Sailor Mouth Saturday: Fresh

Tomorrow is Saint Patrick's Day: the day we're all Irish. Aside from corned beef, beer and all things green I always harken back to - and I'm really dating myself here - these very old Irish Spring soap commercials. Making a "strong" man "fresh" was what Irish Spring was about and thus, today's SMS word.

Fresh at sea generally refers to one of three things: water, wind or rigging. Let's look at them in that order, shall we?

Fresh water if, of course, that that is not salt. A ship freshens her water by taking on more casks of same for drinking and cooking but rarely if ever for washing. Other fresh water, particularly that from rain or snow, was used for that purpose. If none of that was to hand one might have the good luck to use the freshening from a local river. The so called fresh shot was the fresh water that came down stream from a large river and emptied into a body of salt water. As Admiral Smyth notes in The Sailor's Word Book, in such cases - particularly after a large dump of rain or with snow melt inland - "... fresh water is often to be found on the surface a good way from the mouth of the river." There is, in similar cases, the freshes which refer to the large deposits of silt and other materials swept into the oceans and gulfs by the world's mightiest rivers. With the Nile, Congo, Ganges, Mississippi and others, the discolorations in the salt waters can be seen from outer space.

In relation to rivers, a sailor with blue water experience may refer to one who works rivers and lakes pejoratively as a "fresh water jack." This was essential an insult and meant that the individual was just this side of a lubber. Samuel Clemens, as an example, might be called a fresh water jack by the likes of Richard Henry Dana, Jr. or Joseph Conrad. Sorry, Mark Twain...

Fresh water seas are those that are so large, they essentially behave like the ocean. Probably the best example of these is the Great Lakes at the U.S. and Canada boarder. Superior, Michigan, Huron Erie and Ontario are all example of lakes that are just as vast - and potentially deadly - as any gulf we know.

A fresh breeze is a brisk and often sudden wind but can also refer to the way a ship is handled in known channels of wind, such as the trades or gulf stream. A fresh gale is just a more powerful form of a fresh breeze. When a ship begins to feel the push of a fresh breeze, she is said to freshen her way. Fresh way is also said of a man who picks up his stride or sets out at a run. Fresh way is slightly different, and refers to a ships increased speed through the water; she gathers fresh way, for instance, after completing a successful tack when her sails once again catch the wind.

One can freshen rigging by adjusting ropes or cable, thus relieving pressure points and potential failure on or of same. To freshen the hawse, for instance, means to relieve the part of the cable that has been repeatedly exposed to friction from the hawse hole. This is necessary in times when a ship sits at anchor for some days. The term freshen the nip follows this rule and essential refers to the same duty. It also has been used to essentially mean "the sun is over the yardarm" for those officers who are ready for a glass.

The ballast is freshened when it is raked and/or moved to better purpose. Fresh grub are new stores taken aboard. A fresh spell means new men to taking on a repetitious task such as turning the capstan. And finally, your mate might be fresh meaning not that he is a bit too friendly but that he is just this side of drunk. As the Admiral puts it delicately, "excited by drink."

So cheers mates and a Happy St. Pat's. Perhaps a Guinness rather than a grog is in order. Slainte!

Header: Merchant's Quay at Newry; photo from the National Library of Ireland via Naval Architecture

History: "The day was Christmas..."

The day was Christmas, but it brought us no holiday. The only change was that we had a "plum duff" for dinner, and the crew quarreled with the steward because he did not give us our usual allowance of molasses to eat with it. He thought the plums would be a substitute for the molasses, but we were not to be cheated out of our rights in this way. Such are the trifles with produce quarrels on shipboard. In fact, we had been too long from port. We were getting tired of one another, and were in an irritable state, both forward and aft. Our fresh provisions were, of course, gone, and the captain had stopped our rice, so that we had nothing but salt beef and salt pork throughout the week, with the exception of a very small duff on Sunday...

~ Richard Henry Dana Jr. writing from the brig Pilgrim in the Pacific Ocean just north of the equator on December 25, 1834

Blessings, happiness and much more than salt pork and plum duff to all the Brethren this holiday season from the good ship Triple P to your vessel.

And don't forget to enter to win Benerson Little's fabulous book The Sea Rover's Practice here. You shouldn't miss out; the drawing happens on Wednesday!

Header: Adrift at Sea; picture via Mike Burlson's New Wars

Tools of the Trade: Rope and Cable

The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor by Darcy Lever is along the same lines as The Seaman's Friend by Richard Henry Dana, Jr.  Published in 1819, Lever's seminal work on the running of a ship may have influenced Dana's book, which came out in 1879.

