A-Z Naval Records Digest and Thankyous

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James Vernon Cook - my 2nd great-grandfather

As promised, I thought I would present a digest or summary of all my Blogging from A-Z posts as a kind of cheat-sheet for anyone wanting some hints for researching ancestors with a naval background. As previously stated, this is from a very Anglo/Australian point of view, so apologies to researchers with heritage from other countries. Finally, this is not meant to be a definitive digest to all the resources available....just a digest of where my research took me and what I found.

 ACRONYMS/JARGON
As with any new topic of knowledge, you will encounter unfamiliar words or jargon...here is just a sample of what you may encounter...

 ADM - the acronym for Admiralty and the call sign as it were for The National Archives collection of records from Admiralty.

Fathom - equals 6 feet or 1.8 metres.

 Flagship - a ship carrying an Admiral

 HMS Pembroke - the Royal Naval Barracks at Chatham 

 Jackspeak - a sailor's dictionary

 Lean's Navy Lists - 1878 - 1916 - short biographies of Officers in the Royal Navy

 Protected cruiser

Ratings

 Rigs

 Remittance Registers 

 Wavy Navy - the Naval Reserve

 X-Craft - miniature subs

 Yardarm - the outer quarters of a yard, that part which lies outboard of the lifts, on eitehr side of the ship, i.e. the port and starboard yardarms.  They were the positions in a square-rigged ship where most of the flag signals were hoisted, and in the older days of sail, when the disciplinary code on board included punishments of death by hanging, were the traditional points from which men were hanged on board.(from The Oxford Dictionary of Ships and the Sea)


 BOOKS
The web is a wonderful thing to be sure but books/libraries are really where it's at.  Here is a selection that should get you on the right path, answer queries you might have or build a picture for you....in order of author's surname....

 J.J. Colledge's Ships of the Royal Navy

 Justin Corfield's The Australian Illustrated Encyclopaedia of the Boxer Uprising 1899-1901

 Conrad Dixon's Ships of the Victorian Navy

 Simon Fowler's Tracing your Naval Ancestors - a guide for Family Historians 

 Angus Konstam's Yangtze River Gunboats 1900-1949 

 Ian Nicholson's Log of Logs 

 Bruno Pappalardo's Tracing Your Naval Ancestors

N.A.M. Rodger's Naval Records for Genealogists

Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea

And don't forget leisure reading or reading fiction. Historic Naval Fiction will guide you. Joseph Conrad's Youth is a good read too.


PLACES
Part of the fun of family history is exploring...that means getting off your bottom and getting out and about.  Is there a naval or maritime museum near you?  Go and check it out.  Perhaps it is time to book a flight and visit old Blighty.....

 Admiralty Library National Maritime Museum

Australian National Maritime Museum

 British Library 

Caird Library and Archive 

Haslar Heritage Group 

 Kew or The National Archives

 Keyham where Engineering Officers were trained.

 London Metropolitan Archives

 Malta Family History

The National Maritime Museum 

 R.A.N. Heritage Centre

 Royal Geographical Society

Royal Greenwich Hospital 

 Royal Greenwich Hospital School  

 Royal Naval Asylum 

 Royal Naval College

Trinity House

 Zeebrugge Churchyard and Cemetery


Dockyards (ones in bold are Royal Navy)
Cadiz (or Mediterranean)
Chatham
Cork or Haulbowline
Deptford
Gibraltar
Halifax
Harwich
Jamaica or Kingston
Malta
Minorca (or Port Mahon)
Nelson's at Antigua
Pembroke
Penang (or Prince of Wales Island)
Plymouth or Devonport
Portsmouth
Sheerness
Woolwich
York (or Lake Ontario)
Resources/Websites/Help

 Australian War Memorial

 Bodleian Library

 CLIP or the Crew List Index Project

 Commonwealth War Graves Commission

 Cyndislist

50 researchers 

Genuki's Military Records page 

 Gun Plot

 Mariners

 Gilbert Provost's Register of Ships

 Internet Archive

 National Archives of Australia

National Library of Scotland

Navy Records Society

 Paul Benyon's Late 18th, 19th and early 20th Century Naval and Naval Social History

 Paul's Index of 19th Century Naval

 Project Gutenberg

Rum Ration



 San Francisco National Maritime National Historical park.

