18^th and 19^th Century Ship Food

By:  Victoria Rumble  ©

The majority of emigrants during the 18^th and 19^th centuries reserved ship passage in steerage, and unlike their fellow travelers in first class, who traveled for pleasure, steerage passengers were generally those whose circumstances were so reduced they were willing to chance death and deprivation for the opportunity of starting fresh in a new land.

To gain an idea of the number of passengers and their rank on these ships we can look at records of the ship Deutschland that sailed into New York in November 1858 which indicate there were 10 passengers in first class, 78 in second class, and 288 in steerage. 

Steerage quarters were located beneath the passenger decks and above the cargo hold, thus steerage was often called “between decks” or “’tween-deck”.  They were dark, cramped, and access was often only via ladders. 

To make money cargo ships often put in tiers of hastily built bunks to hold steerage passengers when making a return voyage empty of cargo.  Upon arrival in port the bunks could be quickly dismantled and the deck made ready for reloading cargo for the next voyage.

These ships were known as coffin ships due to the high number of deaths from disease during the voyages.  Cholera, typhoid, smallpox, and measles plagued these ships partly because so many of the steerage passengers were the poor who had reached the end of their physical endurance before sailing.  Contagions spread rapidly in the close confined space of steerage. 

The dead were buried at sea as hastily as possible, and by the 1850’s survivors often found themselves subjected to health inspections and quarantine when docking.

What sort of people would subject themselves and their children to such dangers?  Prior to 1880 “almost all” of them were Celtic or Teutonic (German/Scandinavian), but after 1880 the demographic shifted to more “Slavic, Semitic, Roman, or Illyric stock” 

Those purchasing steerage passage included men headed for the gold fields, gamblers who lost their fortunes, soldiers, women left insolvent after the death of parents or husband, men traveling unobserved in order to inspect the conditions of the ships, ministers who chose to share the conditions of those they sought to counsel, and sometimes crew members shared steerage compartments.

Newspapers were filled with ads for ships taking on passengers, some describing the steerage compartments though the actual conditions often failed to live up to the descriptions.  Ads often told the height between decks because in some of the poorer ships this ceiling height was too short to allow a man to stand erect. 

The above are splendid first-class American Packet Ships, coppered and copper fastened, sail fast, seven to eight feet between decks, and fitted up in a superior manner for the comfort and accommodation of Cabin, Second Cabin, and Steerage Passengers.  – Derry Journal, April 1841, ship  Leo.

Ads often assured passengers adequate wood and water would be available during the voyage because tales were widely circulated of the suffering of passengers on ships where these essentials either ran out or were severely rationed.

his vessel is high and roomy between decks, will be comfortably fitted up for Passengers and have an abundant supply of Water and Fuel put on board for the voyage.  – Derry Journal, April 1841, ship Unicorn.

Water was never in quantity sufficient enough for washing and most steerage passengers later stated they slept in their clothing and wore it day and night the duration of the voyage.  “The ability to take a bath is extremely limited on any voyage when both sexes are present on the steerage deck” and steerage passengers were, “limited to the steerage deck and the greenhouse deck above it”.   

Some ships provided coarse poor quality food for steerage passengers, but most included the price of wood and water in the tickets and the passengers were required to prepare their own meals from provisions and utensils brought with them. 

The cooking area consisted of a long and narrow wooden bin filled with sand upon which small fires were built, several at a time, and coffee pots and kettles were set atop for preparation of soup and porridge.  These facilities were inadequate for the number of passengers crammed into these compartments and the timid soon found themselves going hungry or learning to elbow their way in for a turn at putting their kettle to boil.

Cooking facilities for crew and first class passengers were similar though the sand-filled cooking surface was smaller.  There was a very real danger of ships catching fire from sparks and upset fires in rough seas on-board wooden ships even with these sand-lined bins.

In the mornings the women left the cabin with a small bundle of split firewood and a kettle to prepare food.  The room quickly filled and women waited hours for their turn at the fires periodically forced to go out onto the deck gasping for air when their lungs filled with thick smoke from the cook room.  In their absence many lost their place in line or returned to find their kettle moved and someone else’s on their fire.  Angry words were often exchanged.

When it was too stormy for the women on deck the men tried, sometimes in vain, to keep fires lit long enough to make soup or porridge and coffee.  As waves rolled over the upper decks the water cascaded through the cook area and often put out the fires or upset the kettles spilling the contents into the sand or on the floor.  Ventilation was poor, and the cook area often filled with smoke which choked the lungs and burned the eyes.   

