Below deck fife rails in seventeenth century ships !?

R.C. Anderson's The Rigging of Ships in the Days of the Spritsail Topmast addresses this question - though not thoroughly enough to give a straightforward, definitive answer.

Pp. 76-77:  "...Unfortunately there is no doubt that the knights were often between decks.  Van Yk, writing in 1697, about Dutch shipbuilding, says that the knights in men-of-war were on the lower deck of a 2-decker and the section of Allard's book of 1705 shows the main knight in an almost incredible position on the lower deck of a 3-decker.  A French section, of 1691, shows the knights on the middle-deck of a 3-decker with both uper deck and forecastle above the fore knight, but the Royal Louis model, of similar date, has her fore knight on the forecastle and the main knight on the upper deck with only the half deck over it.  At an ealier period (about 1650) the Swedish Amarant has the fore knight on the upper deck and the main on the lower, while the Danish Norske Love has her fore knight on the forecastle and the main probably on the upper deck.

   "The position of the knights is naturally associated with that of the capstans.  To follow the matter further would lead into all sorts of side-issues only remotely connected with rigging.  There is little doubt that the knights of Dutch ships of the 17th century were more often than not between decks and the same would probably hold good for English ships in the first part of the century, when they were using such fittings."

Pp. 78-79:  "After the lower halliards and the top-ropes, the topsail sheets have to be given a lead and a place for making fast.  They went to the bitts, which were a pair of timbers rather like the knights but smaller, which stood just before the lower masts, one on each side.  At first they were probably simple uprights with a sheave in each...but later - somewhere about 1660 in English ships and later in foreigners - they were connected by a cross-piece....About the same time, when English ships took to double jeers instead of ties and halliards, a second pair of bitts, with a cross-piece, took the place of the knight abaft the mast and provided for the hauling part of the jeers....

"The sheet-bitts and jeer-bitts were sometimes nearly as inaccessible as the knights.  The model of the Prince, of 1670, has the fore bitts beneath the forecastle and the Dutch section of the end of the century shows the main bitts on the middle deck of a 3-decker.  By 1700, and probably before that, English ships had raised their fore bitts to the forecastle...."

If I'm reading that correctly, he says the bitts forward of the mast would be for the topsail sheets and the ones aft of the mast for the jeers.  I wouldn't put belaying pins in the cross-pieces unless I had extremely impressive evidence for them.  But I think a big block, hooked to an eyebolt in the deck next to each bitt, would be appropriate as a means of taking the line to the capstan.

Reading this last, I'm thinking that you may just have laid a course straight through the reason why the speach of a sailor is so "colorful". I feel reasonably confident that the person responsible for the design of that run of a ships rigging, had never felt the roll of a deck beneath his feet, and had never once passed a stopper to a line so it could be cast off a capstan, and belayed to a bit, in the cramped, hot, stinking confines of the ship's lowest gun deck!

   Speaking of stoppers, I have never seen, in any rigging plan,of a model, mention of stoppers. Yet, there had to be a way to hold the hauling part, close to a bitt or rail, while it was cast off the capstan, and belayed to bitt, rail, or pin. If it took a capstan to haul around on it, I doubt that it could be hand held while it was belayed.

Hello Bryan01,

Even ship of a later period than you are dealing with have major lines belaying below the 'top deck'.

On the Victory for instance the Main Jeers, Topsail Sheets, and Clue Garnets pass thro' openings on the Quarter Deck, usually covered by gratings, to belay on the Main Jeer and Topsail Sheet Bitts located on the Upper Deck.

As you are building a model of The Prince (a wonderful subject by the way) you have no doubt seen the model in the Science Museum. In case you don't have a reference for the Foc'sle here is a picture showing the deck beam arrangements, it would seem entirely logical that lines passed thro' gratings / scuttles etc; sufficient for the need, as they did on Victory some eighty plus years later.

Other than this I think there is little I can add to your previous contributors.

Gentlemen,

Thank you for your replies this far.

GeorgeW, I certainly do know the model of HMS Prince in the Science Museum Kensington. It's my main inspiration. As a matter of fact I’m building a model of this particular model, not the actual ship.

Thank you for posting the picture. I presume you found it here: http://www.old.modelarstwo.org.pl/index.php

They have some excellent pictures on this site, certainly worth watching.

However, if you found the picture somewhere else then I would really like to know where.

If you mean you are building a model of the dockyard model, you have my admiration Sir,

I cannot recall where I found the picture I tend to browse and save interesting subjects that I think may be of future interest. The Prince is one of them, although I seem to remember that it may have been a Polish site.

Since your original post I was moved to check my books on the subject and interestingly other contemporary English ships of the period did show bitts on the Foc'sle, notably a model of the St Michael of 1669, a three decker much in the style of the Prince (National Maritime Museum)

Source: Navy Board Ship Models 1650 - 1750 by  John Franklin

A fascinating subject

Yes, I'm actually building a model of the model.

I'm still busy determining where the openings between the ribs of the hull are going to be. At first I was puzzled by this task since there are no straight surfaces to work on; everything is curved in several directions. I finally decided to use 3 mm wide strips of tape to outline the ribs. The bow and stern were the tricky parts since these cant inwards but, unlike the ribs of a real ship, the ribs of a dockyard model stay perpendicular to the keel.

Now I only have to remove the pieces of tape where the openings (about 200) have to be made. Although the hull is now completely covered with hideously blue tape, the graceful lines of it are already showing.

After the openings are made the rest of the tape obviously will be removed. Then comes the task of thickening the ribs inside the hull until their cross-section is approximately square.

When that’s finished I can finally start laying the floor beams but that is still a long way from now.

I see you are also the proud owner of the John Franklin book. Unfortunately I’m not so lucky; it would be of great value to this project. Russell Barnes (Russ39) was however kind enough to send me some scanned images of it which already have proved to be very usefull. Thanks again!