Saturday, March 31, 2018
Thursday, March 29, 2018
Navy Rum Rations, The Proof of Rum's Strength, & Scurvy
The history of rum and scurvy is more or less parallel.
Scurvy is a disease caused by insufficient vitamin C in the diet. Vitamin C is found in citrus fruits and vegetables. From wiki:
. . . Early symptoms include weakness, feeling tired, and sore arms and legs. Without treatment, decreased red blood cells, gum disease, changes to hair, and bleeding from the skin may occur. As scurvy worsens there can be poor wound healing, personality changes, and finally death from infection or bleeding. . . . It takes at least a month of little to no vitamin C before symptoms occur.Although scurvy has been known since ancient times, and indeed, was a problem for Crusaders making the long sea voyage to the Holy Land, it truly became a significant problem in Europe with the long sea voyages of the Age of Discovery beginning in the late 15th century. Fresh fruits and vegetables were not available to sailors. Between 1500 and 1800, "it has been estimated that scurvy killed at least two million sailors. Jonathan Lamb wrote: "In 1499, Vasco da Gama lost 116 of his crew of 170; In 1520, Magellan lost 208 out of 230;...all mainly to scurvy.""
From wiki:
In 1734, the Leiden-based physician Johann Bachstrom published a book on scurvy in which he stated, "scurvy is solely owing to a total abstinence from fresh vegetable food, and greens; which is alone the primary cause of the disease", and urged the use of fresh fruit and vegetables as a cure.
However, it was not until 1747 that James Lind formally demonstrated that scurvy could be treated by supplementing the diet with citrus fruit, in one of the first ever reported controlled clinical experiments in the history of medicine. In 1753, Lind published A Treatise of the Scurvy, in which he explained the details of his clinical trial, but it occupied only a few paragraphs in a work that was long and complex and had little impact. In fact, Lind himself never actively promoted lemon juice as a single ‘cure’. He shared medical opinion at the time that scurvy had multiple causes – notably hard work, bad water, and the consumption of salt meat in a damp atmosphere which inhibited healthful perspiration and normal excretion - and therefore required multiple solutions. He was also sidetracked by the possibilities of producing a concentrated ‘rob’ of lemon juice by boiling it. Unfortunately this process destroyed the vitamin C and was unsuccessful.
During the 18th century, disease killed more British sailors than enemy action. It was mainly by scurvy that George Anson, in his celebrated voyage of 1740–1744, lost nearly two-thirds of his crew (1300 out of 2000) within the first 10 months of the voyage. The Royal Navy enlisted 184,899 sailors during the Seven Years' War; 133,708 of these were "missing" or died from disease, and scurvy was the leading cause.
Although throughout this period sailors and naval surgeons were increasingly convinced that citrus fruits could cure scurvy, the classically trained physicians who ran the medical establishment dismissed this evidence as mere anecdote which did not conform to current theories of disease. Literature championing the cause of citrus juice, therefore, had no practical impact. Medical theory was based on the assumption that scurvy was a disease of internal putrefaction brought on by faulty digestion caused by the hardships of life at sea and the naval diet. Although this basic idea was given different emphases by successive theorists, the remedies they advocated (and which the navy accepted) amounted to little more than the consumption of ‘fizzy drinks’ to activate the digestive system, the most extreme of which was the regular consumption of ‘elixir of vitriol’ – sulphuric acid taken with spirits and barley water, and laced with spices.
In 1764, a new variant appeared. Advocated by Dr David McBride and Sir John Pringle, Surgeon General of the Army and later President of the Royal Society, this idea was that scurvy was the result of a lack of ‘fixed air’ in the tissues which could be prevented by drinking infusions of malt and wort whose fermentation within the body would stimulate digestion and restore the missing gases. These ideas received wide and influential backing, when James Cook set off to circumnavigate the world (1768–1771) in HM Bark Endeavour, malt and wort were top of the list of the remedies he was ordered to investigate. The others were beer, sour crout and Lind's ‘rob’. The list did not include lemons.
Cook did not lose a single man to scurvy, and his report came down in favour of malt and wort, although it is now clear that the reason for the health of his crews on this and other voyages was Cook's regime of shipboard cleanliness, enforced by strict discipline, as well as frequent replenishment of fresh food and green stuffs. Another rule implemented by Cook was his prohibition of the consumption of salt fat skimmed from the ship's copper boiling pans, then a common practice in the Navy. In contact with air the copper formed compounds that prevented the absorption of vitamins by the intestines.
