Louis XIV Living conditions of seafarers and French settlers - Our ancestors wre on ships to New France - Health and Punition Part 7

Living conditions of seafarers and French settlers

Our ancestors were on ships to New France

Part 7

Health

The link between food and health is very strong, like today. The imbalance of the diet of sailors, including daily intake of vitamins due to the lack of fresh produce, is the source of short-term deficiency causing diseases such as scurvy,growth retardation in younger or rickets and skin diseases and decreased visual acuity.

epidemics like dysentery and typhus, caused by eating spoiled food or spoiled or poor hygiene, take on catastrophic proportions water because of the promiscuity of sailors and the inability to isolate sick except with a simple square of fabric.

Hozier Shipping Royal Navy in the Caribbean, conducted in 1726 against Spain, s' resulted in the deaths of 4,000 men on the 4750 who took the start.

Personal hygiene is not the primary concern of the captain of a ship. The soap is still a luxury, and the commotion of cleanliness is not routine, especially not in the case of bad weather, and frequently wash with seawater causes anyway, ulcerations the skin.

Alcoholism and venereal ailments are among the most common diseases of the sailors.

mortality in crisis, losses ranged between a fifth and more than half the record, if you can call it a record is 61 6% on a ship of the Royal Palm in the eighteenth century. In normal mortality, the rate of loss varies between 8 and 15% depending on the destination and duration of the mission, similar to that of Shipping rates. This does not include deaths in captivity or those who died in hospitals ashore from 3% to 5%.

 

The fight

 

The Bold leads to breakage, Turner, perfectly illustrates the end of the sailing ships in favor of the steam symbol of the First Industrial Revolution

"Do you know what a naval battle?

ShipThe Bold

Onmaneuver we are shooting cannon, then each of the two naval forces withdrew, and the sea is not less saltyvessel.

vessel The campaign is not necessarily a seagoing  longer the ship is imposing and difficult to maneuver , unless it is used effectively.

 

In the Royal Navy a 3 bridges remain 5.4 time at anchor during the campaign, while at the same time, the sloop or corvette or frigate, pass three quarters of the campaign to sail the seas .

During the fight, a 74 guns, most of the sailors are obliged to parts department, there is only one hundred men to maneuver the ship on

deck.'sbattle line remains combat training by excellence

The substantial difference between the losses suffered by the British and French navies of war during successive confrontations that will struggle be explained by two different tactical approaches.

 

The French are coming to démâter to immobilize the opponent while the British fired solid wood in the hull, to neutralize the enemy by destroying its batteries and therefore causing the most possible his crew losses.

 

The Prince de Joinville wrote in his Old Memories

 

"Our crews were of valor, which has often been the point of heroism, but they knew nothing; they received death without giving; balls were all English; All French balls were going in the air. "

 

By cons when fishing vessels are mentioned in the sources, the history of those so-called "official" Charles M. Vianney Campeau has identified this information because sometimes some of these have also brought passengers. However it would take a special site for such vessels. We know that some years in the 17th century for example, only France, he came over 600, not to mention the British Isles, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands and also everything without forgetting Basque countless boats; So far more than the few commercial vessels. Before the advent of the Internet and the digitization of documents in the archives, there were very few passenger lists of ships to New France.

Ile-aux-Grues

On 1 September 1729, a warshipFrench,Elephant,wrecked near the island-to-Crane. This ship brought to Quebec important figures as Bishop Pierre-Herman Dosquet, fourth bishop of Quebec, the Intendant Hocquart and Lieutenant Louis-Philippe de Rigaud deVaudreuil,eldest son of the former governor of New France . The crew and passengers were saved by a miracle.

November 14, 1736, the French ship Fame, out of Quebec to La Rochelle Nov. 3, 1736, ran aground at the southern tip of Anticosti Island. Of the 60 sailors and passengers, a few managed to reach Anticosti where they spend the winter without provisions, without fire and without warm clothes island. Many of them died on the island and the few survivors of fame revert to Quebec 13 June 1737

Anticosti Island is the largest island of Quebec with a huge area of 7923 squarekilometers.

L 'Anticosti Island is the gateway to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, off the Gaspé Peninsula, extending over a length of 220 km and a width of 56 km. The topography of the island is low relief rather flat.

History of Anticosti Island is dotted with many legends related to shipwrecks and travel adventurers.

Henri Menier It is 1895 which the only village bears his name Port-Menier, a French businessman, acquired it in order to make a place for hunting and fishing. To this end, Menier introduced some 220 ​​deer successfully, but the bison and elk Cervus elaphus-did not proliferate.

Today, five outfitting exclusive hunting and fishing occupy most of the territory of the island. The salmon fishing is widespread.

D'Anticosti National Park was established in 2001 and two ecological reserves, reserve Heath Point and Reserve Grand-Lac-Salé located there.

