Hemp at Sea: The Forgotten Staple of Maritime Historical past

In a coastal museum in Staithes, England, a yellowed discover from 1828 advertises a “Wreck Sale” at an area inn. Listed among the many salvaged cargo from the doomed schooner Bounty are on a regular basis staples of the Nineteenth century: dried fish, timber, whale oil, flax – and hemp. Even the ship’s rope and sailcloth had been up for public sale. This humble artefact provides a vivid reminder that hemp was as soon as a lifeline of maritime life. Lengthy earlier than it was caught up in Twentieth-century prohibitions, hemp was as widespread on the excessive seas as saltwater and wooden, entwined with the every day workings of ships and the fortunes of sailors.

The Many Makes use of of Hemp in Maritime Life

Within the age of sail, hemp was all over the place on a ship. It’s no exaggeration to say that, within the 1800s, hemp was probably the most used shipbuilding materials after wooden[1]. Sailors relied on hemp for vital gear and provides, together with:

Ropes & Rigging: From anchor cables to halyards, just about all ropes had been fabricated from hemp. Powerful, thick hemp strains hoisted sails, anchored ships, and stored the masts standing tall[2]. Hemp was favored as a result of it was the one fiber that might endure months of sea air and salt water with out disintegrating[2]. (To decelerate rot, the ropes had been coated in tar – a messy job that earned British seamen the nickname “Jack Tar”[3].)
Sails & Canvas: Ships’ sails had been historically created from heavy hemp canvas. In reality, the very phrase “canvas” comes from hashish. Sturdy hemp sailcloth may catch the wind throughout oceans with out tearing. Within the Nineteenth century, sails had been typically 100% hemp cloth[4], hand-stitched from broad hemp panels. A single tall ship’s swimsuit of sails would possibly require acres of hemp crops to provide – it’s mentioned every set of sails for a big vessel used fiber from practically half a hectare of hemp crops[5]!
Caulking (Oakum): Hemp even helped maintain ships afloat by sealing them up. Sailors waterproofed the wood hulls utilizing oakum – tar-soaked hemp fiber that was pounded into the seams between planks to cease leaks[6]. Recycling was alive and properly: outdated hemp ropes had been unraveled by hand (typically by prisoners or unlucky workhouse souls) into unfastened fiber, soaked in pine tar, and hammered into the ship’s gaps. This messy hemp-tar combine created a good seal in opposition to the ocean. With out hemp caulking, these wood ships would have swiftly taken on water[6].
Fishing Nets & Traces: Coastal communities like Staithes, famed for fishing, additionally turned to hemp for making nets and fishing strains. Hemp twine was sturdy and resisted saltwater higher than most pure fibers, making sturdy nets to haul within the day’s catch. Historic information observe that hemp nets had been in use for hundreds of years in British waters for his or her reliability[7][8].
Canvas & Fabric Onboard: Past sails, hemp canvas served for sailor’s hammocks, tarpaulins, and sacks. Exhausting-wearing hemp fabric was used for crew clothes and ships’ flags. A ship could be provisioned with hemp canvas baggage for meals storage, hemp webbing for harnesses, and different numerous little makes use of. In essence, if it was a material or rope on a Nineteenth-century vessel, it was seemingly hemp.

All advised, a fantastic crusing ship carried an unlimited amount of hemp. Between the miles of rigging, a number of units of sails, spare strains, nets, and oakum, a fully-rigged ship of the 1800s may have 50–100 tons of hemp onboard in a single type or one other[5]. Little surprise naval powers zealously secured hemp provides. (In reality, hemp was so strategic that conflicts brewed over it – in the course of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain’s Royal Navy relied on Russian hemp imports for 90% of its rope and sail wants, and Napoleon schemed to chop off that offer[9][2].) Hemp really was the hidden engine of maritime empires – a plant that fueled world commerce lengthy earlier than petroleum or trendy synthetics.