In Sheet Anchor, Lever tells us how to lay down rope and cable the old fashioned way.  This is his description of how ship's rope was made from time in memorial: by hand and with a lot of human effort:

Ropes are a combination of several Threads of Hemp, twisted together by means of a Wheel in the Rope-Walk.  These Threads are called Rope-Yarns and the Size of the Rope in Diameter, will be according to the Number of Yarns contained in it.

A Proportion of Yarns (covered with Tar) are first twisted together.  This is called a Strand: three, or more of which being twisted together, form the Rope; and according to the number of these Strands, it is said to be either Hawser-laid, Shroud-laid, or Cable-laid.

A Hawser-laid rope is composed of three single Strands, each containing an equal quantity of Yarns, and is laid right-handed, or was is termed with the Sun.

A Shroud-laid rope consists of four Strands of an equal Number of Yarns, and is also laid with the Sun.

A Cable-laid rope is divided into nine Strands of an equal Number of Yarns; these nine Strands being again laid into three, by twisting three of the small Stands into one.  I is laid left-handed or against the sun.

Header: Venetian Sailboats by Carl Schmidt via American Gallery

Sailor Mouth Saturday: Bend

On the majority of occasions, using the word bend at sea refers to rope, chain and cable in the “old fashioned” sense of those words. When bending rope one is usually attaching it via knot (which itself can be referred to as a “bend”) to another rope.


To bend may also mean tying a rope to an anchor. A Granny’s bend is a pejorative reference to a knot make by a lubber which is, as Admiral Smyth puts it, “a slippery hitch.” This will never do, of course, as a real bend is expected to hold through a gale. Time for an old tar to show the new guy how it’s done.

To bend a sail is to secure it to its appointed stay or yard. A river may have a bend, as in the lower Mississippi’s famous English Turn where British boats were thwarted in their attempt to reach New Orleans during the War of 1812. Men may be exhorted to bend to their oars aboard boats or galleys as well.

Bending ropes means, as noted, to tie them together rather than unraveling their ends and splicing them. Though bending is rarely as secure as splicing, knots have far more flexibility as they are readily tied and untied without the need for cutting and waste. A bowline knot is the most frequent way of bending rope but there are others; The Sailor’s Word Book lists Carrick-bend, hawser-bend, sheet-bend “and cetera” while Richard Henry Dana in The Seaman's Friend gives over a dozen names.

Bending the cable is the similar process of securing cable line to an anchor. As Admiral Smyth notes, this term did not die with the use of actual chains for anchor cable; the shackling of same to the anchor is still referred with such language.

When raising signal flags, a rope known as a distant line was used. This kept the flags separate to avoid confusion in the message, and the act of hoisting the distant line might be referred to as the bend on the tack. One would not want to mistake that England expects that every man shall do his duty.

Bender – though now more familiar in the way of imbibing – originally referred to the coiling of rope aboard ship or at dockside. One might “strike out for a bender” or “look out for a bender” when being told to coil rope or to find a coiled rope.

A bend roll is an old term for a rest used for muskets in the buccaneering days, these guns being extremely long and heavy. The bend proper is the large wedge on which a ship’s bowsprit sits.

The thickest, strongest planks on a ship’s sides were referred to as bends. This term was not used in common parlance among sailors, and is in fact more of a shipbuilder’s term. This part of the ship is more properly known as the wails or wales from which gunwale – gunnel.

And that is enough of bending and bends for one day. Happy Saturday, Brethren; come aboard tomorrow for Seafaring Sunday if you are so inclined.

Header: Going About to Please His Master by V.T. Turner c 1844 via Old Paint

Tools of the Trade: Point Her Rudder

One of my favorite reference books on the Great Age of Sail is Richard Henry Dana, Jr.’s The Seaman’s Friend: A Treatise on Practical Seamanship. Though most people are familiar with Dana’s seminal work Two Years Before the Mast which is really required reading for anyone studying sailing in the first half of the 19th century, The Seaman’s Friend is a far more instructive piece. Full of everything from use of sails to ship’s articles to ways of making and tying rope and cable, the book is invaluable to researchers and writers alike. It stands to reason that when researching the appropriate use of rudders, I reached for Dana.


The rudder of a ship is, it goes without saying to the Brethren, the piece that directs her. Sizeable ships, usually of brig size or larger, worked their rudders through the use of a series of cables connected to a wheel. The famous picture of a ship’s gleaming wooden and brass wheel is iconic, but the icon in and of itself is often mistaken. Smaller vessels such as sloops, schooners and pirogues – those favored by pirates, privateers and smugglers – controlled their rudder through the use of the more straight forward tiller.

