Captain Jim
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Everything posted by Captain Jim
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Ohh...
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From the description I would call the drawing boxes something like a till in a sea chest, a box on rails that can be slid from side to side or removed in order to access something below or load something that is taller than the bottom of the sliding box. Sort of a half-sized tray. If, however, you have loaded something tall that gets in the way of sliding the box to an open area (out from under other drawing boxes) then you would have to remove these from the chest first. Hanging drawers I would call lift-out trays. Basically the writer is admonishing against setting bottles and whatnot unattended and unsupported on tables or deck and suggests full trays as opposed to sliding half-trays.
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Precisely. And Mission...what can I say. You have now become the reference librarian, the spooky one that can sense when the card file is out of sequence.
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Fancy pirate or fop garb for sale
Captain Jim replied to On Stranger Tides's topic in Thieves Market
Lord Percival Putts! How dare you, man! Why I aught to....wait...hey, that's not bad... Wondering if I shouldn't get a "fancy dress" outfit. I think my inner ruffian will still shine through. -
Even the English, arguably some of the best gunmakers ever, proofed each gun barrel separately in government-run proof houses. While this new information may allow us to buy India-made guns with a little more confidence each barrel should be proofed before firing live rounds. And you don't need a firing range, either. If you don't have a berm, dig a hole. Proof the gun in the hole. Just make sure it's legal to do in your neighborhood. And get away. If you can see the gun it can bite you. And anything less than a concrete wall between you and the gun is not enough. I had a 200-year-old oak between me and my gun when I proofed it, touched off with a bit of cannon fuse. But then I live out in the country where big explosions don't bother anyone. Once proofed, fire reasonable loads of proper F-number. If you didn't understand that last sentence then find someone who does to teach you.
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Fancy pirate or fop garb for sale
Captain Jim replied to On Stranger Tides's topic in Thieves Market
And the size would be....? -
Is that the Kraken in that stew? Great pictures, but a little late for our time. Now with the built-in oven there would have been no use for a reflector. Still, nice. Edit: I believe the big doors you see on the front are for stoking the fire. The oven is the little iron door in the flue next to the blue fish in the second picture.
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Well, one must have beer with one's bread now, mustn't one?
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Actually we have two topics here: Land practice and practice at sea. At sea I would imagine they would keep it in their sea chest if they had one. Or would they distrust their fellows so much that they carried it on their person at all times?
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There is nothing in the world quite like the smell of freshly made bread.
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I really don't expect to discover that bread was a common item. From what I have read the general meal while underway was some kind of stew and ship's biscuit, over and over again. And again. Ad infinitum, ad nauseum. As for the first raters and large 2nd raters, as Mission says, they had more comforts. In the plan I posted in post #8, the galley and the masonry for the fire has two distinct sides, one marked #32 "Captains Cook Room", just above the little guy cooking. It seems to have a separate firebox, a raised hearth, probably a brick floor. This is where I would expect to find the more normal "home style" cooking equipment, including reflector ovens, if they were ever aboard ship. Just to make it perfectly clear what I am trying to accomplish, I am trying to add a tin kitchen/reflector oven to my careening camp. I need some documentation that one was aboard a ship, any ship, and in any capacity, including as cargo (That oven? I plundered that offen a whaler/merchantman. Never use it except ashore...) If we can establish bread baking aboard ships at that time, so much the better for our understanding of the times. All that having been said, I can imagine the smell of baking bread, bread that you are not allowed to have, would be enough of an incentive to mutiny, all by itself. (Incidentally, I just pulled two loaves, one cinnamon, out of the oven not 20 minutes ago.)
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That Facebook link isn't working for me. Either I'm doing something wrong or computers really hate you.
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Thanks for the pictures, Jen. So this kind of brings up bread again. Was bread never cooked on board? Or was it simply uncommon or not for the common sailor, just the Captain and officers? What I really need is someone with access to manifests and wills to do a search. If these, or similar ovens were recorded as having been aboard I would think that would definitively answer the question.
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Here are the pictures Jen was trying to post. The first two are of two reflectors (and a Dutch Oven) in use in front of a fireplace. Note the hearth being at floor level, which is quite common with cooking hearths. Since this kind of oven has to be used at the level of the fire, this is the usual setup. Some hearths, however, are built at waist or even chest level. So long as the hearth is wide enough, these can still be used. James Townsend & Sons has a purpose built demonstrations kitchen with just such a raised hearth. Eliminates all that bending over. The galley in the illustration I posted seems to have a raised hearth on one side and a large pot and open hearth on the other. Also note the small kettle in the second picture. Tea, anyone? The third is of the results.
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Well I may just add these to my bag of tricks when my web site goes live. While I have seen some offered for sale, the quality is not what I would want. So, perhaps, there is a market. I especially like the one with the flat front and key lock, but offering more than one grade might be a good idea.
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Yes, but just think of all of the attention you'll get from the police by carrying a box that looks like it houses a giant doughnut!
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No brick bread ovens?
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Is this the other topic you were looking for? Galleys in the Golden Age I would think that would be to protect the ship as much as possible. Once a flame jumps out of those little tin deals, you might quickly find yourself in serious trouble while sitting in the middle of the wooden world. This is why even the pirates had rules about lighted candles, pipes and so forth below decks. As an OT aside, look at that nifty little box of bottles on the Mayflower. The Mayflower The Tin Kitchen was placed in front of a fire, not the fire placed in it. And, yes, one of the first things I saw in this picture was the case of case bottles. The hearth in William's post would be perfect for use with a tin kitchen. I also noticed that most of these galleys seem to be set up for stews and the like, which makes sense for a large crew.
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I could make you one that stored the hat upside down and fill the free space under the brim with storage compartments. Stol be monstrous though.
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Welcome aboard, mate! You have found the most welcoming lot o' bandits ever to sail.
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Now here I have found this diagram of a warship that shows a brick-and-mortar open hearth fireplace and oven, #31 in the list, just abaft the foremast, second deck below weather.
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Here is what I'm thinking, in terms of this tin kitchen. As far as I know, the iron oven/stove wasn't invented until 1735 or later (more likely after 1800.) Most cooking at this (1720) time was done on open hearths or brick and mortar bread-type ovens. So how did sailors cook before the advent of the iron stove? Would they have used what was common on shore and just moved it aboard ship? Were open hearth/oven combinations, like on shore, used on ship?
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Oh, but on the same page as you posted, right below the vasculum, is a tin kitchen. But, like most, he wants $450 for it. Not going to happen. The one I posted is $130.
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Not the same thing, mate, although as a biologist I may have to get one of those now, too. Damn you. This is what we're looking at:
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For a long time now I have been looking for the earliest reference to a "tin kitchen", a kind of half-round reflector oven. To date I have only been able to find references to around the time of the Revolution. That is until tonight. On the 18th Century Material Culture's Facebook page I found two paintings dating to the late 1600's with clear depictions of the "tin kitchen." "The Cook, 1657-1667" and an untitled work dated sometime prior to 1678. So now I will buy a tin kitchen and use it secure in the knowledge that it is at least period. Now, can anyone find a reference to one of these, or something similar, being aboard a ship?