Ancestry Magazine

Throughout history, the seas, lakes, and rivers have played a dominant role in the flow of commodities and people. Water and the vessels that ply it have provided a livelihood for millions, and have generated volumes of research material.

As ancient mariners were drawn to the water, their descendants are charmed by tales of seafaring ancestors. Whether a runaway lad bewitched by the sea, a Frenchman who sailed with Lafayette, a merchant marine sailor who worked on the great Lakes a century later, or a “romantic” figure feted or foiled by the waves, most of us have at least one relative who piques our interest in marine-related records.

That America is fascinated with her watery past seems evident from the popularity of maritime museums and artifacts, and by the demand for related books, movies, TV documentaries, theme parks, etc. Hundreds of maritime sources are scattered across the country, each with a different scope and potential. Some are characterized by fishing, whaling, or naval activities; others are defined by specific ports or waterways. Some maritime records provide exciting biographical details; more often, they list only the names and perhaps residences of individuals. However, it is the possibility of placing our ancestor in a given time and place and documenting his or her role in a larger history that justifies a foray into maritime research. Nonetheless, maritime records are among the most unlikely sources used by researchers, in part because they are often among the most difficult to locate.

Mapping a Straight Course
You must know the full name of the person you want to find in maritime records. Misspelled names, nicknames, and inaccurate family traditions complicate most searches. You should know which kinds of records are the most likely sources of information, and where and when to look for them. Ports of Departure
The reference section and the computer catalog at the public library are the best starting points on any voyage into maritime research. Reference librarians are trained to expedite your research aims. Time spent reading about the history of maritime or naval activity in your area of interest can be most enjoyable, and will provide data needed to further a research project.

Most large libraries have reference volumes that identify more obscure, but significant sources such as The Perils of The Port of New York: Maritime Disasters From Sandy Hook to Execution Rocks by Jeannette Edwards Rattray (New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1973). This chronology of ship disasters from the 17th to the 20th centuries includes information such as: The Sheffield. “On Saturday, November 11, 1843, the Liverpool packet Sheffield with 130 passengers and crew aboard was entering New York Harbor in a southeasterly gale at 1 p.m. with a pilot. The ship, headed for Staten Island Light, struck on Romer Shoal. Passengers, mostly immigrants in the steerage, stampeded. Captain Charles W. Popham took charge.” The author quotes a journal description of how “High seas pounded the packet. Rain poured down. The cabin began to take water, driving people up on deck. The Sheffield’s three masts were chopped down and pushed overboard to lighten her. Tea and bread were served. Prayers were said. The Bible account of St. Paul’s shipwreck and deliverance was read. The water rose higher. Everyone expected to die. The author describes the dangerous hours before the passengers were miraculously rescued.

A number of published guides, specific to geographic areas of the Uni ted States, can be most helpful. For example, Great Lakes Maritime History: Bibliography and Sources of Information (Charles E. Feltner and Jeri Baron Feltner, Dearborn, MI: Seajay Publishing, 1982) cites reference works.

Periodical indexes, such as PERSI (see the Library Sources column in vol. 12 no. 2 of Ancestry Magazine) may point to fascinating and informative articles such as “Seamen’s Protection Certificate Records for Genealogical Research” by Ruth Dixon (National Genealogical Society Quarterly (NGSQ), vol. 78, no. 3, September 1990). This article explores four groups of records created when hijacking on the high seas was an occupational hazard of American seamen. The impressment of seafaring males into the service of foreign navies lasted well into the last century. In 1796, Congress enacted legislation whereby American sailors on commercial (or Merchant Marine) vessels were henceforth to be issued identification papers. The resulting seamen’s protection certificates served as passports, naming and describing their owners and documenting their nationalities in an effort to prevent hijackings.

While it is estimated that fewer than 1/10 of the original documents survive today, the four groups of seamen’s records can provide details that are hard to come by in other sources for the time period. Perhaps most useful in this category are the Seamen’s Protection Certificate Applications, created at the office of the collector of customs at U.S. ports. Each applicant was required to present written evidence of his birth, baptism, or naturalization, or a sworn and witnessed affidavit of some knowledgeable party.

