Ships pre-1855 named FAVORITE

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 90. Select page: Next | 1 | 2 | Last
Port of registry Details Closure Official number Source Crew lists Links Port no/PR no
Aberdeen11/1832, 20 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 1TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
10/1844, 207 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 71/404 Lookup PR noPR
10/1844, 207 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-08, folio 322, 18501/404 Lookup PR noPR
Aberystwyth51/1837, 119 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 8TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
11/1847, 119 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 32, row 502/221 Lookup PR noPR
11/1847, 119 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 2, 18502/221 Lookup PR noPR
17/1848, 40 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 2, 18502/245 Lookup PR noPR
17/1850, 62 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 32, row 552/321 Lookup PR noPR
Alloa2/1853, 76 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 36, row 33TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Baltimore2/1839, 51 tons  Re-registered at Baltimore 4/1853 TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 14TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
4/1853, previously Baltimore 2/1839  TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 14 
Banff2/1844,   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 16TNA BT 98 Data post 18557/114 Lookup PR noPR
3/1850, 41 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 32, row 597/251 Lookup PR noPR
Belfast139/1836, 125 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 21TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Cardiff6/1837, 62 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 38TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
6/1837,  Registry transferred to Aberystwyth 1850 TNA, BT 162/19-01, folio 39, 1850 Data post 1855 
Cardigan34/1836, 33 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 40TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
50/1836, 40 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 41 
Colchester19/1851, Sail, 9 tons   16587 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books TNA BT 98 Data post 185527/517 Lookup PR noPR
Falmouth15/1838, 55 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 4TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Faversham128/1824, 68 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 8TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
128/1825, Sail, 67 tons   11233 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
19/1836, 8 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 9 
Fort William7/1845, 37 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 7TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Glasgow34/1837, 41 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 14TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
34/1837, 41 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-09, folio 348, 1850 
Gloucester12/1825, 7 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 20TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Greenock28/1840, 405 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 3, row 33TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
28/1840, 405 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-09, folio 360, 1850 
Inverness15/1843, 26 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 5TNA BT 98 Data post 185554/213 Lookup PR noPR
22/1844,   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 654/289 Lookup PR noPR
Jersey60/1839, 16 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-11, folio 451, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855152/131 Lookup PR noPR
3/1853, Sail, 17 tons   9536 View details for this ONRSS, Appropriation Books  
Kirkcaldy25/1836, 182 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 12TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Kirkcudbright7/1837, 58 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-2, image 2, row 77TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Kirkwall6/1842, 20 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 13TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
6/1842, 20 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-09, folio 374, 1850 
3/1849, 50 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-09, folio 374, 185058/97 Lookup PR noPR
Lancaster4/1844,   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 14TNA BT 98 Data post 185559/122 Lookup PR noPR
Leith1/1836, 135 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 15TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Lerwick8/1843, 19 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 18TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
Limerick5/1826, 18 tons   ?   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 24TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
5/1826, 18 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-11, folio 429, 1850 
Liverpool290/1847, 662 tons   TNA, BT 162/19-04, folio 136, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 185562/2648 Lookup PR noPR
Liverpool, NS10/1848, 61 tons   TNA, BT 162/20-3, folio 144, 1850TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
London420/1824, 55 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 40TNA BT 98 Data post 1855 
529/1825, 49 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 42 
33/1830, 187 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 47 
320/1836, 53 tons   TNA, BT 111/5-2, image 36 
394/1836, 46 tons   TNA, BT 111/30-1, image 59, row 53 
Navigation up arrow