California History Guide > Aboard A Spanish Galleon

Below Decks

Life aboard a galleon, especially for the sailors, was very unpleasant. The ships were stuffy, smelly, and damp below decks, and rats, cockroaches, and other bugs were very common.

The food was often spoiled, extremely hard to chew, or full of bugs like weevils. Fresh fruits and vegetables were very rare because they didn't keep on long voyages. Instead, the sailors' diet was made up of things like salt beef, pork or fish, dried peas, and hard biscuits. Fire could only be used to cook food during calm weather. In stormy weather, the threat of the fire spreading out of the brick oven was too great.

The crew slept and ate on the gundecks crammed in between the cannons. Some men slept in hammocks ond others on the floor. When the weather was good, they could open the ports and hatches and let in light and air. In bad weather, when the hatches had to be closed, conditions were often dark, stuffy, smelly and wet.

As bad as these conditions were, the lower decks were even worse since they were below the water and didn't have portholes. The hold, where food, provisions, cargo, and extra sails and rope were stored, was smelly, dark, and damp. In fact, it was so unpleasant that being lowered alone into the hold was frequently used as a punishment. The offender would be lowered into the hold for an hour or two where they were surrounded by the darkness and stench. Sometimes, a single light would be lowered with them to attract the rats and cockroaches!