Sorry to disagree, J, but...
It is generally believed that the saying about a confined space that there is "no room to swing a cat" there comes from the cat-o'-nine-tails, a multi-thonged whip used for punishing sailors in the olden days. However, it is virtually impossible for that to be the case.
The word, �cat-o'-nine-tails', is not recorded anywhere before the end of the 17th century and there is no record of the single word �cat' to mean �cat-o'-nine-tails' for yet another hundred years. There is also not a single recorded use of "no room to swing a cat" being a reference to a naval flogging between then and the end of the sailing-ship navy's days.
After all, why would there have been? Such punishments were invariably carried out on deck as a �lesson' in front of the assembled ship's company...that is, in a place where there was invariably ample room.
The earliest recorded use of �no room to swing a cat' dates further back and is quite clearly a reference to an actual cat! The following is a quote from 1665..."They had not space enough (according to the vulgar saying) to swing a cat in." The word �vulgar' here means �common', so the whole idea was clearly already virtually a proverb and so presumably a lot older still.
In addition, around the same time, archers used to practise their skills by shooting at a leather bag, known as a �bottle', containing a live cat! This would be swung around as a moving target and, presumably, the marksmen enjoyed hearing the poor creature's squeals if they hit it. Shakespeare wrote in Much Ado About Nothing, "Hang me in a bottle like a cat and shoot at me."
So, there are at least two historic references to a real cat swinging which long pre-date the Royal Navy's punishment implement.