Vitamin C for mariners

There's a white-out in North Pembs today so I've been restricted to close-up shots. I took this one when I got off the bus - it's a common plant near the coast and in spring its little white flowers and glossy, heart-shaped leaves can be seen in clumps or even stretches along the roadside. Then it disappears as other plants grow over it. It's called Scurvy-grass.

Obviously, it's not a grass. It's actually is a member of the cabbage family and, to be honest, Cochlearia officinalis is not a plant you would feel inclined to go into raptures over - unless you were a pre-1753 sailor fresh from a long voyage. Because, as its name indicates, it was one of the early remedies and prophylactics for scurvy, the foul disease that ravaged ships when sailors lived on salt meat and sea biscuit for months on end. Without access to fresh fruit or vegetables, no long voyages were unaffected. Magellan lost 80% of his crew to scurvy when he crossed the Pacific and Captain Cook, despite his best precautions, did not escape either. Scurvy also affected polar explorers and impoverished city dwellers with a poor diet. To find out just how gruesome the affliction was you can read a very interesting account here .

I always wondered how this Vitamin C-rich plant could be preserved fresh on board ship and I think the answer is, it couldn't, it was more a case of eating it right before and after your voyage. Because Scurvy-grass is a salt-loving coastal plant that grows all over the world, it seems that sailors would find it and cram it into their mouths as soon as they staggered off the gangplank whether at their home port or in foreign climes. (Apparently the desire for fresh leaves could drive the afflicted berserk.) Scurvy-grass ales, salads and sandwiches were also available for the health conscious at one time.

In 1753 naval surgeon James Lind published his Treaty of the Scurvy which proved once and for all the benefit of citrus fruit juice, hence the appellation limeys for British sailors since it became mandatory for the British Navy to provide it. It was not until 1932 that the Hungarian scientist Albert Szent-György identified the magic ingredient as ascorbic acid, renamed Vitamin C. He received the Nobel Prize for his discovery.

[Human beings, along with monkeys and guinea pigs, are the only animals unable to store Vitamin C in their bodies. Fresh, raw, meat contains enough Vitamin C to protect against scurvy which is why arctic people such as Inuit were not afflicted.]