 Trove 

 UK Mariners 

 UKMFH

Vaughan Evans Library at the Australian National Maritime Museum

WorldCat

You Tube

TNA Guides

 Royal Naval Dockyards

Royal Navy Ratings' Service Records 1853-1928

 TNA Records

 Hospital musters from 1740-1860 ADM 102 

Prize Money Lists ADM 238 

 Ships Logs are located in ADM 53

Ships' musters can be found from 1667-1878 in ADM 36, ADM 37, ADM 38, ADM 39 and ADM 41.

Yard Pay Books for dockyard workers can be found in ADM 42. They cover the years 1660-1857. 
Thank you/Shout Out!

 Last but not least, a big shout out and thank you to everyone who commented on my blog.  I blog because I want to record my research but I also blog because I love interaction...people encouraging me or enlightening me ..or finding new cousins....thank you all for your support along the way.  Check out their blogs won't you...what an amazing bunch of people from all over the world. I call them my Mates given the nautical theme and my Strine (Australian) background. Mate meaning friend.

 Old Bloggy Mates

 Adventure before dementia - Diane B
Bob's Home for Writing - Bob Scotney
Family History Across the Seas - Pauleen Cass
Family History Fun - ScotSue
Finding Eliza - Kristin
Geniaus - Jill Ball 
GenieQ - Helen Connor
Jollett etc - Wendy
Library currants Carmel R Galvin
Strong Foundations - Sharon
That Moment in Time - Crissouli
Travel Genee - Fran Kitto
Twigs of Yore - Shelley Crawford

New Bloggy Mates

 A Bit to read - I.L. Wolf
A Postcard A Day - Sheila
Ancestor Chasing - Kerryn Taylor
Confessions of a Part-time working Mum - J Lenni Dorner
Family Reunion Keepsake Book - Sue
History RoundAbout - Kathrynf
How to Tell A Great Story - Aneeta Sundararaj
Kathleen Valentine's Blog - Kathleen Valentine
Life as a Potpourri - Sneha Sasi Kumar
Life Spoken Through Fingers -  Renee
Lori Henriksen - Lori
Molly's Canopy - Molly Charbonneau
My Genealogy Challenges - Dianne Nolin
Other Worlds -  Liz
P.S. Annie - Suzanne McClendon
Ragtag giggagon - Richard Gibney
The Squirrel Nutwork - Nutmeg
The Nimble Mime - Manisha Awasthi
The Old Shelter - Sarah Zama
Zulu Delta 45 

Comments

GeniAus said…
Do you ever sleep?

You've given me a long lists of blogs to check out .... and I'm supposed to be concentrating on my Irish research.

You are a Geneastar.

May 1, 2016 at 7:53 PM
Cassmob (Pauleen) said…
So much to read!! You haven't mentioned the merchant seamen guidebook...would you like the details?
May 1, 2016 at 9:06 PM
Alex Daw said…
Dear Jill - just occasionally! Dear Pauleen - yes please !
May 3, 2016 at 6:28 AM
Unknown said…
I'm working my way through as many A-Z Challenge bloggers as I can, and I've seen a handful of genealogy blogs in the process. As a recovering family tree researcher, I must say I really like the idea of blogging about the research rather than just posting the dry data on Ancestry somewhere.

It is very generous (and clever!) of you to provide this summary of resources all in one post. Must remember to steal this idea from time to time.

Speaking of, I'm collecting A-Z Challenge recap posts like yours over at Listly. Very interesting seeing the similarities and differences in everyone's experience this year. Enjoy! http://list.ly/list/17Wd-2016-a-to-z-challenge-wrap-ups
May 7, 2016 at 2:48 AM
Molly Charboneau said…
Thanks for the shout out! Great meeting you during the challenge. Hope to check back in the future...once I get some rest :-) Molly http://mollyscanopy.com/
May 8, 2016 at 2:06 AM
Anonymous said…
Wow that was odd. I just wrote an really long comment
but after I clicked submit my comment didn't show up.
Grrrr... well I'm not writing all that over
again. Anyways, just wanted to say superb blog!
October 16, 2018 at 1:25 PM
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