The Dixon article states that “records for the port of Philadelphia are by far the most extensive,” with applications covering the period 1791 to 1861. Dixon is also the author of “Early Merchant Marine Records: Indexed 1824-11861,” an article that appeared in the Fall 1993 issue of the Federation of Genealogical Societies Foru m (vol. 5, no. 3). The index to 20,000 applications for seamen’s protection certificates filed by merchant seamen at the port of Philadelphia is now available in the Civil Reference Branch of the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Dixon notes that a 3 x 5-inch card index already exists for applications for 1797 through 1823, and that computerizing both indexes is the next step in the project. “Philadelphia Seamen’s Protection Certificate Applications,” an article by Ira Dye, further details these records (Prologue: Journal of the National Archives, vol. 18, no. 1, Spring 1986). The National Archives has the vast majority of the surviving seamen’s protection records.

Another NGSQ article is “Crews of Some 18th Century Rhode Island Whalers” by Kenneth Scott (NGSQ, VOL. 74, NO. 4, December 1986). Scott provides a brief historical description of the 18th century slavers from Rhode Island and their crews, carefully citing the manuscript collection of the New York Historical Society, the National Archives, and other sources that served as the basis for his work. In the same issue of NGSSQ, John Austin lists mariners or “Sailors in Dukes County, Massachusetts, Ports in 1850.”

“Finding River People on Western Waters” by Ann. H. Peterson (NGSQ Vol. 78, no. 4, December 1990) explores activities and records created during the peak period of steamboat activity. The essay focuses on 19th century rivermen working the Upper Mississippi, from Cairo, Illinois, to Saint Paul. Peterson defines crew ranks; stresses the importance of historical background; and describes the usefulness of census records, published rosters and reminiscences, collective works, directories, memoirs, newspapers, trade journals, private papers, business records, membership organizations, and special collections libraries, and the National Archives records relating to research on people of the waterways. Her 53 notes and references are a gold mine of “water sources,” alone.

Maritime Collections
The more than 70 maritime collections in the United States (most connected to museums) are rich storehouses of information. In “Maritime Museums: How to Search Them for Your Family’s History” by Jerry McWilliams and Waverly Lowell (Family Heritage, vol. 1, no. 5, October 1978), the authors explain that most maritime museums have four types of materials: 1) library materials, such as books, documents, and newspaper files; 2) a photograph archive; 3) an oral history collection; and 4) museum artifacts. They suggest three reference works:

1) Lloyd’s Register, The Record of American and Foreign Shipping and Merchant Vessels of the United States. A multi-volume set which lists ships registered with the international insurance syndicate in London, and provides names of shipmasters and shipowners. Annual issues list registers of ships and individual ship construction.

2) The Record of American and Foreign Shipping is similar, but contains a greater number of American ships.

3) Merchant Vessels of the United States has information on smaller American vessels and United States Government vessels.

These works can provide information about ships your ancestors may have commanded or owned, and can also verify the correct names of ships. Some volumes contain line drawings of the various types of vessels. The article lists six maritime museums with large research collections: Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 1355 Kalihi Street, Honolulu, Hawaii 96819; Mariner’s Museum, Newport News, Virginia 23606; National Maritime Museum at San Francisco, foot of Polk Street, San Francisco, California 94109 (J. Porter Shaw Library); Newport Historical Society, 82 Touro Street, Newport, Rhode Island, 02840; Peabody Museum, 161 Essex Street, Salem, Massachusetts 01970; Mystic Seaport, Mystic, Connecticut 06355 (G.W. Blunt White Library).

Several shipping and navigational colle ctions are housed in university libraries, such as the Center for Archival Collections at Bowling Green State University (Bowling Green, Ohio 43403). The center houses the largest documentary collection of Great Lakes shipping material in the nation, including photographs, published volumes, naval architectural drawings, pamphlets, letters, manuscripts, ships’ logs, corporate records, and scrapbooks. Of note are vessel enrollments from Great Lakes custom districts and vessel passage lists from major reporting points. Information on shipwrecks and ship genealogy is also available. A computerized inventory of shipwrecks in Michigan Coastal waters has been developed for the state Department of Natural Resources.

Coast to coast, the National Archives has the most diverse and extensive collection of maritime records. The Archives: A Guide to The National Archives Field Branches (Loretto Szucs and Sandra Luebking, Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1988) details the diversity of maritime and naval affairs in record groups located in regional archives. Records of the coast guard, the Bureau of Customs, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation, Maritime agencies, and Naval Districts and Shore Establishments are all potential sources of maritime and naval-related information. But the most intriguing records are found in the U.S. court records described in The Archives. Records in the National Archives-Southeast Region include records of the federal admiralty courts with cases from the Civil War and Spanish-American War. Some files involve importation of slaves.

