I'm currently re-reading O'Brian's Master and Commander 20-volume novel about the British Navy in the Napoleonic years 1800-1815 or so. The search for antiscorbutics was a very important task for voyages that lasted up to a year. Whalers could be out even longer, btw, so it wasn't just Navy ships that had to worry about scurvy. One of the most important supplies was kegs of inspissated lime juice (meaning concentrated) and the daily serving of grog was how they administered it. Grog was rum, lime juice, and water. Rum was what tempted the sailors to ingest the lime juice. Fruit and vegetables were bought whenever possible at port calls, and those probably had more effect than the lime juice, but the lime was still critical. And to this day, British sailors are known as Limeys.
