Ships pre-1855 named BLESSING

This page is an index of ships by name drawn from the primary records of British shipping prior to 1855.

All British ships were registered at one of the hundreds of ports of registry around Britain and the then British Colonies. The documents relating to them, including the crew lists and agreements are now at The National Archives (TNA).

The index shows the ships' names and ports of registry, with links to other data such as the crew list holdings and with clear references to the sources of our data.

For a full explanation of the records of British shipping, please see our information page: Records of British ships

How to search for ships pre-1855 by name

On the search form, enter at least three letters of the ship's name and select whether you wish to make an Exact match search, or a fuzzy search based on whether the name Starts with this, Includes this or Ends with this. The form will not accept wild-card searches using '*', '%', '?' and suchlike.

For Exact searches only, if you know the ship's port of registry you can choose that from the list. Otherwise, just leave this blank.

Then click

Reading the results

For exact searches, the results show the ships' ports of registry.

For the fuzzy searches, the results show an alphabetic list of possible ship names, from which you can select one to go to an exact search result.

The results show a list of registry details, together with other details such as tonnage. Some data sources show the official number which was allocated from 1855 onwards and which we include as a convenient link to data for the ship post-1855.

Any available details of the register closure are shown.

The source of our information is shown. In some cases, the icons link to images of the Appropriation Books which show data for ships registered pre-1855. You can check our data for yourself.

On the right-hand side of the page, there are further links.

provides details of the crew list holdings at TNA for ships of that name and port (with further links to the FamilySearch films online). Be aware The TNA catalogue shows only the range of names held in each box. There is no guarantee that there will be records for a particular ship.

links to the CLIP advanced search pages which will show any data we have for ships post-1855 of that name and port. Be aware Because that search is by name and port, these are only tentative suggestions - the ship may have ceased to exist, or her port of registry may have changed.

The final column, Port no/PR no, shows port number and port rotation number combinations for that ship, which we have recorded or have interpolated from crew list records for the period 1845 to 1854 in BT 98 at TNA. These numbers were used in the records of seafarers such as BT 113 and BT 124.

For more details of port numbers, see Port numbers . For more details of port rotation numbers, see Port rotation numbers

The entries are colour coded.  nn/nnn  indicates data drawn from BT 98.  nn/nnn  indicates data interpolated from BT 98 data. Blank entries indicate where we have no data and are not able to interpolate data reliably, for example registrations pre-1845. Many early (and some post-1853) registrations may never have been allocated a port rotation number.

The link next to the data goes to the main port rotation numbers page for that registration.

Our thanks to James Canney for suggesting adding the port rotation number data.

Data sources

The sources of the data are:

Please see our general information page CLIP data for details on sources, methodology, the abbreviations we have used, and our acknowledgements.

Be aware! CLIP data is transcribed 'as seen' - we have not tried to interpret or correct it (but see note about BT 111 in the Data sources section). Where we have doubts about an item, or have edited it, we mark it with a  ? .

Page 1 of 1.    Records 1 to 46 of 46.
Port of registry Details Closure Official number Source Crew lists Links Port no/PR no
Boston38/1836, 36 tons  Registry transferred to Hull 6/1855 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 11TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
38/1836, 36 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 18, 1850 
20/1843, 37 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 12 
20/1843, 37 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 19, 1850 
Bridgwater7/1838, 27 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 13TNA BT 98 Data post 185515/49 Lookup PR noPR
7/1838, 27 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 21, 185015/49 Lookup PR noPR
11/1851, 27 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 24 
11/1851, Sail, 27 tons   10805 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
Dartmouth11/1843, 30 tons  Registry transferred to Hull 16/1856 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 27TNA BT 98 Data post 185531/430 Lookup PR noPR
11/1843, 30 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-02, folio 65, 185031/430 Lookup PR noPR
Goole42/1837, 54 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 40TNA BT 98 Data post 185547/95 Lookup PR noPR
42/1837, 55 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-03, folio 92, 185047/95 Lookup PR noPR
11/1854, previously Hull 38/1844  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 2 
11/1854, 42 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 14, row 28 
Harwich4/1829, 63 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 1TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
4/1829, 63 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-03, folio 104, 1850 
Hull38/1844, 42 tons  Registry transferred to Goole 11/1854 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 2TNA BT 98 Data post 185552/315 Lookup PR noPR
38/1844, 43 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-03, folio 111, 185052/315 Lookup PR noPR
11/1852, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 69 
6/1855, previously Boston 38/1836  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 11 
6/1855, 36 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 15, row 5 
16/1856, previously Dartmouth 11/1843  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 11, row 27 
16/1856, 36 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 15, row 22 
London163/1844, 342 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-1, image 27TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
163/1844, 342 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 31 
Newcastle188/1838, 12 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 59TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
188/1838, 12 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-05, folio 172, 1850 
55/1847, 342 tons  Lost TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 6475/2223 Lookup PR noPR
55/1847, 342 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-05, folio 179, 185075/2223 Lookup PR noPR
21/1854, previously Shields 199/1851  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 14, row 675/3004 Lookup PR noPR
21/1854, 12 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 14, row 2675/3004 Lookup PR noPR
21/1854, Steam, 12 tons   19740 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books 75/3004 Lookup PR noPR
Shields199/1851, 12 tons  Registry transferred to Newcastle 21/1854 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 14, row 6TNA BT 98 Data post 1855124/926 Lookup PR noPR
St John's, Newfoundland39/1829, 30 tons   TNA, BT 162/20-2, folio 76, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Sunderland80/1846, 343 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 12, row 75TNA BT 98 Data post 185592/1375 Lookup PR noPR
35/1849, 345 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 5592/2065 Lookup PR noPR
35/1849, 346 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 268, 185092/2065 Lookup PR noPR
Swansea12/1827, 22 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 2TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
12/1827,  Totally lost TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 278, 1850 
Weymouth4/1833, 35 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 6TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
4/1847, 36 tons  Re-registered at Weymouth 1/1852 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 7101/130 Lookup PR noPR
4/1847, 35 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 283, 1850101/130 Lookup PR noPR
1/1852, previously Weymouth 4/1847  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 7 
1/1852, 35 tons  Registry transferred to Whitby 19/1854 TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 64 Data post 1855 
Whitby19/1854, previously Weymouth 1/1852  TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 13, row 64TNA BT 98 Data post 1855104/929 Lookup PR noPR
19/1854, 35 tons   TNA, BT 111/29-3, image 14, row 27104/929 Lookup PR noPR
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