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Ships' Crew, Information, Movements, Pictures and Shipwrecks

Web Sites for Genealogists - An Australian gateway site for tracing your family history by Cora Num

Need help with your shipping research? See  my latest book (2010) How Did They Get Here? Arrivals after 1924.  Click here for details.

Ships' Crew
State Records of South Australia offers online name searching using ArchivesSearch. Records available include masters, mates and engineers certificates of service and certificates of competency; marine surveyors and pilots licences plus records for seamen on the River Murray.

Persons Lost and Found 1838-1905 by Maureen M Leadbeater includes deserters from wives, families, ships, military and other service. Updated

Mariners and Ships in Australian Waters by M Warner lists the names of passengers and crew arriving in Sydney (1845-1922 with gaps). (See Online Indexes and Passenger Lists for details). Updated

Genseek's Mariner and Crew Records includes a captains index plus a wide variety of other indexes.

Mariners. This site is dedicated to research into the mariners and ships of the merchant marine and the world's navies. Information and links for Australia and New Zealand are available.

Hall Genealogy Website - UK Mariners Page. This extensive gateway site offers links to a wide variety of resources for researching UK mariners. It is a must to visit.

Maritime History Archive, St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada holds 70% of the records of the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen known as Agreements and Account of Crew of British Empire vessels. They hold 1863-1938 plus the majority of the records for 1951-1976.

Ships' Information
Australian Periodical Publications has digital copies of The Shipping Gazette and Sydney General Trade List online (1844-1855). Useful for detailed information on a specific voyage to Australia.

Register of Ships by G Provost and P Joicey has transcriptions from Lloyd's Register of British and Foreign Shipping (1764-2003). Ships are listed alphabetically with registration details such as rigging, tonnage, dimensions, propulsion, owners and master available.

Palmer List of Merchant Vessels Online by Michael Palmer contains extensive information and includes ships' pictures where available. The focus is on ships to the US but it includes ships that came to Australia.

The Maritime History Virtual Archives by Lars Brussels. This great site has information and links covering all aspects of maritime history and includes ships' pictures.

Ships' Movements Lists
Ozships: Australian Shipping 1788-1968.  This site lists shipping arrivals and departures. It also includes 92,000+ passenger list entries which can be browsed alphabetically. 

Passenger Ships arriving in Australasian Ports. Includes arrivals (not all listed) to New South Wales (1837-1899), Queensland (1840-1915), South Australia (1836-1860), Victoria (1837-1899), Western Australia (1829-1889), New Zealand (1839-1905) and convict transports (1788-1868).

Index to vessels arriving in Sydney 1837-1925 by Mary-Anne Warner. This index to 120,133 records lists the name and type of vessel plus date of arrival in Sydney. This index is useful for checking or confirming the date of arrival once you know the name of the ship. 

South Australian Genealogy & Heraldry Society Shipping Arrivals. This alphabetical list of ships arriving in South Australia (1836-1886) lists ships' name, arrival date and port plus departure port.

The Pioneers Association of South Australia. This site contains a List of Ships to South Australia 1836-1845. It lists name of the ship; departure port and date, arrival port and date, other information such as ship type and tonnage plus details of the number of passengers.

Ships' Pictures
See also Pictorial Databases
Norway Heritage - Hands Across the Sea. This extensive site is a great place to search for historical details and images of ships. Searches can be made by ship name or owner/operator such as Cunard Line or White Star Line. Detailed histories are available on various steamship companies plus images of the ships, advertisements and ships' postcards (where available). New

National Maritime Museum Picture Library (Greenwich UK) holds almost three million items. The collection includes historical photography, ship plans, prints, oil paintings, astronomical and navigational instruments, and ship models. Updated 

National Maritime Museum (Greenwich UK). Research guide G3: Passengers: Ships sailing to Australia & New Zealand (images). This guide lists some of the National Maritime Museum's photographic material (original photos, or photographs of plans, pictures or models) showing ships that have sailed to Australia and New Zealand. New

Wikimedia Commons is a media repository created and maintained by volunteers. It provides a central repository for freely licensed photographs, diagrams, animations and other media. Currently there are seven million+ freely usable media files available. Use the search box and enter Category:Ships. There are 48 ship categories returned including ships by name (3,000+). New

Australian War Memorial collection databases include photographs. The photograph collection contains almost one million images. Use this database to locate photographs of troopships, hospital ships or naval ships. Note that many of the hospital and troopships were immigrant ships before and after war service. New

Australian National Maritime Museum Go to the Quick Links at the bottom of the page and click on  Research Guides.  Click on the Pictures of ships in the Australian trade guide which details available indexes including the Vaughan Evans Maritime Illustration Indexes from the Illustrated Sydney News (1853-1889), the Illustrated London News (1842-1891) and the Australasian Sketcher (1873-1889). There is also access to the Index to Ship Pictures compiled from books in the Museum Library collection. It includes a wide range of titles covering the sailing ship era up to current day cruise ships, illustrated newspapers and maritime art books. Updated

Passenger and Emigrant ships to Australia and New Zealand. A list of ships and where to find pictures of them. It lists 700+ sailing ships for the period up to 1880 and 500 steamers for the period 1880-1914. New                                   

Steam and motor ships that carried passengers to Australia and New Zealand from 1918 to the 1970s. This site also lists the transports that carried troops to the Middle East, Singapore and New Guinea in World War II. There is detailed information for each ship plus a picture if available or information where a picture can be found. New

Richard McKenna Memorial Pictorial Shipping Database. This Australian collection comprises library books, shipping registers, ship's photographs, maps and charts, shipping memorabilia, ship's plans and other maritime paraphernalia. The online database is currently being re-developed.

State Library of South Australia. H A Godson Collection of River Murray Shipping contains 16,000+ photographs of paddle steamers and other vessels and river ports, as well as historical River Murray scenes. For access use the South Australiana Database and enter Godson as a search term under the Collection of Pictorial Material option or do a Keywords search by ship's name.

State Library of South Australia. The A D Edwardes Collection of 8,000+ Photographs of Sailing Ships from around the world, taken between 1865-1920. For access to 2,280+ of these images use the South Australiana Database and enter A D Edwardes as a search term under the Collection of Pictorial Material option or do a Keywords search by ship's name.

Art School Online by Roger Elliott. This interesting site has online lessons in drawing sailing ships. There is detailed explanations on the type of ships and rigs etc.

Shipwrecks
Environment Australia National Shipwreck Database of all known shipwrecks in Australian waters. 

Encyclopedia of Australian Shipwrecks by Peter Stone. This site, based on material collected by Jack Loney, lists 8,000+ entries. There is an entry for each vessel shipwrecked with relevant physical details and details of her loss. This is followed by a code to a published reference work.

Ships' Graveyards of South Australia. This site provides comprehensive information about deliberately abandoned vessels in South Australian waters. It includes location map and descriptions of 19 identified sites; facts sheets, with histories and photographs, for all known graveyard vessels. It also provides access information if you wish to visit the sites.

Western Australian Maritime Museum Western Australian Shipwrecks Database.

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© Cora Num 1997-2010. Last updated 30 May 2010