Nelson & His World

Just wondered if anyone has any detailed knowledge of Receiving ships.

I want to plot the 10 year career of a man who was recruited under the Quota Acts in 1795 and ended up at Trafalgar on HMS Collosus.

His muster entry on Collosus gives his previous ship as Enterprise/Deptford cutter. It's possible I can work backwards and eventually arrive at his first/Receiving ship.

Or were there so few Receiving ships that I could check for him on their musters and work forwards.

Or maybe I try to do both and hopefully meet in the middle.

If anyone has performed a similar exercise I would be most grateful to hear what approach you took.

MB

I believe the recommended way is to go backwards. Otherwise - unless you have some definite info on where he was sent - it would mean hours of trawling through several muster books. In 1795 there were about fourteen or so several receiving ships in service.

P

Thanks for your reply.

I didn't know how many Receiving ships there were. But your figure of fourteen doesn't surprise me given the numbers of men they were trying to recruit under the Quota Acts.

I am intrigued one day to see the musters for one of these ships. It must have been a pretty chaotic business, with a constant stream of men coming and going.

I get the feeling that they were pretty nasty places - sort of one step up from a Prison Hulk. The officers were a poor bunch, and the living conditions dire.

I will follow your advice, try and locate him on the Enterprise and work backwards from there.

Meawhile I would be very interested to know the names of the fourteen Receiving ships and the ports where they were located? Is there anywhere that I can pick up that information.

Fingers crossed the guy I am researching spent many years on each of his ships!!

MB

Receiving ships are identified in Steel’s Lists (later lists just show the abbreviation RS). Steel’s List also provides the comment: “Ships for receiving stores on-board are stationed at Portsmouth, Plymouth, Chatham, and Sheerness, and are termed, Receiving-Ships”. This suggests to me that not all were necessarily used for receiving men. The Navy List for 1799 in two parts in the Naval Chronicle volume 1 (now at last available as full text in Google Books) identifies a number of receiving ships at that time. There seem to be five or six for Plymouth alone. I have seen the Salvador del Mundo mentioned as a receiving ship at Plymouth earlier, but the Naval Chronicle lists it as a prison ship in 1799.

I certainly concur with PhiloN’s recommendation to work through musters backwards from the known ship. If the man’s service was continuous, I have found that can be very quick and easy. What slows you down is the retrieval time for the next book, so make sure you have a second piece of research to do while waiting or you will end up filling in time with endless trips to the cafeteria! Of course that second piece of research might be working through receiving ships’ musters if you have identified them! You might be forced to follow both approaches if there was a break in service.

The date of entry in one ship’s muster should give you a good indication of the date of discharge in the previous ship’s muster, but sometimes the date of entry will just be the date the new book was started. If uncertain of dates, I would also recommend working backwards through each individual muster book. You will no doubt know all this, but this is because each two month book bound into the volume often carries forward all the men’s names from the previous two month book, even those previously discharged. If you search from the beginning, you have to go through all the two month books until you hit the man’s date of entry, whereas you might find him straight off in the last one. This isn’t always the case, as sometimes a new two month muster book will drop out men previously discharged, and renumber the men remaining in the muster. You can do a quick check for this by comparing the numbering in the first and last books in the volume.

Good luck!

I checked the early part of the captain's log of the Impetueux, the start of which I have a digital copy. She was being refitted at Portsmouth in October 1796. It records that on 8 November, two days before she sailed, 'the Ships Company shifted from the Russel'. I wonder if this was a receiving ship, as it seems it was being used to muster and accommodate most the crew while the refit was taking place.

..you asked: "...Meawhile I would be very interested to know the names of the fourteen Receiving ships and the ports where they were located? Is there anywhere that I can pick up that information".

Steels monthly Navy Lists show them.


In the May 1795 edition of Steel’s Navy List, the following are shown

CHICHESTER at Plymouth
ESSEX at Portsmouth
ENTERPRIZE at the Tower
MODESTE at Portsmouth
MEDWAY at Plymouth
PRINCE EDWARD at Chatham
PRINCESS CAROLINE at Sheerness
PROSPERITY at Sheerness
RIPPON at Portsmouth
RAINBOW at Woolwich
WARRIOR at Portsmouth
WARWICK at Chatham
YARMOUTH at Plymouth

Total - 13 ships

There was also the DEPTFORD and WOOLWICH tenders, listed as being employed on the Impress Service

The harbour guardships could also receive men I believe; again from the May 1795 edition of Steel's list -
CAMBRIDGE at Plymouth, flag of Vadm Sir R Knight
SANDWICH at the Nore, flag of Vadm C Buckner
LEOPARD in the Downs, Capt Swaffield
ROYAL WILLIAM at Spithead, flag of Adm Sir P Parker

..As I noticfe that your man was sent from the ENTERPRISE/DEPTFORD - the first was a receiving ship, the second a press tender. It is likely that you have found the start of his career...??