Wednesday, March 28, 2018
Tuesday, March 27, 2018
Monday, March 26, 2018
Charleston River & Coastal Traffic
Coasters and river traffic
The Brown's Ferry Boat - flat bottom boat, 50 ft long (oars and bermuda rig?)
Periagua: (wiki) The original periaguas or piraguas were the dugout canoes encountered by the Spanish in the Caribbean. Small craft of greater capacity were created by splitting a dugout and inserting a plank bottom, while the freeboard was increased for sea voyages by adding planks on the sides.
By the 18th century the term "periagua" was being applied to flat-bottomed boats, which could be 30 feet (10 m) or more long and carry up to 30 men, with one or two masts, which could also be rowed. Later in the 18th century "periagua" became the name for a specific type of sailing rig, with gaff rigged sails on two masts that could be easily struck, commonly with the foremast raked forward and the main mast raked back. The "periagua rig" was used on U. S. Navygunboats on Chesapeake Bay in the early 19th century. The term "periagua" was also applied to rowing scows similar to a john boat.[1]
Periaguas were used in fishing and coastal and inter-island commerce.
Early in the 18th century periaguas were used by pirates around the Bahamas, Cuba and Hispaniola. Periaguas could be rowed against the wind, useful for approaching potential victims or escaping from pursuers.
In the UK - Barges were the fastest means of water transport between business centres and residences and were the limousines of the lower Thames in the 17th and 18th century. An eight-oared Shallop could cover the 35 miles from Hampton Court to Greenwich in approximately four hours. During the Golden Age of oared craft, from the thirteenth century to the late nineteenth century, all rich families and official organisations, such as the Navy Board and the City merchants, possesed a Shallop.
Sunday, March 25, 2018
Thursday, March 22, 2018
Wednesday, March 21, 2018
Book I Reference Links
Key Books:
Adam Smith, A
Wealth Of Nations
Bunyan, A
Pilgrim's Progress
Locke, Two
Treatises of Government
Hobbes, Leviathan
Alcott, Little
Women
Fielding, The
Hist of Jos. Andrews (1742)
Mary Wollstonecraft, Original
Stories From Real Life (1796)
Colonial Newspapers
Religion
Rsch Doc: Religion Rights
Revolution
Rsch Doc: Role of Religion in the
Revolutin
Class Structure in Charleston
Hidden History of Old Charleston (Kindle loc 284 and the
suicide of John Henry Rutledge in a modern Romeo and Juliet tale)
Crime and Punishment
History of UK
General US Hist 1760-74
The Declaratory Act of 1766
Townshend Acts
Tea Act of 1772
Intolerable Acts 1774
Rsch Doc American Archives 74-75
Powder Alarm
Rev. War – Battles & Cantonments
Trenton and Princeton
Rsch Doc: Gen Hugh Mercer
McCullough, 1776 (Kindle)
Washington's Crossing (Kindle)
Saratoga
Rsch Doc: Jane McCrea
The Wyoming Massacre
Valley Forge
The Southern Campaign (79-81)
Moultrie, Memoirs
of the Am Rev. v. 2
Ramsay, Hist
of the Am Rev in SC, v. 2
Sir Henry Clinton, Narrative
Lord Cornwallis, Reply
to the Narrative
Lee, Memoirs of the War in the Southern Dept., Vol.
II
Rsch Doc: Cornwallis's Army in the South
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Siege of Charleston
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
Waxhaw Massacre (29 May
1780)
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Huck's Defeat (12
Jul 80)
Wiki
Rsch Doc: Hucks Musgrove Blackstocks
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Camden (16 Aug 80)
Touring
SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Fishing Creek (18 Aug 80)
Touring SC's Revolutionary War
Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Marion's Battles
Rsch Doc: Francis Marion
Touring SC's Revolutionary War
Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Musgrove Mill
(19 Aug 80)
Rsch Doc: Hucks Musgrove Blackstocks
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Kings Mountain (7 Oct 80)
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Blackstocks Farm
(20 Nov. 1780)
Rsch Doc: Hucks Musgrove Blackstocks
Touring SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Cowpens (17 Jan 81)
Wiki
Touring
SC's Revolutionary War Sites (Kindle)
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
March to the Dan
Rsch Doc: Gen Greene & Dan
The Revolutionary War in the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Guilford Courthouse
The Revolutionary War in
the Southern Backcountry (Kindle)
Yorktown
Eutaw Springs
Quotations
Rsch Doc: Sommerset's Case Quotation
Rsch Doc: Quotes
Fox,
Charles (Brit MP)
Franklin, Ben
Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac
Marion's
Men (Poem by Will. Cullen Bryant)
Misc
Maps
Charleston
Map 1780
SC
Roads & Election Districts 1768-75
Charlestown
Map 1704
Charleston
Map 1733
SC
River Map (Modern)
Charleston
Walking Tour Map (password is all lower case: charleston)
Charleston
Harbor 1861
Tuesday, March 20, 2018
Charleston - Gullah Culture, Traditions & Speech
Sweetgrass Baskets
Gullah Superstions:
From Charleston Footprints: The term “hant” is an old Gullah word referring to a ghostly presence, not “haint”. And from the Gullah traditions, one of the most menacing hants was the “Plat-eye”, a ghost who entered peoples’ bodies and made them do awful things. The Plat-eye’s only weakness was that it could not cross over water, and thus, many houses in the remote areas around Charleston long featured sea-blue paint around door and window frames.
