The British Royal Navy Floated on an Ocean of Rum
From as far back as the reign of Henry VIII, English sailors enjoyed a daily ration of alcohol. It was not just for keeping the crews happy and lubricated, but also a matter of health: on long voyages, water in wooden casks would eventually go bad, and spoil sooner or later. Adding alcohol to the water would extend its shelf life, pushing its expiration date more towards the later rather than sooner end of the spectrum.
After the British captured Jamaica in 1655, the Royal Navy began replacing its sailors’ daily ration of French brandy with Jamaican-produced rum. The transition was helped by lobbying from British West Indian planters, whose sugar plantations produced rum’s main ingredient, molasses. Eventually, the daily rum ration of half a pint became an integral part of British sailors’ lives.
The ration was initially issued neat, but starting in the 1740s, it became compulsory to mix the half pint of rum with a quart of water, in a 1:4 ratio. That concoction came to be known as “grog”, after an admiral nicknamed “Old Grog” because of a grogram coat he wore at sea. In 1756, regulations directed the addition of lemon or lime juice to help ward off scurvy.
At the height of the age of sail during the Napoleonic era, British ships were powered by wind, but British sailors were powered by rum. Twice daily, at noon and again at sunset, British sailors would muster on deck in a “rum line” to collect their daily rum ration. On special occasions, by way of reward or to celebrate victories, captains might issue their crews a double ration – a full pint of rum.
To ensure that their rum had not been watered down, British tars would pour some of it on gunpowder, and try to ignite it. If it ignited, it was “proof” that the rum’s alcohol content was at least 57 percent. If it failed to light up, then the rum was “under proof”. Thus the origin of the term “alcohol proof“, although the gunpowder test for alcoholic content was replaced by a gravity test in the 19th century.
A side effect of the daily rum ration was that, at any given time, much of the Royal Navy was operating at various levels of inebriation. Rum and the Royal Navy became closely associated in public perception. When First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill was once challenged for offending some Royal Navy traditions, he derided those traditions as “rum, buggery, and the lash“.
The daily rum ration was scaled back to a quarter pint in the 1850s, but continued to be issued for the remainder of the nineteenth century, throughout both world wars, and for much of the twentieth century. The increasing sophistication of military technology, however, made the daily rum ration increasingly anachronistic, not to mention hazardous. Drunk sailors on modern naval vessels were too great a danger to their ships and crewmates. So on July 31st, 1970, the Admiralty finally abolished the daily rum ration once and for all. The date, known forever after known as “Black Friday” in the Royal Navy, was one of mourning. Solemn ceremonies took place on all serving ships, featuring black armbands, muffled drums, mournful pipers, and flag-draped coffins, as British sailors bid farewell to a 300-year-old tradition.