Steerage passengers were often assaulted by water crashing down from the upper deck during high seas. 

The rain fell in a perfect avalanche; with all the scuppers open, the water became, in a few minutes, almost knee deep on the spar-deck.  The rolling of the ship threw it over the combings of the hatches, and down it came upon the gun-deck, and then took another leap below, flooding the ward-room, steerage, and berth-deck.  With the hatches covered, and the external  Air excluded, the heat below soon became intolerable.  Our choice lay between being roasted or drenched.  Most of us preferred the latter, and emerged into the drifting sea above.  – Colton.

Provisions taken on board for these journeys usually consisted of hardtack or flat bread, butter, cheese, salted beef or pork, kegs of pickled herring, potatoes, rye or barley flour, dried peas and beans, rice, barley, oats, coffee, sugar or syrup, salt, pepper, vinegar, onions, and ale, rum, or brandy.

Provisions supplied by the Dutch East India Company

Preserved potatoes were not dried potatoes, which certainly would have tasted and kept better, but potatoes that had been exposed to hot water to retard their budding.  They were so despised that some records note they were thrown overboard.

“Enquire Within Upon Everything” (1894).

Preserving Potatoes
The preservation of potatoes by dipping them in boiling water is a valuable and useful discovery. Large quantities may be cured at once, by putting them into a basket as large as the vessel containing the boiling water will admit, and then just dipping them a minute or two, at the utmost. The germ, which is so near the skin, is thus destroyed without injury to the potato. In this way several tons might be cured in a few hours. They should be then dried in a warm oven, and laid up in sacks, secure from the frost, in a dry place.

Utensils consisted of a water pail, coffee pot, cooking pot, and eating utensils. 

From the single cook pot and provisions dried or pickled provisions the steerage passenger was able to fashion a pea or bean soup, or chowder using the herring, onions, potatoes, and hardtack.  

[See recipe below].

Prior to the 1880’s space was so restricted passengers spent most of the voyage confined to bunks built two deep with no room to store belongings except in the bunk.  “When the man got in, the baggage got out”…, which meant during the night passages were filled with trunks and possessions which rolled around during the night so that passengers had to sort through and reclaim their own belongings the next morning.

Everything in the ward-room and steerage which had not been secured, rushed about in crashing confusion.  The candle-sticks leaped from the sideboard, a tray of knives and forks followed, while a water tank flew from one bulkhead to another, as if determined to dash in its own staves. 

The family whose provisions did not last the duration of the voyage either lived off charity of fellow passengers or did without.  Fish could be caught from the top deck, and in some cases captains steered the ships into areas where they expected to take on large quantities when needed, but given steerage passengers weren’t allowed on deck with cabin passengers the likelihood of fishing for food wasn’t guaranteed.

That fish was probably made into chowder or fish stew using whatever provisions remained or could be purchased, and in the absence of any other ingredients it was probably boiled in water, or possibly roasted. 

Other captains had no compassion for starving passengers.  “In some instances, passengers after having been sick for days without nourishment, were obliged to buy flour of the Captain at exorbitant prices, and cook with their own hands something to sustain life.”

The captain being referenced had a formal complaint lodged against him by the passengers on his ship dated 28 Nov., 1849.

On 30 Nov., 1847 Stephen De Vere wrote for T. F. Elliot, Chairman of the Colonization Commission, a summary of the plight of steerage passengers based on his own experience when he sailed with his family from Ireland to Canada.  He was so horrified by the experience that De Vere spent a great deal of his personal fortune assisting other Irish in making the journey.

Before the Emigrant has been a week; at Sea he is an altered Man.  How can it be otherwise?  Hundreds of poor people, Men, Women, and Children, of all Ages, from the Driveling Idiot of Ninety to the Babe just born, huddled    together without Light, without Air, wallowing in filth and breathing a fetid    Atmosphere, sick in Body, dispirited in Heart, the fevered Patients lying between the Sound, in sleeping Places so narrow as almost to deny them the Power of indulging, by a Change of Position, the natural Restlessness of the Disease; by their agonized Ravings disturbing those around, and predisposing them through the effects of the imagination, to imbibe the contagion; living without food or medicine, except as administered by the hand of casual charity, dying without the voice of spiritual consolation, and buried in the deep without the rites of the church.  The food is generally ill-selected and seldom sufficiently cooked, in consequence of the insufficiency and bad construction of the cooking places.  The Supply of Water, hardly enough for cooking and drinking does not allow for washing.  In many ships the filthy beds, teeming with abominations, are never required to be brought on deck and aired; the narrow space between the sleeping berths and the piles of boxes is never washed or scraped, but breathes up a damp and fetid Stench, until the Day before the arrival at quarantine, when all hands are required to“scrub-up”, and put on a fair face for the Doctor and Government Inspector. No moral restraint is attempted, the voice of prayer is never heard; drunkenness with its consequent train of ruffianly debasement, is not discouraged because it is profitable to the Captain who traffics in the grog…

