Ships pre-1855 named ORIENT

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 39 of 39.
Port of registry Details Closure Official number Source Crew lists Links Port no/PR no
Aberdeen44/1848, 134 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 55TNA BT 98 Data post 18551/592 Lookup PR noPR
44/1848,  Lost 1850 TNA, BT 162/19-08, folio 323, 18501/592 Lookup PR noPR
Banff12/1855, 102 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 55, row 11TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Halifax, Nova Scotia17/1848,  Registry transferred to Windsor 1850 TNA, BT 162/20-3, folio 130, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Jersey43/1853,   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 62TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
43/1853, Sail, 25 tons   9723 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
London413/1838, 596 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-4, image 39TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
413/1838, 596 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 52, row 37 
490/1838, 326 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-4, image 39 
501/1838, 326 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-4, image 39 
404/1847, 596 tons   TNA, BT 111/7-1, image 2064/4780 Lookup PR noPR
404/1847, 596 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 764/4780 Lookup PR noPR
24/1854, 1032 tons   TNA, BT 111/7-1, image 2264/7617 Lookup PR noPR
24/1854, 1032 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 6764/7617 Lookup PR noPR
Newcastle53/1837, 252 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 8TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
44/1844,   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 1275/1526 Lookup PR noPR
44/1854, 250 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 7575/3027 Lookup PR noPR
Shields184/1849, 252 tons  Re-registered at Shields 32/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 49TNA BT 98 Data post 1855124/434 Lookup PR noPR
184/1849, 252 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-06, folio 237, 1850124/434 Lookup PR noPR
114/1850, 97 tons  Re-registered at Shields 152/1850 TNA, BT 162/19-06, folio 240, 1850124/621 Lookup PR noPR
152/1850, 96 tons  Registry transferred to Stockton 14/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 51 Data post 1855124/659 Lookup PR noPR
152/1850, 96 tons  Re-registered at Shields 28/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 51124/659 Lookup PR noPR
152/1850, 97 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-06, folio 240, 1850124/659 Lookup PR noPR
28/1853, previously Shields 152/1850  TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 51124/1153 Lookup PR noPR
32/1853, previously Shields 184/1849  TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 49124/1157 Lookup PR noPR
Stockton19/1844, 156 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 21TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
14/1853, previously Shields 152/1850  TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 51 
14/1853, 96 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 59 
14/1853, Sail, 96 tons   23673 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
Sunderland170/1845, 156 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 22TNA BT 98 Data post 185592/1260 Lookup PR noPR
170/1845,  Re-registered at Sunderland 9/1850 TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 259, 185092/1260 Lookup PR noPR
16/1846, 97 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 53, row 2392/1311 Lookup PR noPR
16/1846,  Registry transferred to Shields TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 260, 1850 Data post 185592/1311 Lookup PR noPR
9/1850, 156 tons  Re-registered at Sunderland 159/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 2392/3245 Lookup PR noPR
9/1850, 156 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-07, folio 272, 185092/3245 Lookup PR noPR
159/1853, previously Sunderland 9/1850  TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 54, row 2392/4038 Lookup PR noPR
159/1853, Sail, 156 tons   2605 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books 92/4038 Lookup PR noPR
Whitby20/1855, 287 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-3, image 55, row 4TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Windsor, NS16/1850, 78 tons   TNA, BT 162/20-4, folio 152, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Navigation up arrow