The 1828 Staithes Wreck Public sale: Hemp’s Position Revealed

What does that public sale invoice from Staithes inform us about hemp’s function at sea? For one, it reveals how helpful and ubiquitous hemp was by the 1820s. The Bounty’s salvaged items – listed alongside whale oil and high-quality timber – included hemp and flax, seemingly in uncooked fiber bales or as a part of the ship’s cargo. The inclusion of “rope and ship’s fittings” within the public sale implies the restoration of the vessel’s hemp rigging and sails as properly. Native sailors and shipowners would have eagerly bid on these ropes, cables, and canvas, since such gadgets had been expensive to provide from scratch. A salvaged hemp hawser (thick rope) may discover new life mooring a fishing boat; repurposed sailcloth would possibly patch up one other ship’s sails or be sewn into sturdy fishermen’s smocks.

This little coastal sale poster paints an image of a round economic system of the ocean. A wreck wasn’t simply particles to haul away – it was a possibility to reclaim treasured supplies. In a hardscrabble fishing village like Staithes, hemp fibers had been really a group useful resource. Recycled oakum from outdated ropes would seal new boats. Weathered sails could be lower down for smaller craft. Nothing went to waste, as a result of hemp had actual financial value. Seeing “Hemp” itemized on that 1828 flyer – in an period earlier than trendy plastics and petroleum – reminds us that hemp was not some area of interest crop; it was a maritime staple, as essential to a seafaring city as bait and barrels.

There’s additionally a poignant symbolism in that public sale discover now residing within the Staithes museum. It survives as a relic of hemp’s heyday, when Hashish sativa was a workhorse fiber, not a prohibited plant. Within the two centuries since, hemp’s story nearly slipped from reminiscence, like a shipwreck sinking beneath the waves. To the folks of 1828, although, these bundles of hemp represented cash, utility, and future voyages but to sail. Hemp was hope – the rigging for the following ship, the web for the following catch, the caulking to maintain the following hull dry.

From Important Useful resource to Prohibition and Decline

The prominence of hemp in maritime life continued via the age of sail, however by the early Twentieth century the winds started to alter. A convergence of things – technological, financial, and political – led to hemp’s dramatic decline. Steamships and motor vessels decreased the necessity for canvas sails and natural-fiber rigging. Competing supplies like cotton (for canvas) and Manila fiber (for rope) had been accessible in world commerce. And most fatefully, hemp was swept up within the rising tide of hashish prohibition.

Within the early 1900s, attitudes shifted and hemp went from maritime staple to misunderstood outlaw. Many Western nations conflated industrial hemp with its psychoactive cousin, marijuana. The results had been extreme. Britain banned hemp cultivation in 1928, and america adopted with the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, successfully outlawing hemp farming[10][11]. Across the identical time, DuPont’s new artificial fiber nylon hit the market – quickly touted as a miracle alternative for rope and webbing. By the top of World Struggle II, cheaper synthetics and strict drug legal guidelines had pushed hemp to the margins.

There was a short second of reprieve throughout WWII: going through materials shortages, the U.S. authorities quickly inspired farmers to develop hemp once more for the conflict effort (famously producing a movie titled Hemp for Victory in 1942). Outdated habits proved onerous to revive – as soon as the conflict ended, hemp fell again underneath prohibition. In 1961 the United Nations Single Conference on Narcotic Medication sealed hemp’s destiny globally by classifying hashish (with no distinction for low-THC industrial hemp) as a managed substance[12]. The crop that had as soon as rigged the nice ships of the world was now contraband. By the late Twentieth century, fields that had grown hemp for rope and canvas had been rising nothing of the kind. Generations forgot that their crusing ancestors even used hemp.

The ironies run deep. As hemp vanished, trendy ships turned totally to metal cables, petroleum-derived plastics, and chemical fibers. In only a few a long time, a plant that had actually helped conquer the world’s oceans was practically erased from trade and tradition. Hemp went from a strategic naval useful resource to a historic footnote – a “forgotten staple,” certainly.

A Twenty first-Century Revival: Again to the Future with Hemp

Right now, the story of hemp is coming full circle. After a long time adrift, hemp is within the midst of a world revival – not for clipper ships and manila ropes, however for sustainability and innovation. As we grapple with local weather change and plastic air pollution, this outdated plant is discovering a brand new calling. Fashionable industries are rediscovering what sailors and shipwrights knew centuries in the past: hemp is extremely versatile, sturdy, and eco-friendly.

