Lloyds Register Database

(Lloyd’s Register of Shipping 1764–66 © Lloyd’s Register)

Lloyd’s Register of Shipping, founded in London in 1760, assesses and certifies ships and offshore structures to ensure they meet international standards for safety, quality, and environmental performance. Lloyd's first register of assessed shipping dates from 1764–66, and Lloyd’s have kindly allowed us to present their data from this register, which we have mapped and made fully searchable. Further details on Lloyd’s archives can be found here.

There are just over 400 entries which do not have recorded voyages. Therefore, details of the ships and people linked with them will appear in the searches, but not the mapping functions.

• People Searches

  These search boxes look for the letters entered by the user and match them to surnames containing those letters (e.g., typing ‘SM’ will return ‘Cheesman’, ‘Osmond’, etc.). To search for ‘John Smith’, type ‘Smith’ and click the blue search button to show all surnames that include ‘Smith’. After searching for a surname, you can filter results by entering a forename in the box above the column. For example, to filter shipmasters called ‘John Smith’, type ‘John’ in the box above the master’s names.

• Location Searches

  You can search for the places where ships were built, voyage origins and destinations, and whether a ship sailed via another location.

• Ship Name Searches

  You can search by a ship’s current name (name at the time of registration) or any former or new name(s) it might have.

• Ship Type Search

  You can search by ship type (e.g., brig, pink, bark, etc.).

Filtering Your Search Results

To filter search results — for all columns except the names of shipmasters (see above) — click on a particular value. For example, clicking ‘London’ in the Voyage Origin column displays only records containing ‘London’. Results can be filtered by multiple criteria at once (such as Where Built and Year Built). You can also filter by entering text in the box above the relevant column. The arrows on the right of each column heading order results alphabetically or by year. Note that clicking the blue search button without entering any search terms will display the entire dataset.

‘Previous Search’ and ‘Clear’

After filtering your search results by multiple criteria, clicking the ‘Previous Search’ button returns you to your original search, removing all filters. For example, after searching for shipmaster ‘Smith’ and then filtering by ‘Owner’ and ‘Where Built’, clicking ‘Previous Search’ returns you to the search originally performed (‘Smith’). The ‘Clear’ button removes all search criteria, but you will have to manually remove any text entered into the filter boxes above the search results.

Further Information

Clicking on the ‘View voyage details’ link in the Source Ref column displays additional details of that entry, such as the year(s) the ship appears in the Register, its tonnage, number and type of guns, hull condition, etc. In this period, Lloyd’s graded the hulls of ships via a system of vowels (A, E, I, O, U), with A the best quality and U the worst.

Interactive Mapping

We have mapped where ships were built (no homeports are provided in this register) and their voyages. After performing a search, clicking on the Map - Place Built, Map - Voyage Origin, and Map - Voyage Destination tabs will display the locations on a modern map. Interacting with any location circle displays information relevant to that location. Clicking the Map – Voyage tab shows the voyages undertaken by the ships. The size of the location circle represents the number of voyages associated with that location. The width of the voyage lines demonstrates the number of voyages on the route — the more voyages, the thicker the line. Clicking on the voyage line or the location circle lists the voyages related to that route or location.

How to Cite

The documentary reference in the Source Ref column is the location of the entry in the original shipping register — first by the year of the register, then by the first letter of the ship’s name, and finally by the entry number under that letter. For example, the brig called Betty (64/B/236) appears in the register for 1764 under the letter ‘B’ and is the 236th entry under that letter.

Please acknowledge use of this data as follows:

Lloyds Register of Shipping 1764 (Lloyds Register Foundation, 1764): LRS 64/B/236, taken from: www.maritimebritain.org, date of access.

Contact Us

We welcome your comments, feedback, and queries. You can do so by emailing us here.