Reproduced with the approval of the author Michael Palmer
Lloyd's Register of [British and Foreign] Shipping is a British
publication that describes, classifies and registers vessels according
to certain criteria of physical structure and equipment, to enable
underwriters, shipbrokers, and shipowners more easily to assess
commercial risk and to negotiate marine insurance rates.
The name "Lloyd" derives from Edward Lloyd, the "coffee man", as he
called himself, who operated a coffee house in London, originally in
Tower Street, then, from just after Christmas 1691, in Lombard Street,
near the General Post Office. Lloyd's coffee house served as a meeting
place for merchants wishing to exchange news, as well as for merchants
and underwriters wishing to negotiate insurance on vessels and cargo.
The earliest surviving volume of Lloyd's Register dates from 1764,
updated in manuscript to 1766; other surviving volumes date from 1768
(letters M-Z only, updated in manuscript to 1771), 1775-1784, 1786-87,
1789 1802, 1803, 1804-1806, 1807, 1808-1816, and 1818 to date. Between
1800 and 1833, a dispute between underwriters and shipowners resulted in
the publication of two separate registers, the "Green Book" by a society
of the former, the "Red Book" by a society of the latter; for 1803 and
1806, only the Green Book survives. The coverage of these registers is
similar but not identical, some vessels being included in one but not
the other. In 1834, a new society independent of both underwriters and
shipowners, Lloyd's Register of British and Foreign Shipping, was
formed, to supervise surveys of vessels [1] and to publish Lloyd's
Register of Shipping. This society, despite the similarity of names,
is, and always has been, completely separate from, and independent of,
the underwriters of Lloyd's (the Corporation of Lloyd's, familiarly
known as "Lloyd's of London"), which was first incorporated in 1871.
Lloyd's Register has been published annually since at least 1775;
since 1834, it has been published in the middle of the year, covering
the following period 1 July through 30 June. D. T. Barriskill's
indispensable "A Guide to the Lloyd's Marine Collection and Related
Marine Sources at Guildhall Library", "Guildhall Library Research Guide 7
(2nd ed.; London: Guildhall Library, 1994)", pp. 4-7, gives a detailed
description of the Register, including (p. 5), the following table of
main categories of information published, together with the dates
between which each appeared:
Name of vessel ............................ 1764-date
Previous names (if any) ................... 1764-date
[between 1786 and 1871, as part of the Government's provisions to combat
smuggling, British vessels were forbidden by statute from changing
names; however, this provision did not prevent the owner of a vessel
from making a "colourable" sale to foreigners "off the register", in
order to return the vessel to the statutory register under a different
name]
Official number ........................... 1872/73-date
Signal code ............................... 1874/75-date
Rig/description ........................... 1768-date
Tonnage ................................... 1764-date
gross/net/under-deck ................. 1874/75-date
Dimensions
load-draught ......................... 1775-1833
length/breadth/depth ................. 1863-date
Description of engines .................... 1874/75-date
Date of building .......................... 1764-date
[Green Book, 1800-1833, gives age]
Place of building ......................... 1764-date
Name of builder ........................... 1860-date
Name of owner ............................. 1764-date
Name of master ............................ 1764-1920/21
(to 1947 in Register of Sailing Vessels)
dates of service with owner/on vessel. 1887-1920/21
Number of crew ............................ 1764-1771
Port of registry .......................... 1834-date
Port of survey ............................ 1764-date
Class ..................................... 1764-date
"Postings" of casualties, etc ............. 1775-1966/67
Destined voyage ........................... 1764-1873/74
Researchers consulting Lloyd's Register should bear in mind that
although the information in Lloyd's Register was considered current at
the time of publication, before the introduction of telegraphic
communication, this information, in particular with regard to the
identities of the master (whose name was not infrequently garbled) and
owner, was often out of date, occasionally by several years. In
addition, vessels lost or "sold foreign" might continue to appear in the
Register for several years, until the society was formally notified of
their fate or disposition.
More importantly, Lloyd's Register of Shipping is a voluntary
classification society [2], and until 1875 its published volumes list
only those vessels it had surveyed and classed [3]. As a result, many
smaller vessels, and many early steamships, do not appear in the
published volumes of Lloyd's Register [4]. Since 1875, Lloyd's
Register has included all British vessels of 100 tons and over, whether
or not surveyed and classed by Lloyd's. Until 1890, Lloyd's
Registerwas almost exclusively confined to British registered vessels,
although it included some foreign vessels that traded regularly with
Great Britain [5]; since 1890, it has listed all British and foreign
sea-going merchant vessels of 100 tons and over.
Copies of Lloyd's Register are held by a number of institutions,
including both Lloyd's Register of Shipping and the Corporation of
Lloyd's. In 1969, Gregg International Publishers Ltd, of Farnborough,
England, reprinted the surviving volumes of Lloyd's Register for
1764-1881 (for 1800-1833, only the Green Book), and microfilm copies of
the registers for 1776-1880 are also currently available. Copies of
these reprint volumes and microfilms are held by most major university
and maritime research libraries throughout the world, many of which,
however, consider them of such importance that they do not permit
Interlibrary Loan. Lloyd's Register of Shipping itself maintains a
(woefully incomplete) list of major libraries with holdings of Lloyd's
Register at http://www.lr.org/information/maritime/m-collection.html.
For researchers unable to access copies of Lloyd's Register in person,
Lloyds Register of Shipping (http://www.lr.org) does provide a research
service, although at rates geared to the business community. The
Maritime History Archive at the Memorial University of Newfoundland
offers a similar research service at considerably lower rates
(http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~mha/fees.html).
Notes:
1. Lloyd's Register of Shipping vessel survey reports for c. 1833-c.
1964 are now held by the National Maritime Museum, Romney Road,
Greenwich, London, SE10 9NF, http://www.nmm.ac.uk.
2. Similar voluntary classification societies include the Bureau
Veritas, now in Paris (http://www.bureauveritas.com), which has
published a Registre Maritime since 1829; the American Shipmasters'
Association (since 1898: American Bureau of Shipping), originally in New
York but now based in Houston (http://www.eagle.org), founded in 1862,
which has published an annual register since 1867; the New York Marine
Register, founded in 1857, renamed in 1858 American Lloyd's, which
merged with the American Shipmasters' Association in 1884; Det Norske
Veritas (http://www.dnv.com), founded in 1864; and Germanischer Lloyd
(http://www.germanlloyd.de), founded in 1867.
3. The statutory list of British-registered merchant vessels was the
Mercantile Navy List, first published in 1850 (corrected to December
1849) and superseded in 1978 by the Department of Trade's Official List
of Registered Ships.
4. Returns of all registered steam vessels in the United Kingdom between
January 1851 and January 1870 have been published in Parliamentary
Papers, House of Commons, 1851-1870.
5. These vessels include virtually the entire fleet of Norddeutscher
Lloyd, which upon its foundation in 1858 had taken "Lloyd" as part of
its title to indicate that all its vessels were built to the standards of Lloyd's Register of Shipping.
Michael Palmer
Claremont, California
mpalmer@netcom.com
1999 06 09