots or 20 km/h

And had a total complement of 850.

Of particular note for this story is that the distance from the waterline to the maindeck and larboard rail was at least 15ft or around 5m.

 ‘I have rec’d the letter directed to your son dated 1st Janry and as a Messmate of your son’s think myself in duty bound to inform you of your son’s unhappy and sudden Death.’

So wrote John Vincent a Quarter Gunner on HMS Victory to the parents of Charles Hancock in a letter dated 24th July 1805. By then Charles had been dead for eight months.

According the Muster Book both John Vincent and Charles Hancock joined the ship on 11th May 1803. Charles was twenty years old on joining and rated a Landsman and stayed as such until his death some eighteenth months later.

It is almost an automatic reflex to assume that a seaman dying on board the Victory died in the heat of battle but, like the majority of crew deaths, his was, at best as the result of an ‘accident’

Vincent continued in his letter to talk, as a parent himself, about how Charles’ death would ‘cause a tender and mutual sensation to communicate his unhappy and untimely, to you his Parents, his Brothers, Sisters, and acquaintances’.

He then presents a narrative of the circumstances of Charles’ death.

‘About half after ten at night…..having left him On or about the 24th November last as we were cruising off Toulon and at the time little or no wind, the Day of the Month and time was taken down by me, but by some accident have lost the memorandum but hopeing this will reach you safe as a means of Giving your Satisfaction………(etc) for I am a father…….(etc).about ten minutes walking on the Larboard Gangway of the ship………he being a young man of a sprightly disposition……was moving himself about in different attitudes, unfortunately pass’d the end of one of the Rails which are whipp’d upon the Gangway on purpose to hold the Ship’s company’s hammocks upright rather too hard which upset with him and not being able to save himself he unfortunately fell overboard and was Drowned…..(etc). Tho’ every effort possible was made use of for to save him he had a Greatcoat on which I believe must have been a great annoyance to him.’

This letter has a lesson within it for researchers and that is that regardless of the genuineness of the item itself as a ‘historical document’ relating a factual account of an event it needs to be cross referenced………

For a Messmate who had taken it on himself to inform Charles’ parents of his death in considerable detail there seem to be some major discrepancies or perhaps simply lapses in his memory……..Remember that John Vincent had written: ‘About half after ten at night…..having left him On or about the 24th November last as we were cruising off Toulon and at the time little or no wind, the Day of the Month and time was taken down by me, but by some accident have lost the memorandum ‘.

According to him Charles Hancock met his untimely death ‘on, or about, 24th November last…….About half after ten at night’ and also that ‘every effort possible was made use of for to save him’.

In an unaccredited ‘Log of the Proceedings of HMS Ship Victory’ there is the following entry;

 ‘November 24th 1045 pm. Shortened sail & Hove too.’ There is no mention as to why they hove too but neither was there any mention of having to stop to search for anyone who fell overboard.

Things are somewhat different for entries the following day. The same log reads; ‘November 25th 1100 am. Hancock fell overboard & was drowned.’

This is supported by the Master’s Log; 

‘Remarks Sunday 25th November 1804.

1 am: Moderate breezes. Soundings 60+ fathoms-Soft muddy bottom.

0600: Fresh breezes close reefed the Top sails.

0800: Sounded with 120 fathoms Line no bottom.

1100: Charles Hancock Seaman fell overboard and was drowned.

1200: Sounded in 90 fathoms no bottom.’

Again no mention of any attempt to rescue Charles Hancock just a bald statement of fact.

We have a picture of Charles Hancock who would have been nearly twenty-two years old at the time of his death having been on board for a year and a half who was still only rated as a Landsman which effectively meant that during that time he had not shown himself capable of acquiring sufficient skills to be at least rated ‘Ordinary’. Under what circumstances he decided it would be a good idea to engage in ‘moving himself about in different attitudes’ some fifteen feet at least above the waterline on gangway netting which would at that time of day have held the crew’s hammocks is anybody’s guess. It seems clear, despite what John Vincent says, that he was doing this in broad daylight and it would also be before the daily issue of grog. In addition he would have been in full view of everybody on deck including the officer of the watch at the very least. It hardly seems to be the sort of clowning which would meet with the approval of Captain Hardy.

As if to add insult to injury ‘He had a Greatcoat on which I believe must have been a great annoyance to him.’ This shows John Vincent to be a master of the understatement! I would think it would have been more than just a ‘great annoyance’ to Charles Hancock who, like the majority of seamen, was probably unable to swim anyway and died cursing the weight of it.

It is only to be hoped that the greatcoat was not a parting gift from his parents.