Monday, March 19, 2018
Sunday, March 18, 2018
Charles Towne Landing 1670
Seeking a place for establishing a settlement, the first colonists were directed to Albermarle Point by the Chief of the Kiawah Indians. The friendly Cassique and his people greatly helped the struggling colony.
The Kiawah chief, or Cassique, invited the new English settlers to build their village here at Albemarle Point. The arrangement had immediate benefits for both the Kiawah and the English.
The Kiawah often fought against the Westos, an aggressive tribe who lived along the Savannah River. The Westos used European guns to raid other tribes’ coastal villages. With help from the English settlers – and their English guns – the Kiawah could better defend themselves against their longtime enemy.
In return, the Kiawah helped the English feed, clothe and shelter themselves during their early years in a wild an untamed land.
The original settlers to the colony of Carolina arrived in 1670 from Barbados and settled at Albermarle Point, also known as Charles Town Landing, south across the Ashley River from current day Charleston. In 1680, the settlement relocated to the current location of Charleston.
The first order of business at the new colony was defense. The colonists were aware that the Spanish, hostile Native Americans and predatory animals threatened their safety. Well-supplied by the Lords Proprietors, they came to Carolina prepared to defend themselves.
Neglecting crops and homes, the entire community labored to build a wall of defense. They moved tons of earth to make a broad ditch, felled hundreds of trees and erected the massive palisade that stretched 1,500 feet across Albemarle Point.
Never sure of when an attack might occur, the men carried guns in the fields and even armed their slaves
The Kiawah chief, or Cassique, invited the new English settlers to build their village here at Albemarle Point. The arrangement had immediate benefits for both the Kiawah and the English.
The Kiawah often fought against the Westos, an aggressive tribe who lived along the Savannah River. The Westos used European guns to raid other tribes’ coastal villages. With help from the English settlers – and their English guns – the Kiawah could better defend themselves against their longtime enemy.
In return, the Kiawah helped the English feed, clothe and shelter themselves during their early years in a wild an untamed land.
The original settlers to the colony of Carolina arrived in 1670 from Barbados and settled at Albermarle Point, also known as Charles Town Landing, south across the Ashley River from current day Charleston. In 1680, the settlement relocated to the current location of Charleston.
The first order of business at the new colony was defense. The colonists were aware that the Spanish, hostile Native Americans and predatory animals threatened their safety. Well-supplied by the Lords Proprietors, they came to Carolina prepared to defend themselves.
Neglecting crops and homes, the entire community labored to build a wall of defense. They moved tons of earth to make a broad ditch, felled hundreds of trees and erected the massive palisade that stretched 1,500 feet across Albemarle Point.
Never sure of when an attack might occur, the men carried guns in the fields and even armed their slaves
Saturday, March 17, 2018
Friday, March 16, 2018
Intelligence & Spies In The Revolution
Rev. War – Spies and Intelligence
Washington's Spies (Kindle)
James Fenemore Cooper, The Spy (Kindle)
Spies - Mt. Vernon site
Dr. Benjamin Church (Loyalist Spy)
Patriot Spies
Nathan Hale
Culper Spy Ring
Nancy Hart
Lieutenant Lewis J. Costigan
Lieutenant Lewis J. Costigan
Loyalist Spies / Assets
Dr. Benjamin Church
Benedict Arnold
Critical Intel
Battle of Trenton
Battle of Princeton
Yorktown
Thursday, March 15, 2018
Wednesday, March 14, 2018
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