Enterprise was based in the river Thames, by the Tower of London

Chas & Philo

I really appreciate these informative replies.

Chas - That description in Steel's Navy List is really odd. It's as if they made a misprint and should have called them "Store ships".

I checked out Smyth's "Sailor's Word Book" and he says:

No mention of stores!!

Philo - Fantastic to have that list of all the Receiving ships. I pictured them at the main naval ports - but not one on the Thames by the Tower of London!

This chap I am researching - I have the same name, age and place of birth on a list of Quota Act recruits and the Trafalgar Roll (HMS Collosus). The name is quite unusual - Luke Vaughton. So I am 99.9% certain that is it the same fellow.

And yet the muster of Collosus says that he joined in 1803 from the Enterprise/Deptford tender.

I suppose there could be reasons for a man to end up on a Receiving ship "mid-career". Or maybe, just maybe, these are 2 different people.

Oh well! Plenty still to learn here - that's for sure. I love the detective work in research - but just sometimes it would be nice if things were a trifle more straightforward!!

Thanks again for all your help.

I will report back with any developments.

MB

The Enterprize was still a receiving ship at the Tower in 1805, and the Deptford was still in service in the Thames, so I suspect your man was paid off during the Peace of Amiens and pressed or volunteered again in 1803. So you may have a break in service to contend with!

The Steel's List description of receiving ships for receiving stores was repeated from at least 1784 to 1800. By 1805 the description had changed to distinguish receiving-ships and store-ships as follows: "Ships for receiving men newly raised are stationed at Portsmouth, Plymouth and Sheerness; and are termed RECEIVING-SHIPS. There are also Store-Ships at these and other principal ports". However, in the 1795 list and earlier lists there were a few other ships identified as store-ships with the abbreviation SS, both in ordinary and in commission. It seems a long running confusion!

Tony

Thanks for this additional information.



I wasn't think straight was I!! It makes perfect sense that he was paid off and rejoined. And adds to my logic that I may have to work backwards AND forwards to cover the 10 years between 1795 and 1805.

I looked on the IGI and found a Luke Vaughton getting married on 24th May 1803. And the Ayshford Trafalgar Roll says that "my" Luke Vaughton made an allotment of salary to his wife on 16th August 1803.

So quite a few pieces seem to be fitting into the jigsaw!!



In that case I guess it must have been a generally accepted term during that period - otherwise some eagle eyed reader would surely have picked them up on it??!!

Smyth's "Word Book" was of course published later in the nineteenth century.

BUT I notice that Falconer had a very clear description of a "Store Ship" as follows:



What a strange time it was. Some things very precisely defined - and others quite loose. Maybe if you were there at the time it all made perfect sense.

Quite likely our own times will appear equally confusing 200 years hence.

Thanks again

MB

My mistake re the Russell. This was Capt John Willet Payne's previous ship, which he commanded at the Glorious 1st of June. During that engagement the America, (then renamed Impetueux) was captured, and Payne was later rewarded with her command. So the Russell acted as his own receiving ship but was probably not generally used for that purpose.

I cannot find Vol 1 on Google Books - does anyone have the URL?

vela, the URL for the Naval Chronicle vol 1 is http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pyMoAAAAYAAJ - Sorry, I should have included it before, as Google Books is an absolute nightmare when it comes to multi-volume books or journals. Considering Google's stated 'mission' is to organise the world's information, you would think they could allow you to search by volume number or issue number. It would be a start just to show it it the search results! Even the publication date doesn't always help - sometimes it's the date of the first volume/issue, sometimes it's that date of the correct volume/issue, and sometimes it's just a random number! (End of rant!)

Thanks, Tony.

Am I correct in thinking that the volumes missing from the web are IX, XVII, XXII, XXVIII, XXIX, XXXIX and XL?

A combined index to the Naval Chronicle would be an interesting tool. (I am aware of Hurst’s index to Births, Deaths and Marriages).