James Lind
James Lind was a Scottish doctor. He was a pioneer of naval hygiene in the Royal Navy. By conducting one of the first ever clinical trials, he developed the theory that citrus fruits cured scurvy. He argued for the health benefits of better ventilation aboard naval ships, the improved cleanliness of sailors' bodies, clothing and bedding, and below-deck fumigation with sulphur and arsenic. He also proposed that fresh water could be obtained by distilling sea water. His work advanced the practice of preventive medicine and improved nutrition.
Scurvy
Scurvy is a disease resulting from a lack of vitamin C. Early symptoms include weakness, feeling tired, and sore arms and legs. Without treatment, decreased red blood cells, gum disease, changes to hair, and bleeding from the skin may occur. As scurvy worsens there can be poor wound healing, personality changes, and finally death from infection or bleeding.
Cornelis de Houtman
Cornelis de Houtman, brother of Frederick de Houtman, was a Dutch explorer who discovered a new sea route from Europe to Indonesia and who thus begun the Dutch spice trade. At the time, the Portuguese Empire held a monopoly on the spice trade, and the voyage was a symbolic victory for the Dutch, even though the voyage itself was a disaster. Houtman was also a spy, having worked against the Portuguese by bringing back to the Netherlands privileged nautical information obtained during his stay in Portugal.
William Baffin
William Baffin was an English navigator and explorer. He is primarily known for his attempt to discover a Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, during the course of which he was the first European to discover Baffin Bay in present-day Canada. He was also responsible for exceptional surveys of the Red Sea and Persian Gulf on behalf of the East India Company.
William Parry (explorer)
Rear-Admiral Sir William Edward Parry was an English explorer of the Arctic who was known for his 1819 expedition through the Parry Channel, probably the most successful in the long quest for the Northwest Passage.
John Ross (Royal Navy officer)
Sir John Ross was a British Royal Navy officer and Polar explorer. He was the uncle of Sir James Clark Ross, who explored the Arctic with him, and later led expeditions to Antarctica.
John Davis (English explorer)
John Davis or Davys was one of the chief English navigators of Elizabeth I. He led several voyages to discover the Northwest Passage and served as pilot and captain on both Dutch and English voyages to the East Indies. He discovered the Falkland Islands in August 1592.
Gilbert Blane
Sir Gilbert Blane of Blanefield, 1st Baronet FRSE FRS MRCP was a Scottish physician who instituted health reform in the Royal Navy. He saw action against both the French and Spanish fleets, and later served as a Commissioner on the Sick and Wounded Board of the Admiralty.
Sick and Hurt Commissioners
The Sick and Hurt Commissioners were responsible for medical services in the Royal Navy. They were a separate body to the Navy Board, supplying surgeons to naval ships, providing them with medicines and equipment, and running shore and ship hospitals; they were also responsible for prisoners of war.
Thomas Trotter (physician)
Thomas Trotter (1760–1832) was a Scottish naval physician and author who was a leading medical reformer in the Royal Navy and an ardent critic of the slave trade. Trotter was born in Melrose, Roxburghshire, and studied medicine under Alexander Monro (secundus) in Edinburgh. His major work, the Medicina Nautica, was published in 1802 and provides a detailed examination of the state of naval medicine during the French Revolutionary Wars.
São Gabriel (ship)
The São Gabriel was the flagship of Vasco da Gama's armada on his first voyage to India in 1497-1499.
Red Dragon (1595)
Scourge of Malice or Malice Scourge or Mare Scourge was a 38-gun ship ordered by George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland. She was built and launched at Deptford Dockyard in 1595. The Earl used her as his flagship during raids on the Spanish Main, where she provided additional force to support his fleet. She was later renamed Red Dragon; the East India Company used her for at least five voyages to the East Indies. The first recorded performance of the play Hamlet took place on Red Dragon in 1607 while she was anchored off the coast of Sierra Leone.
Henry Middleton (captain)
Sir Henry Middleton was a sea captain and adventurer. He negotiated with the sultan of Ternate and the sultan of Tidore, competed against Dutch and Portuguese interests in the East Indies but still managed to buy cloves.
Battle of Flores (1592)
The Battle of Flores (1592), also known as Cruising Voyage to the Azores of 1592, or the Capture of the Madre de Deus describes a series of naval engagements that took place from 20 May to 19 August 1592, during the Anglo-Spanish War. The battle was part of an expedition by an English fleet initially led by Sir Walter Raleigh, and then by Martin Frobisher and John Burrough. The expedition involved the capture of a number of Portuguese and Spanish ships including the large Portuguese carrack Madre de Deus, after a long naval battle off the island of Flores in the Azores. The expedition, particularly the capture of the great carrack, was a financial and military success. The rich cargo aboard the carrack, which at the time equaled nearly half the size of the Kingdom of England's royal annual revenue, was subject to mass theft when it arrived in Dartmouth, England, followed by quarrels over the shares of the prize. The expedition had formative consequences for the English both financially and on the future of English exploration.
Capture of Recife (1595)
The Capture of Recife also known as James Lancaster's 1595 Expedition or Lancaster's Pernambucan expedition was an English military expedition during the Anglo–Spanish War in which the primary objective was the capture of the town and port of Recife in Pernambuco on the Portuguese colony of Brazil in April 1595. An English expedition of ships led by James Lancaster sailed via the Atlantic capturing numerous prizes before he captured Recife. He held the place for nearly a month and then proceeded to defeat a number of Portuguese counterattacks before leaving. The booty captured was substantial, Lancaster chartered Dutch and French ships that were also present there thus making the expedition a military and financial success.
Bantam Presidency
Bantam Presidency was a presidency established by the British East India Company and based at the Company factory at Bantam in Java. Founded in 1617, the Presidency exercised its authority over all the Company factories in India, including the agencies of Madras, Masulipatnam and Surat. The factors at Bantam were instrumental in founding the colony of Madraspatnam in 1639 with the Fort St. George, which later grew into the modern city of Madras. The Presidency of Bantam was twice downgraded, first in 1630 before being restored in 1634 and for the second time in 1653, when owing to the hostility of Dutch traders, the Presidency was shifted to Madras. Bantam remained an agency under the suzerainty of Madras and then Surat till the 1680s, when trade was moved to Bencoolen in Sumatra. The factory at Bantam survived until the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 when all the British colonies in the East Indies were handed over to the Dutch in return for recognition of British primacy over the Malay Peninsula.