GSS, you ask if a sailor would have had the necessary literary skills to compose Rounding the Horn, as most were illiterate. However being unable to read or write does not prevent someone from having a fluency with language, as Jim has pointed out from his own experiences. The entire premise of the "Radio Ballads" was that ordinary people were more than capable of describing their own lives in both words and song with an imaginative use of language which belies their lack of education.

To pick up on an earlier point, I was at school in the 1960s when corporal punishment was still used. These were not "Tom Brown's Schooldays" style thrashings, but a few strokes with a cane or gym shoe. We accepted it without resentment, and it was usually preferred to detention or lines since it was quickly out of the way. It was easy to avoid simply by not breaking the rules, but if you did break the rules you knew you could expect to be punished. We were also perfectly capable of distinguishing between this, in a context of clear rules and discipline, and violence.