Pirates & Privateers: Robert Hay's Books

Between 1820 and 1821, Robert Hay wrote a memoir for his children. Some of this material eventually appeared in Paisley Magazine under the pseudonym Sam Spritsail around 1828. Hay’s account of his life was later edited by his great-granddaughter and published in 1953. Vincent McInerney, the editor of this volume in the Seafarers’ Voices series, has taken the original material and the additions later made to it to join them together in this narrative for today’s readers.

Hay serves as a seaman in the Royal Navy from 1803 to 1811, during the wars with France. He provides an account of life on the lower deck on warships in Nelson’s Navy. While such memoirs aren’t unusual, the majority are written long after the fact, at a time when social mores differ from those in which the story is set. Hays, however, pens his shortly after he went to sea at fourteen, and he does so as a volunteer, rather than being pressed into service. Instead of entering the service as a seaman, he becomes a “shoe boy,” a personal servant to an officer. Although he deserts in hopes of finding a berth on a merchant ship, he ends up back in the Royal Navy, where he eventually becomes a carpenter’s mate, which teaches him a skill he can later use on land when he retires.

Hay provides a matter-of-fact recitation of it was like to be a sailor in the early 19th century. Having worked aboard both naval and merchant vessels, he compares and contrasts the differences between the two. The first chapter sets the stage, giving an account of his family and youth before he ran away to sea. The remaining chapters discuss the ships he served on and the events and people he encountered on board and in his travels. Landsman Hay is a fascinating story with rare glimpses of navy life and personnel from a servant’s perspective.