Shipboard Eye Injuries (late 17th-early 18th Century)

AZ_Dawn · Jul 2, 2008

I need one of my pirates to lose an eye. I don't want him to lose it in battle or have it deliberately gouged out. I want him to lose his eye in a shipboard accident, preferably a work-related accident. Any suggestions? And no, he doesn't have a hook!

Also, if anyone knows the treatment for an eye injury back then besides bandaging it up, let me know. Thanks!

san_remo_ave · Jul 2, 2008

A wooden shard from a cargo loading accident?
Workhouse accident as a child before becoming a pirate?

Puma · Jul 2, 2008

And you know - the continual depiction of pirates with eye patches isn't really realistic. You might want to do some checking on this before you work it into your story. Puma

IceCreamEmpress · Jul 2, 2008

Here are some first-person stories by people who have lost an eye. Perhaps one of them might suit--there seem to be several people who got something in their eye that became infected, and a few people whose eyeball burst after sudden trauma (like the guy who lost an eye to his surfboard).

So it seems like he could have been scraping barnacles when one flew into his eye (those things are pointy) or got hit in the eye with a boom, or got a splinter in his eye (as suggested above)...

waylander · Jul 3, 2008

A rope under tension snapped and the flying end caught him in the eye

donroc · Jul 3, 2008

You might have his parrot do it as a variation of a cliche, for humor when the parrot is drunk or has poor eyesight or for more serious reasons.

PattiTheWicked · Jul 3, 2008

Running with scissors?

Doogs · Jul 3, 2008

Someone up in the rigging drops their knife?

He's at the wheel, it gets away from him and one of the knobs clobbers his eye?

Hot pitch in the eye?

Puma · Jul 3, 2008

Treatment for an eye injury would probably have included washing the eye area using an eye cup and possibly washing with a boric acid solution (not sure how long the use of boric acid has existed but that's what babies eyes were washed with to prevent infection after birth in the mid 20th century). If there was a foreign object in the eye, it would have been extracted using something like a forceps - there were medicines and even doctors on pirate ships.

Possible injuries - something blown into the eye during a storm at sea, getting hit in the eye by a broken spar during a storm, getting hit by the end of a rigging line that was released unexpectedly, falling on an implement in the galley while he's preparing food, getting hit by a piece of grapeshot from an opposing ship, getting hit by a slug during a battle, tripping and falling on his own weapon, etc. Any of those help? Puma

IceCreamEmpress · Jul 3, 2008

Puma said:
If there was a foreign object in the eye, it would have been extracted using something like a forceps

And it might still have gotten infected. People lose their eyes to this very thing in the 21st century, in the developed world, with access to our current ophthalmology--see the first-person stories on the site I linked.

There was a lot of eye loss in the 18th century; much of it was due to disease, but there was a high rate of accidental enucleation and infection that required excision as well.

AZ_Dawn · Jul 3, 2008

Thanks, guys! This helps a lot.

Puma said:
And you know - the continual depiction of pirates with eye patches isn't really realistic. You might want to do some checking on this before you work it into your story.

I was thinking more along the lines of a glass eye (eyepatches are good for the cheese factor, though

). Come to think of it, I need to take your check on it advice and see if they even had glass eyes back then.

IceCreamEmpress said:
Here are some first-person stories by people who have lost an eye.

That's a seriously disturbing site, but at least the stories didn't have pictures to go with them. Didn't know about those psychological effects; I'll have to brace myself for a second look.

waylander said:
A rope under tension snapped and the flying end caught him in the eye

Puma said:
...getting hit by the end of a rigging line that was released unexpectedly...

I read something like that in a non-fiction pirate book, but some of the history was wrong, so I wasn't sure if that bit was right or not. Looks like it might have been.

Doogs said:
Someone up in the rigging drops their knife?

I thought about that, but I suspected if a long sharp object dropped in someone's eye from that height, loss of an eye would be the least of their worries.

Puma said:
Treatment for an eye injury would probably have included washing the eye area using an eye cup and possibly washing with a boric acid solution (not sure how long the use of boric acid has existed but that's what babies eyes were washed with to prevent infection after birth in the mid 20th century). If there was a foreign object in the eye, it would have been extracted using something like a forceps - there were medicines and even doctors on pirate ships.

I'll have to look into this, too.

Doogs · Jul 3, 2008

re: dropping knife from rigging - sure, if it dropped point first. But a grazing blow, or being hit pommel first in just the wrong place would be more than enough to kiss an eye goodbye.

funidream · Jul 3, 2008

Boiling hot pitch splashed in his eye -
they were slapping that stuff on everything - even their hair.

AZ_Dawn · Jul 4, 2008

Doogs said:
But a grazing blow, or being hit pommel first in just the wrong place would be more than enough to kiss an eye goodbye.

It's that "more than enough" that worries me; those pommels are darned hard! I want him to lose an eye, not die or get brain-damaged. :e2hammer:

funidream said:
Boiling hot pitch splashed in his eye -
they were slapping that stuff on everything - even their hair.

I thought that was tar, or was tar after my period?

Okay, I googled glass eyes and found out that while they did indeed exist back then, they were too fragile and uncomfortable for an active pirate lifestyle (assuming anyone in the Caribbean made glass eyes in the first place). Darn it.

funidream · Jul 5, 2008

AZ_Dawn said:
I thought that was tar, or was tar after my period?

Pitch and pine tar or wood tar are all the same thing - a waterproof resin used for caulking ships, coating rigging, fabric, etc.

This is the product used aboard ships during your time period - not the more modern petroleum based tar that you see being used nowadays to tar roofs. Here's some info:

http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm

AZ_Dawn · Jul 5, 2008

funidream said:
Pitch and pine tar or wood tar are all the same thing - a waterproof resin used for caulking ships, coating rigging, fabric, etc.

Aauugh! I forgot they're the same thing! :e2smack:

Barb D · Jul 11, 2008

He stepped on a board with a nail in it, and it popped up and hit him in the eye. Yeeeow!

Shipboard Eye Injuries (late 17th-early 18th Century)

AZ_Dawn

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san_remo_ave

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Puma

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IceCreamEmpress

Hapless Virago

waylander

Who's going for a beer?

donroc

Historicals and Horror rule

PattiTheWicked

Unleashing Hell.

Doogs

Puma

Retired and loving it!

IceCreamEmpress

Hapless Virago

AZ_Dawn

AW Addict

Doogs

funidream

AZ_Dawn

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funidream

AZ_Dawn

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Barb D