Ships pre-1855 named KINGSTON

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 2.    Records 1 to 50 of 71. Select page: Next | 1 | 2 | Last
Port of registry Details Closure Official number Source Crew lists Links Port no/PR no
Beaumaris11/1853, previously Dublin 24/1851  TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 3TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
11/1853, 306 tons  Registry transferred to Liverpool 76/1856 TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 45 Data post 1855 
Bridgwater9/1847, 103 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 50TNA BT 98 Data post 185515/177 Lookup PR noPR
9/1847, 104 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 22, 185015/177 Lookup PR noPR
Cork21/1840, 130 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 11, row 18TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
21/1840,  Re-registered at Cork 17/1850 TNA, BT 162/19-10, folio 412, 1850 
55/1846, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 5229/523 Lookup PR noPR
55/1846, 34 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-10, folio 414, 185029/523 Lookup PR noPR
17/1850, 129 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 7929/909 Lookup PR noPR
17/1850, 129 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-10, folio 417, 185029/909 Lookup PR noPR
Dublin51/1845, 306 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 53TNA BT 98 Data post 185535/515 Lookup PR noPR
51/1845, 306 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-10, folio 423, 185035/515 Lookup PR noPR
24/1851, 306 tons  Registry transferred to Beaumaris 11/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 3 Data post 185535/824 Lookup PR noPR
Grimsby10/1850, 47 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 7TNA BT 98 Data post 185549/88 Lookup PR noPR
10/1850, 48 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-03, folio 100, 185049/88 Lookup PR noPR
Halifax, Nova Scotia1/1850, 108 tons   TNA, BT 162/20-3, folio 137, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Hartlepool5/1855, previously Scarborough 13/1848  TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 20TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
5/1855, previously Scarborough 6/1852  TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 33 
5/1855, 263 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 59 
Hull16/1837, 276 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 1TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
4/1841, 79 tons  Re-registered at Hull 59/1844 TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 11, row 41 
59/1844, previously Hull 4/1841  TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 11, row 4152/336 Lookup PR noPR
59/1844, 79 tons  Registry transferred to Ramsgate 18/1853 TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 11, row 42 Data post 185552/336 Lookup PR noPR
59/1844, 79 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-03, folio 111, 185052/336 Lookup PR noPR
Kirkcaldy6/1838, 25 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 6TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
6/1838, 25 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-09, folio 372, 1850 
6/1838, Sail, 25 tons   18018 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
Liverpool9/1827, 268 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 10TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
163/1838, 388 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 13 
51/1842, 431 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 16 
160/1845, 431 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 6062/1928 Lookup PR noPR
160/1845, 431 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-04, folio 131, 185062/1928 Lookup PR noPR
45/1848, 388 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 1162/2713 Lookup PR noPR
76/1856, previously Beaumaris 11/1853  TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 45 
76/1856, 305 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 14, row 3 
London253/1834, 112 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 39TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
122/1835, 69 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 39 
362/1835, 278 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 39 
362/1835, 279 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 19 
416/1836, 294 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 39 
104/1838, 69 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 39 
112/1844, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-3, image 40 
112/1844, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 23 
81/1846, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/6-3, image 2564/4006 Lookup PR noPR
81/1846, 34 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 6364/4006 Lookup PR noPR
240/1852, 105 tons   TNA, BT 111/6-3, image 25 
240/1852, 105 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 31 
23/1853, 843 tons   TNA, BT 111/6-3, image 25 
23/1853, 843 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 13, row 32 
Newcastle46/1835, 388 tons   TNA, BT 111/31-1, image 12, row 32TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
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