Previously 20 years, legal guidelines have progressively relaxed to differentiate non-intoxicating industrial hemp from medication. Nations from Australia to Canada, the U.S., and throughout Europe have re-legalized hemp farming for fiber, meals, and different makes use of. This has unlocked a wave of creativity. Hemp fiber is as soon as once more prized for making textiles, clothes, and even high-tech composites. Designers mix hemp with natural cotton or use its linen-like threads in trend, recognizing that hemp textiles are sturdy and require far much less water and chemical compounds than cotton[13][14]. In building, hemp’s woody core is combined with lime to create hempcrete, a carbon-storing, insulating materials now utilized in eco-friendly properties. Its fibers are pressed into thermal insulation batts, bioplastics, and even automobile components[15]. Researchers are exploring hemp for every little thing from sustainable packaging to supercapacitors. It appears there’s little this plant can’t do.

In a poetic twist, hemp can be reappearing in maritime contexts – this time as a part of inexperienced design. Boat builders have experimented with hemp fiber composites for lighter, greener hulls, and conventional tall ships often sport hemp canvas sails or ropes for historic authenticity. Whereas trendy delivery gained’t return to all-hemp rigging (metal and synthetics have their place), the maritime world hasn’t utterly forgotten its trusty outdated ally. The data that hemp resists UV gentle, mildew, and salt stays related for inventors looking for pure options to plastics.

Crucially, customers and corporations are actually viewing hemp via the lens of legacy. Fairly than a novel development, hemp’s resurgence is framed as a return to custom – with a sustainable twist. Each hemp T-shirt, hempcrete wall, or hemp plastic prototype carries an echo of the previous. We’re not inventing a brand new materials; we’re reviving a time-tested useful resource for the fashionable age.

Embracing Hemp’s Legacy

The story of hemp at sea is greater than a maritime historical past lesson – it’s a reminder of how shortly an important useful resource might be forgotten, and the way joyfully it may be rediscovered. Standing in entrance of that 1828 wreck public sale poster on the Staithes Museum, one can’t assist feeling a heat connection to these seafarers of outdated who valued hemp so dearly. They could be shocked to study that, practically 200 years later, hemp is once more being championed as an answer to up to date issues. From sustainable textiles to inexperienced constructing, the “industrial hemp” of at present is choosing up proper the place the outdated sailmakers and ropemakers left off.

At Margaret River Hemp Co, this sense of continuity is on the coronary heart of what we do. We take inspiration from hemp’s wealthy heritage in locations like Staithes and Whitby as we craft trendy merchandise for a greater future. In any case, the resurgence of hemp isn’t only a passing fad – it’s the revival of a legacy. The identical plant that caulked wood ships and crammed clipper sails now has a task in lowering waste and constructing sustainably. We discover that extremely encouraging. For this reason we love seeing historic references to hemp – it reminds us that hemp isn’t a development, it’s a convention and a legacy. By embracing hemp’s previous, we’re additionally charting a course to a extra resilient future, on land and sea alike.

Sources:

Staithes Museum (artifact), Shipwreck Public sale Discover, Whitby (1828) – Salvaged cargo itemizing hemp, ropes, sailcloth, and so on. ({Photograph})
Jo Dope Weblog – Hemp and Ships – Hempen Ships? (Aug 20, 2024) – discusses historic makes use of of hemp in 1800s shipbuilding (sails, ropes, caulking)[1][6]
CannaReporter – Napoleon Bonaparte: How Hemp and Hashish Had been Essential… (Feb 28, 2025) – notes Nineteenth-century navies relied on hemp; every crusing ship carried 50–100 tons of hemp rope, sails, oakum[2][5]
Wikipedia – Hemp: Etymology of canvas from hashish; tarred hemp ropes and “Jack Tar” nickname[16][3]
Wikipedia – Oakum: Description of oakum as tarred hemp fiber used for caulking wood ships[17]
The Boon Room – Fish Nets (Many Makes use of of Hemp) – explains hemp’s use in sturdy fishing nets since medieval instances[7][8]
Alliance for European Flax-Linen & Hemp – Hemp in Historical past (2023) – timeline noting hemp’s Twentieth-century decline (UK ban 1928, US 1937, nylon invention 1938) and Twenty first-century revival in sustainable industries[11][15]