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THE ASTORIAN • SATuRdAy, NOvEmbER 13, 2021
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THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, NOV. 13, 2021 • B1
C.F. Smith
Sailors aboard ships at the entrance of the Columbia River survived on hardtack in 1887. The biscuits were often full of worms, maggots or weevils.
The ‘worm castles’ of the sea
A look back at the rations given to sailors
By JULIA TRIEZENBERG
For The Astorian
Julia Triezenberg
V
arious forms of unleavened bread have been a survival
food around the world for thousands of years.
Hardtack was one particular form of unleavened bread
that was a staple ration for sailors and soldiers throughout
the 18th and 19th centuries.
Hardtack was considered a superfood ration for a few rea-
sons. It was easy to make a lot of bread at a very low price
point, since its only ingredients were flour, salt and water.
To make them easy to store on a ship and to ensure they
lasted a long time, hardtack was baked for so long that it was
essentially a “biscuit brick.” With next to no moisture inside
of it, hardtack would last indefinitely if it was stored in the
right conditions.
In fact, some of the hardtack that was used during the
Civil War was actually leftover from Mexican-American
War rations more than a decade before.
Traditional hardtack was so dense, sailors would some-
times use it as a plate for their meal. It was difficult to eat it
plain without losing a tooth. Usually sailors would crumble
the biscuits into their soup, coffee or fry them in leftover fat
to try to improve the flavor.
Hardtack biscuits accumulated a lot of nicknames over
the years, including “tooth dullers,” “molar breakers,” “sheet
iron,” and, most infamously, “worm castles.”
Hypothetically hardtack never went bad if stored prop-
erly, but sailors struggled to keep it safe from the constant
moisture that surrounded a ship sailing in the middle of the
ocean.
If the mold didn’t get it first, rations would be full of
worms, maggots or weevils. It wasn’t uncommon to have to
bang your biscuit on the side of the table and watch all the
bugs skitter out before you enjoyed your dinner.
Another strategy was to dunk your hardtack in hot water
and scoop the floating bugs off the top.
It’s not hard to believe that there aren’t a lot of nutrients
in a biscuit made solely from flour, salt and water. The com-
mon ideology behind nutrition in the 1700s and 1800s was
radically different from what we know today.
Hardtack was a staple of sailors’ diets most days, and all
that mattered was that they eat enough biscuits to feel full.
Many sailors faced the ravages of scurvy until it was discov-
ered that incorporating vitamin-C into their diets could dra-
matically improve their experiences at sea.
It’s not known by the same name anymore, but hardtack
can still be found as a survival food — particularly in Alaska
and Hawaii.
Now referred to as “pilot bread,” or “pilot crackers,” hard-
tack was introduced to both areas by whaling and merchant
vessels traveling through the area. The recipe has changed
slightly to make the biscuits a little softer to bite, but the
main idea is the same.
Attempting your own hardtack could be a great experi-
ment as we head into the holidays and baking season is upon
us.
Julia Triezenberg is an educator at the Columbia River
maritime museum.
Author Julia Triezenberg’s hardtack biscuits, baked
in summer 2019. They are hard as rocks now.
HARDTACK RECIPE
Ingredients
• ½ cup of flour
• 1 tablespoon of salt
• ¼ cup water
Directions
For two biscuits (you won’t want more than that), mix
together the flour with the salt.
Add the water and mix until your biscuits feel like
cookie dough.
Hardtack biscuits were so tough that you could replace
household items with them, like this picture frame from the
National Museum of American History’s collection.
Bake for 20 to 30 minutes at 375 degrees and see how
your own ‘biscuit bricks’ turned out.
Charles W. Reed
A drawing from the 1877 memoir ‘Hardtack and Coffee’ depicts a soldier frying up his hardtack biscuits.
Winslow Homer
Union Capt. J. W. Forsyth sits on a crate of hardtack, also called ‘army bread.’
A.T. Agate
LEFT: A cartoon from 1864 depicts a solider breaking his tooth on hardtack. RIGHT: An image
of Astoria and the Columbia River in 1844, when sailors survived a journey by eating hardtack.