Based on reports of the ministers of the Navy and the correspondence among officers, this paper analyzes labor relations in daily life, as well as the nutrition and health of sailors in the first twenty years after abolition. The racial question arises related to the modernization of nutrition practices and treatment, and new ways of understanding the bodies of sailors. By focusing the analysis on the years before the major 1910 mariners' revolt, judging from reports and records of the officers it is seen how the transition from slavery to a new system on a national scale within the Brazilian Navy corresponds with the arrival of new ideas about health to be applied in the path towards progress.
Navy; health; nutrition; race; Brazil