Why sauerkraut was a savior for sailors
In the late 18th century, scurvy was killing around 50 percent of British mariners on long-haul journeys – more than shipwrecks, battles and all other diseases combined. Between 1500 and 1800, the illness had claimed roughly two million sailors’ lives. On the disastrous 1740 expedition around Cape Horn led by Commodore George Anson, of the 1,854 men who departed, only 188 returned. The vast majority had died from scurvy. By the mid-18th century, the Royal Navy was desperate for a remedy. They noticed that, contrary to their struggles, the Dutch were losing hardly any men to the illness.
