Maritime History

Submitted by Guinevere

Sailors

The term sailor is commonly used to describe any man who went to sea, whether in the Royal Navy, Merchant Navy, Coastguards, Lifeboat Service, fishing fleet or as a pilot, privateer or a single boatman. If a man went to sea he was a sailor.

Mariners

The term mariner can be synonymous with sailor but is more likely to mean that the man was concerned with the navigation of the vessel. Master mariners were those skilled in navigation. A Master Mariner would probably have a Mate or Master's ticket and be on the Seaman's Register at the National Archives. Mariners would come under the umbrella heading of the Merchant Navy.

The main source for tracing details of merchant seamen and shipping, especially from the 18th century onwards, are the archives of the Registry of Shipping and Seamen (RSS). These records are held in a number of places. Some are with the RSS in Cardiff, some with the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich and National Archives of Scotland and Ireland. However, the majority are held in The National Archives in Kew. These records are broken down into categories and an explanation of how these can be viewed can be found on The National Archives.

Organised service records do not commence until 1835 when The Merchant Shipping Act of that year required masters of all ships to file Agreements and Crew Lists with the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen.

For those researching mariner ancestors who are experiencing difficulty locating them on the England and Wales census, Seamen on British Censuses contains a good explanation of the requirements regarding enumeration and may assist in helping you to locate those missing people!

The National Maritime Museum ~ Maritime Memorials is another good source of information for those researching this field.

Text from Family Tree Forum Online Magazine ~ Volume Two: April 2008

General Links

• National Maritime Museum's Guide to Researching Family History from Maritime Records

• Researching the Mariners and Ships of the Merchant Marine and the World's Navies

• Tracing British Seamen & their ships

• UK Mariners Site - All Things Nautical

• John's Nautical and Boatbuilding Pages

• The Maritime History Virtual Archives

• Merchant Navy and Royal Navy Information

• Lloyds Register of Ships 1764-2003

• Index to Lloyds Captains' Register

• Vessels & Enumeration in Census Records

• Index of Ships' Captains Australia and New Zealand

• The Ocean Liner Virtual Museum

• The Titanic

• See also Emigration and Immigration for Shipping Lists and more Maritime Resources.

The Royal Navy

• The Royal Navy

The Merchant Navy

• Records of Merchant Seamen

• The Federation Of Merchant Mariners

• Through Mighty Seas, Merchant sailing ships of the North West of England

• British Merchant Ship Losses in World War I

• Merchant Navy Losses in World War 2

• The Crew List index project - Merchant seafarers on British registered ships between 1861 and 1913

• How to trace Merchant Navy personnel

• How to trace Merchant Mariners, mates and engineers who served in the Merchant Navy

• Irish Merchant Seamen 1918-1921

Coastguards and Coastal Defences

• HM Coastguard

• British Coastguards 1841 - 1901

• History of The Coastguard With Particular Reference to Wick and Newbiggin-by-the-Sea

• History of Walton on the Naze Coastguard 1851-1901

• A Brief History of The Tenby Coastguard Service

• History of The Isle of Barra Coastguard

• The Irish Coastguard Service From The 18th Century to The Early 20th Century

• The South Coast Martello Towers

• Landguard Fort, Felixtowe

• The Needles Battery

• Newhaven Fort

• WW2 Coastal Defences Salthouse, Kelling & Weybourne, North Norfolk

• The Nothe Fort, Weymouth

• The Palmerston Forts Society Forts in Portsmouth Area

• Shoreham Fort

• The Maunsell Sea Forts, Whitstable

The Fishing Industry

• Hull Trawler Losses of World War One

• The Brixham Sailing Trawlers Database

• History of Fishing at Burton Bradstock

• A Guide to Family History in Hull and Grimsby Fishing Archives (pdf file)

• The Fishing Industry in Hastings

• The Polperro Fishing Industry

• Irish Sea Herring Fisheries in the 18th and 19th Century

• A History of the Scottish Fishing Industry

• The Stonehaven Fishing Industry

• The History of Fraserburgh's Fishing Fleet

• Buckie and District Fishing Heritage

• Milford Haven Trawlers

Lifeboats

• Grace Darling Museum

• Shore Thing. Crew Member Archives of the RNLI

• A Site Dedicated to The Lifeboat Men of Whitby Who Lost Their Lives in 1861

Many other Lifeboat stations have their own history sites, often with old Crew Lists and Photographs - these include:-

• Aberystwyth

• Burnham-on-Crouch

• Burnham-on-Sea

• Dover

• Falmouth

• Gravesend

• Lyme Regis

• Mumbles

• Portpatrick

• Ramsgate

• Sheerness

• Shoreham

• St Peter Port

• Swanage

• Thurso

• Walton and Frinton

• Wells-next-the-Sea

• Whitstable

Lighthouses

• Lighthouse Personnel in England, Wales and The Channel Islands c. 1790-1911

• Trinity House's Gallery of Lighthouses

• Map of UK Lighthouses in 1900, Scotland, Northern England and North of Ireland

• Map of UK Lighthouses in 1900, Southern England, The Channel Islands and South of Ireland

• History of Scottish Lighthouses

• Bellrock Lighthouse (off the Angus Coast)

• History of the Older Higher Lighthouse, Portland Bill

• A Brief History of Happisburgh Lighthouse

Shipbuilding

• The Shipbuiliding Industry of North East England 1790-1899

• Berwick on Tweed Shipyard

• Clydeside Shipbuilding History

• The Whitehaven Shipbuilding Industry

• Chatham Dockyard

• Titanic in Belfast~Harland & Wolff

• Harland and Wolff Apprentices

Shipping Companies

• The White Star, Shaw Savill and Albion Lines

• The Caledonian Macbrayne Fleet

• The Union Castle Line - Staff Register

• The Dundee Perth and London Shipping Company

• History of the P & O Shipping Company

• Manchester Liners Old Shipmates Association

• The Isle of Man Steam Packet Company

Shipwrecks

• Great British Shipwrecks

• Dorset and Portland Shipwrecks

• Chesil Beach Shipwrecks

• Shipwrecks off The Needles, Isle of Wight

• Isle of Man Shipwrecks

• Shipwrecks of Cork Harbour

• Early Australian Shipwrecks

Smuggling

• A History of British Smuggling

• A History of Smuggling in East Dorset

• The History of Smuggling in Polperro

• Smuggling in and around Burton Bradstock

Ports and Harbours

• Maritime London

• Piers of England

• Port Cities uk, Bristol, Hartlepool, Liverpool, London & Southampton

• Bristol Channel Pilots

• Brixham Heritage Sailing Trawlers Archive

• Tales of the Maritime Heritage of Cornwall

• Royal Dockyard Devonport

• Granton and Leith Trawlers

• Jersey Seaman's Benefit Society

• The History of Maritime Liverpool

• Liverpool Pilots

• Merseyside Maritime Museum

• Merseyside Shipping Snippets

• History of Portsmouth Dockyard

• South West Maritime History Society

• The Thames Sailing Barge Trust

• Thames Pilot

• Cardiff Mariners

• The Maritime History of Holyhead

• Maritime Llyn and the Sea.The Men, Ships and Ports of Llyn, Wales

• Swansea Mariners

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