The National Archives-New England Region court files include many that relate to activities of privateers during the War of 1812, and enforcement of the naval blockade against he South during the Civil War. Customs records at this location document the establishment and development of the import and export trade, individual seaports, lighthouses, revenue cutters, and vessels. The records frequently yield valuable information passengers, seamen, masters, and owners of vessels. Records relating to vessel documentation include registers, enrollments and licenses, bills of sale, and records of change of owners and inspection of vessels. Also included are records on lighthouses administration and operation, seaman registers, crew lists, shipping articles, and wreck reports.

From Maine to Connecticut, New England trading ships worked out to sea, bound for other American ports, the West Indies, and Europe. Documentation of these vessels found at the National Archives-New England Region provides first-hand accounts of the height of the Atlantic maritime industry when whaling was at its peak. Other records provide evidence of pirates and buccaneers when they reigned on the high seas. Journals and documents pertaining to New England ports often yield details on prominent figures in American history. A journal containing a list of ships registered at the port of New Haven, for example, lists Benedict Arnold, who, as a merchant and druggist of New Haven, regularly traded with Canada and the West Indies. Arnold frequently sailed the ships himself and is listed as the master of the Fortune on this registration list.

Even inland regions of the National Archives have records with potential information on individuals who worked on or near waterways in mid-America. Records of marine inspection and navigation at the National Archives-Great Lakes Region, for example, contain biographical information in the form of certificates of enrollment and licensing of commercial vessels and yachts, and oaths taken by owners and masters (some with naturalization information) for the states of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

Records at the National Archives-Northeast Region include such notable admiralty cases as those relating to the sinkings of the Titanic, Lusitania, and Andrea Doria. The branch has extensive material on such subject s as the Brooklyn Navy Yard, fortifications of rivers and harbors, and records of the collectors of customs for the District of New York and the ports of Albany, Newark, and Perth Amboy, including correspondence and records of entrances and clearances of vessels from 1815 to 1942.

Customs holdings at the Pacific Southwest Region include reports of shipwrecks off the southern California coast, and records of the ports of San Pedro, Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Luis. Records of the U.S. Coast Guard document West Coast commercial shipping activities and yacht enrollments, including those of many movie stars.

Customs Bureau files at the Pacific Northwest Region include fascinating tales of customs agents at isolated border outposts pitted against opium smugglers, counterfeiters, and other unscrupulous characters. Records of customs collectors in the Puget Sound district include correspondence, 1852 to 1905; journals and financial records relating to importing of merchandise into the United States, documentation and inspection of vessel records, and records concerning the enforcement of customs and navigation laws. Logbooks of merchant vessels in foreign commerce and shipping articles signed by all crew members are present for 1890 to 1911 and 1920 to 1954.

A Guide to Pre-Federal Records in The National Archives, compiled by Howard Wehmann and revised by Benjamin L. DeWhitt (National Archives Trust Fund Board, 1989) illuminates some of the nation’s earliest documents. A short section provides an example of its potential: JU.21.6. Case papers are another series from the Vice Admiralty Court of the Province of New York, located at the regional archives in New York. These records consist of libels, claims and answers, interrogatories, depositions, court orders, and other papers filed in prize cases, seamen’s wage suits, salvage cases, actions arising from evasions of customs regulations, cases involving cruel and unusual treatment of seamen, insubordination and mutin y, and miscellaneous cases, including an assault on passengers in an immigrant vessel for publicly objecting to a short allowance of food, and proceedings initiated by the “Surveyor of His Majesty’s Woods in America” against individuals for cutting down white pine trees reserved for masts for Royal Navy vessels.

Glenn Gordinier, a research associate with Mystic Seaport Museum, quoted in “Black Mariners Museum,” an AP article that appeared in the Salt Lake Tribune, 23 Mary 1994, with a New London, Conn. Dateline, said, “African-Americans in general are not aware of this aspect of their heritage, but then Americans in general don’t know their maritime history. It’s a vacuum in the American consciousness.” The preceding examples offer only a sampling of the potential in the unlikely sources of maritime records.

Loretto Dennis Szucs is a professional genealogist specializing in Chicago reseach. She is the author of several books and numerous published articles on genealogical sources.