Berthing
Berthing requires the earliest attention by the first lieutenant, and the operation may be facilitated by having a plan of the decks, showing the hammock hooks of every available berth. The watches should be distributed equally on each side of the ship, so that when one watch is piped up the other will not be left entirely on one side. Boatswains’ mates and men liable to a call at any time of the night, should be placed near the hatchways; quartermasters, marines, and others who keep watch and sleep in the morning, placed where they will not be disturbed after all hands are called.
Sleeping Sailors, by Stephen Biesty (x)
On board a frigate the berthing is generally as follows, at least the Admiralty's instructions - on site, however, it can look different, but that is decided by the First Lieutenant : Berth deck: servants and stewards, starboard side forward; balance of the starboard side, idlers (except carpenter’s mates, master at arms and quartermasters); port side, marines. Gun deck: forward, forecastlemen; starboard side, main topmen and after-guards; port side, fore and mizzen topmen; or the numbers of the above parts of the ship may be run continuously athwartships, beginning forward, after having first selected billets for the men required in particular places.
Carpenters’ mates and carpenters should be berthed near the pump, sail-makers’ mates and captains of holds as near the hold or sail-room as possible, cook near the galley, etc. At least one boat’s crew should be so berthed in port, as to be readily called at a moment’s notice.
Hammock plan of the lower deck of HMS Bedford (1775), a 70 gun Third Rate, two decker. (Blue are the sailors, red the marines ) (x)
The boys of the ship must be berthed together, and separate from the rest of the crew; usually aft on the gun-deck in charge of the gunner or the master at arms. On a tack over the forward hammock hook of each billet is hung the number corresponding to the hammock, neatly painted on a small tin plate. The hammock numbers correspond with the watch numbers. These numbers are stencilled on a piece of canvas, in black or blue for starboard watch, red for port watch, and sewed on the outside of the hammock.
The rules for the hammock were as follows: A hammock can contain a mattress and mattress cover, and a pair of blankets. The Bedding should be aired once a week. To air bedding the hammocks are unlashed, slung by the lashing and triced up in the lower rigging. They had to be scrubbed at least once a month; clean hammocks having been issued the evening before, so that they may be “slung” and the old ones prepared for scrubbing in the morning.
A Plan of the Upper Deck of a Seventy-four Gun Ship,..., delineating an Arrangement of the Hammocks for the Crew, from David Steel’s The Elements and Practice of Rigging and Seamanship, 1794 (x)
A complete set of clean hammocks should always be on hand. After scrubbing, they are turned in by guns’ crews, each one carefully inspected by the officers of the divisions, to ascertain if all have been properly scrubbed, then rolled up, placed in a bag or case having the gun’s number painted on it, and taken to the sail-room, where the sail-maker receives it. A torn or badly stained hammock should be left out and given to the sail-maker’s mate, to be exchanged.
Hammocks are lashed up by taking seven marling turns with a manilla or white rope (untarred hemp) lashing. Every hammock should have three good nettle stops on the head, for stopping on the girtlines, and two on the foot. Some officers prefer having the stops put on the girtlines, but this is objectionable, as the line stretches. Hammocks stow in their own parts of the ship; a gauge to level them at the right height above the rail, and a hoop through which they are required to pass, being sometimes used.
