The Enemy Killed 59. Something Else Killed 1,518.

In a single year in the West Indies, one British fleet lost 59 men to the enemy — and 1,518 to something else. Step below decks on a Royal Navy warship in Nelson's day: 14 inches to sling your hammock, a toilet that was a plank over the open sea, decks holystoned before dawn, lice in the seams of your shirt — and a six-day experiment the Navy took 48 years to act on. Chapters 0:00 Fourteen inches 0:43 A floating town 1:52 The head 4:11 Holy bibles 6:42 The real killers 9:39 The other end 10:56 Night again Main sources Gilbert Blane, on the West Indies fleet, July 1780–July 1781 (memorial to the Admiralty, 1781); Observations on the Diseases Incident to Seamen (1785); Select Dissertations (1822) James Lind, A Treatise of the Scurvy (1753) and later writings (1762–1772) Thomas Trotter, Medicina Nautica (1797) Regulations and Instructions Relating to His Majesty's Service at Sea (1766 edition) Woodes Rogers, A Cruising Voyage Round the World (1712) William Falconer, An Universal Dictionary of the Marine (1769) Stephen Hales, A Description of Ventilators (1743) Aaron Thomas, journal kept aboard HMS Lapwing (1798) James Cook, Philosophical Transactions 66 (1776) William Beatty, The Authentic Narrative of the Death of Lord Nelson (1807) Image credits Paintings, prints and book pages are public domain or CC0 (Royal Museums Greenwich, Rijksmuseum, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cleveland Museum of Art, National Portrait Gallery London, Internet Archive, Wikimedia Commons), except: Wellcome Collection, CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.... title pages of James Lind's A Treatise of the Scurvy (1753, 1757); portrait of Thomas Trotter; ship's biscuit (1875); cases of amputation instruments (c. 1750–1800; French, 18th century); surgical instruments of Thomas Major, naval surgeon, by Evans (1793) Auckland Museum, CC BY 4.0: sailor's sewing palm (1969.12) "Deptford Victualling Yard – Main Gate", photo by casch52 on Flickr, CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) CC BY images may be cropped or colour-adjusted for the video. Film footage, public domain: Old Ironsides (1926), The Sea Hawk (1924) and Down to the Sea in Ships (1922), via Internet Archive; Bluenose vs. Gertrude L. Thebaud, Wallace R. MacAskill (1938).