30 September
The National Archives has opened up and made accessible over 1,000 Royal Navy Medical Officers' Journals (ADM 101 series), as part of an extensive cataloguing project supported by the Wellcome Trust.
ADM 101 consists of journals and diaries compiled by Royal Navy Surgeons and Assistant Surgeons who served on HM ships, hospitals, naval brigades, shore parties and on emigrant and convict ships in the period 1793 to 1880. See a selection of the files and listen to our podcast at nationalarchives.gov.uk/surgeonsatsea.
The journals include a variety of colourful tales of 18th and 19th century ship life from drunken rum-related incidents (ADM 101/86/1 / ADM 101/125/3), venereal disease (ADM 101/103/2), scurvy, shark bites, tarantulas to lightning strikes (ADM 101/85/4), gun fights, mutiny, arrests and court martial (ADM 101/38/2), not to mention ship wrecks (ADM 101/77/9) and even murder.
'Significant collection'
Bruno Pappalardo, Naval Records Specialist at The National Archives, said: 'Medical officers serving in the Royal Navy were required to submit detailed records of the health and treatment of those under their care in the form of journals which are probably the most significant collection of records for the study of health and medicine at sea for the 19th century.'
As a result of this extensive cataloguing work, the records can be easily searched by the name of the Medical Officer, the patient, the ship or even by disease or ailment. The cataloguing also revealed some unexpected 'bonus' material contained in the journals. Uncovered were watercolour illustrations, sketches, hand-drawn maps, charts showing details of the climate, details about the layout of the vessels, ideas about ventilation, and details of the countries visited and people encountered.
