The National Archives was awarded a grant in June 2008 under the Wellcome Trust's Research Resources in Medical History programme, which provides funding for high quality projects to catalogue and preserve significant history of medicine collections. This two-year project, completed in June 2010, has fully catalogued over 1,200 journals prepared by medical officers of the Royal Navy between 1793 and 1880, held by The National Archives in the record series ADM 101.
See an example by browsing the Catalogue from ADM 101/148
For medical historians and researchers
The journals relate to Royal Navy, convict and emigrant ships and provide detailed information on diseases, patients, injuries, treatments and living conditions on board. The project aimed to create fully searchable material within The National Archives' Catalogue, enabling medical historians to define and pursue lines of enquiry, test hypotheses and explore the practical application of the theories of the period's great health reformers.
Medical researchers can now track cases to compare the treatment regimes - and relative success - of different medical officers; to examine the prevalence and persistence of particular diseases; to see which factors affected health; and to study how factors such as conditions onboard, the route followed and the countries visited impacted on sickness rates.
For family historians
Family historians can search by name, tracking ancestors who came into contact with the surgeons during this period - whether they served on board ship, were emigrating to start a new life or were being transported.
Other content revealed
The cataloguing has helped reveal some of the other extraordinary material contained in the journals. This includes watercolour illustrations, hand-drawn maps, pictures of local flora and fauna, charts showing details of climate, details of the layout of vessels and details of the countries visited and people encountered.