Several attractions can be visited on the island: the Chute Vauréal which 76 meters high and flows into a canyon with a length of more than three kilometers; Cap de la Vache Qui-Pee or Cap de la Vache Pisseuse a cliff fifty feet in the western part of the island, in the shape of a cow's head in profile crowned few tufts black spruce. Water seeping through the limestone mass resurfaces in nets, hence its evocative.name

Descriptionof the execution of the gauntlet

had been attached to a rope that end of the forecastle to the quarterdeck, the soldier is stripped of his coat, and bound him by the across the body with a rope that was spent in an iron ring that ran along the rope taut; the whole crew was on both sides of the rope with blackjacks hand: they are small, flat braided rope, which is used to furl the sails; he had to run seven times from front to rear of the ship, and during its course all those who were armed with blackjacks he relied on the body. We said grace after three races, we gave our captain.
Went one thirty or so and they drank during that time each bottle of wine. These sailors are waiting for high tide to return to their buildingbreak.
on the Grand Bank Fishing

During the transatlantic crossing, some events  Monotony of the journey. The most important and probably the most interesting for sailors, is the ceremony of baptism which must pass all the buildings and all the people who pass on the Grand Banks for the first time. The ceremony also takes place: in five other locations, either by crossing the Straits of Gibraltar and the Dardanelles, the Arctic Circle, the equator and the tropics. Sailors and passengers suffer the baptism of the equator are free from all the others. All persons who are in their first trip to appear before a crew member disguised how shaggy pks possible.

They sit on a bar over a ball filled with water, and then pour an offering of silver. If they refuse to make this small contribution, the sailors drop them in a barrel. Instead of a forced bath, temperatures on the Grand Banks is rather inclement, sailors smear recalcitrant black. The money raised allows the crew to buy some water spirits to drink. Apart from the crew who is benefiting, passengers do not seem to enjoy the experience. The missionaries, among others, see it as a parody of the sacrament of baptism and finds all pretty

rude.'sArrival on the Grand Bank allows all sailors as passengers, catch some cod and other fish. Consumption of this fresh fish After a few weeks of very salty foods, is particularlyappreciated.And as other distractions of the crossing, the crew unloads a few muskets against an ice floe while the captain fired a cannon or two on Bird Island entering the Gulf.

"We cast a cannon , which put the alarm throughout this volatile republic he e y forma above both Isles a thick cloud of these birds. The boat had two or three leagues in Charlevoix I write in the trip. Those aboard sailboats August 25 there celebrating St. Louis in honor of the King. At sea, the celebration means a few guns and a hearty at the captain's table meal. In ports, the ceremony is more elaborate; jubilant crew building.

 

Travel with the filibuster Father Labat

   

Wednesday 7, I gave a dinner at the Captain Daniel, his foreman, his writer and his surgeon, and we embarked on the four o'clock spot to have

lunch the next day to Guadeloupe. The boat he was riding was Bermudian, very good sailer; he was ninety good men and six cannons. It was more than enough to attack a Spanish galleon and an English forty guns. We hove to the Preacher, where, according to our good custom filibusters, they always have a matter, especially those who still have some money, because the laws of the filibuster can not be good to wear at sea, and when it is in the case, you need to spend it faster in a cabaret. Captain Daniel gathered his people about nine o'clock and did serve its sails.

 

We were very well until mid-channel between Dominica and Martinique, but suddenly the wind dropped and we had a quiet any dish. Our pilot was not mistaken in his judgment brought this unexpected calm; he said we were going to have a squall; he take the reef in the mainsail, place new maneuvers foremast and foresail; he visited the moorings cannons and reinforced the ropes that held the boat. No sooner had he finished than we were taken with a swirl of wind from the east-southeast, so angry and so uncivil that began sinking our mainsail. Even were we glad that we did not dismasted; we rescued the shreds of our sailing and we bougeâmes first to masts and ropes and then with a piece of trinquet, great as a towel. Although I was without a doubt one of the best sleepers of the sea, the case was so sudden that I could not close my eyes; besides, my mattress was soon soaking wet, as the blades covered us at any time from back to front. I sat flat on the back of fellow, wrapped in a cover and bound by the waist with a good rope, somewhat like a monkey, lest any blade or a roll did not take the liberty of shed off the edge.

 

People in deep silence obeyed at will at the slightest command and working with all their might. The sea seemed all on fire; time, which was black, was something awful; I could not see my hands by approaching my eyes lit up when he does point but the lightning was so vivid that I then saw all the movements of our people. Captain Daniel gave me a water bottle of spirits, which I swallowed adroitly a good shot, because it should not be awkward to put a bottle in his mouth without breaking teeth. This liquor, which I never liked, then seemed excellent; it warmed me as I was half frozen, the water of the sea with this property in hot countries to be extremely cold, and I had nothing dry on the body. About four o'clock in the morning the rain fell and fell violently much wind, and at day one of our men shouted land downwind us.

 

Stay tuned to see part 8