Becoming Mad at Sea: Shaped by the Pressures of Sea-service in the Long Eighteenth-Century British Navy

Abstract This article examines how the pressures of sea-service shaped the perceptions and experiences of becoming mad at sea and everyday constructions of madness outside the asylum. Using medical and legal sources from the eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century British navy, it explores how the disciplined and co-operative nature of shipboard work, combined with the dangers, spatial restrictions and mobility of life in the ocean environment, impinged on the lives of seafarers experiencing mental disturbance, difference and distress, and moulded how ‘madness’ was recognised in the space of the ship. The evidence given by surgeons, officers, and sailors reveal processes of stigmatisation and medicalisation at the intersection of the social and medical models of disability but also pragmatism and community support. As such, these records in many ways challenge assumptions that madness and certain high-pressure settings are inherently disabling, highlighting the complexities that surround ‘madness’ in difficult environments and community contexts.