The meat was of the worst Quality.  The Supply of Water shipped on board was abundant, but the Quantity served out to the passengers was so scanty that they were frequently obliged to throw overboard their salt provisions and rice (a most important article of their food), because they had not Water enough, both for the necessary cooking and the satisfying of their raging Thirst afterwards…

First class passengers usually dined at least moderately well, and the quality of food on some ships rivaled that of the best restaurants.  Bills of Fare for ships during the 1840’s and 1850’s list a surprisingly wide array of dishes and beverages.

The Bill of Fare for the steamship Golden Age for July 1860 included pearl barley soup, salt cod with egg sauce, mutton with capers, corned beef or pork, beef a’ la mode, ox-heart a’ la jardinière, pigs head millinea, baked mutton pies, mutton haricot, curry and rice, roasted beef, pork, and mutton, string beans, potatoes, green [fresh] corn, rice, custard pudding, green fruit pies, almonds, fruit, cheese and crackers, and coffee. 

Privateers sometimes stopped other ships and took what they needed in the way of supplies.  During the War of 1812 one captain recorded in his ship’s log that at various times he had taken on provisions from the English in this way including bread, biscuit, salt beef, salt pork, butter, hams, cheese, potatoes, porter, water, whiskey, wine, tea, sugar, rum, brandy, flour, etc. 

Hard tack and salt meat were the primary rations for crew and from these they fashioned soups and stews of sorts including chowder; lobscouse – pounded biscuit with chopped salt beef and potatoes boiled together and seasoned with salt and pepper; salmagundi - made of slices of cured fish boiled with onions; and gash – a ragout made from whatever was left over.

Unless salted or jerked (dried), meat went on-board the ships on-the-hoof to be slaughtered as it was needed before refrigeration.  Fresh vegetables were consumed before they had time to spoil after which dried foods remained for the duration of the voyage. 

CHOWDER, 1859.

Fry three slices of salt pork, crisp, in a deep kettle; take them out and lay in slices of potatoes, flour and pepper them; then lay in slices of cod or haddock, which must also be floured and peppered.  Put in alternate layers of potatoes and fish, with flour, salt, and pepper until it is all laid in.  Pour over it boiling water enough almost to cover it.  When it boils up dredge in more flour.  Dip a few crackers in water and lay over the top, and cover the kettle close.  Boil it three quarters of an hour.  Use ship-bread [hardtack] if it is preferred.  Some people add a cup of milk just before it is served.  Add part of a fresh lemon, if you like. 

© Copyright 2007.  Article may not be reprinted or redistributed without permission of the author. 

Bibliography:

De Vere, Stephen E.  Letter.  Nov. 30, 1847.

Immigration Commission Abstract of Report on Steerage Legislation. 

Peters, Robert.  The American Immigration Collection.  1912.  NY.

The Weekly Reporter, 1896-97.  1897.  London.

Woolman, John.  The Journal of John Woolman.  1909.  NY.

Edwards, R. D.  The Great Famine; Studies in Irish History 1845-1852.  1956. 

Derry Journal.  April 12, 1841.

Olmstead, Frederick Law.  A Journey Through Texas.  1863.  Boston.

Thomes, William Henry.  The Gold-Hunter’s Adventures, or Life in Australia.  1864.  Boston.

Watkins, N.J.  The Pine and the Palm Greeting.  1873.  Baltimore.

Scoville, Joseph Alfred.  The Old Merchants of New York City.  1885.  NY.

Chase, Lucien.  The Traveler’s and Tourist’s Guide through the United States of America and Canada.  1851.  Philadelphia.

Child, Lydia Maria.  Isaac T. Hopper:  A True Life.  1853.  Boston.

Colton, Walter, Rev.  Deck and Port.  1850.  NY.

Parton, James.  Famous Americans of Recent Times.  1851.  NY.

Coggeshall, George.  Privateers and letters-of-marque, during the War with England in the Years 1812, 1813, and 1814.  1856.  NY.