Dana’s take on the workings of a ship’s rudder is so pure in its description and no-nonsense in its language that my paraphrasing it would be criminal. Besides which, I can wrap my head around how a rudder works and use one without going astray but the intricacies of steering a sailing ship can be difficult to put on paper. Unless you happen to be a genius at such things, as Dana surely was. Here then, from Chapter 10 “General Principles of Working a Ship” in The Seaman’s Friend, a few paragraphs on the all important rudder:

A ship is acted upon principally by the rudder and sails. When the rudder is fore-and-aft, that is, on a line with the keel, the water runs by it, and it has no effect upon the ship’s direction. When it is changed from a right line to one side or the other, the water strikes against it, and forces the stern in an opposite direction. For instance, if the helm is put to the starboard, the rudder is put off the line of the keel, to port. This sends the stern off to starboard and, of course, the ship turning on her centre of gravity, her head goes in an opposite direction, to port. If the helm is put to port, the reverse will follow, and the ship’s head will turn off her course to starboard. Therefore the helm is always put in the opposite direction from that in which the ship’s head is to be moved.

Moving the rudder from a right line has the effect of deadening a ship’s way more or less, according as it is put at a greater or less angle with the keel. A ship should therefore be so balanced by her sails that a slight change of her helm may answer the purpose.

If a vessel is going astern, and the rudder is turned off from the line of the keel, the water, striking against the back of the rudder, pushes the stern off in the same direction in which the rudder is turned. For instance, if sternway is on her, and the helm is put to the starboard, the rudder turns to port, the water forces the stern in the same direction, and the ship’s head goes off to starboard. Therefore, when sternway is on the vessel, put the helm in the same direction in which the head is to be turned.

A current or tide running astern, that is when the ship’s head is toward it, will have the same effect on the rudder as if the ship were going ahead; and when it runs forward, it will be the same as thought the ship were going astern.

Sternway is, of course, the opposite of headway; an action whereby the ship is moving backwards instead of forwards. Thus the need to change the way in which the rudder is handled.

If you’ve an interest in Dana’s comprehensive work, The Seaman’s Friend is available online at the California Digital Library and in plain old cover-to-cover book form from Dover Publications.

Header: Cover of the 1997 addition of Richard Henry Dana Jr.’s The Seaman’s Friend

Tools Of The Trade: In To Shore

The Seaman's Friend: A Treatise on Practical Seamanship by Richard Henry Dana, Jr. (above in 1842) was originally published in 1841. None other than D. H. Lawrence tells us that the author “…achieves greatness” with his seminal work on seafaring. Of course Dana’s name will be familiar to many. He authored the classic Two Years Before the Mast, published in 1840, which documented his time as a foremast Jack aboard a clipper travelling from Boston, around Cape Horn to California and back.

I love Dana’s work for its “… dispassionate statement of plain material facts”, to again quote Lawrence. There’s nothing left out but there is also no emotion added to the mix. This is sailing, matter-of-fact, perilous and rewarding. And it is worth returning to over and over again. So today, a sample: Dana’s advice on landing a ship’s boat through heavy surf. It is hard work but it can be safely done if proper procedures are followed.

As far as possible, avoid each sea [ed note: in this paragraph “sea” refers to breaking waves] by placing the boat where the sea will break ahead or astern of her.

If the sea be very heavy, or if the boat be very small, especially if she has a square stern, bring her bow round to seaward and back her in, rowing ahead against each heavy surf that cannot be avoided sufficiently to allow it to pass the boat.

If it be considered safe to proceed to the shore bow foremost, back the oars against each sea [again, a wave in this case] on its approach so as to stop the boat’s way through the water as far as possible and, if there is a drogue [buoy on a line], or anything in the boat that may be used as one, tow it astern to aid in keeping the boat end-on to the sea, which is the chief object in view.
Bring the principal weights in the boat toward the end that is to seaward, but not to the extreme end.

If a boat worked by sails or oars be running under sail for the land through a heavy sea, her crew should under all circumstances, unless the beach is steep, take down the masts and sails before entering the broken water, and take her to land under oars alone, as above described. If she have sails only, her sails should be much reduced, a half-lowered fore-sail or other small head-sail being sufficient.

If sent for treasure, always have a net or canvas bag to contain the treasure, and a buoy rope to attach to it to recover it in case of accident. [Note here that treasure may mean nothing more than fresh water, but then again…]