The following is from the British National Archives Website:
… BMDRegisters.co.uk has added records of births, deaths and marriages of passengers at sea to its online service.
The records give detailed information compiled from ships’ logs by the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen and its predecessor. The registers cover 1854 to 1908 and include over 150,000 individuals. They were previously available only on microfilm at The National Archives.
- BT 158 – Registers of Births, Deaths and Marriages of Passengers at Sea 1854-1890
- BT 159 – Registers of Deaths at Sea of British Nationals 1875-1888. The name of this series is misleading as it includes other nationalities
- BT 160 – Registers of Births at Sea of British Nationals 1875-1891
It is free to search on the website but there is a charge for downloading images of original records.
Background
From 1874, the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen was required to report births and deaths at sea aboard all ships registered in Britain or its colonies and on foreign-registered ships carrying passengers to or from the UK, to the Registrars General of England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland (the General Register Offices).There are separate volumes for England, Scotland and Ireland, corresponding to the general register office to which the details were to be reported. The registers for Scotland and Ireland contain details where the deceased was a ‘Scotch or Irish subject of Her Majesty’. The registers for England include all events not reported to the GROs for Scotland and Ireland and thus contain entries for foreign nationals as well as those for English and Welsh subjects.
Disasters at sea
Included in these records are 288 death records for the Royal Charter, which was traveling back from Australia in October 1859 when it became caught in a storm just miles from home off the coast of Anglesey. The ship was carrying a great number of prospectors who had gone to Australia to find their fortune, so when the ship sank on 26 October it took over 67,000 ounces of gold with it. Many inhabitants of nearby coastlines became rich overnight as the gold began to wash up on the shores.Also included are the casualties of the biggest marine disaster of the 19th century, the sinking of the White Star Line’s passenger ship SS Atlantic, which struck rocks off the coast of Nova Scotia on 1 April 1873. Of the 562 people who died, 508 are recorded within BT 158 and BT 159.
Happier times
As the majority of the ships included were passenger ships, which would travel across the world to and from America, the UK and Australia, people met, fell in love and often married onboard. Babies born at sea were often named after the ship, such as the daughter of welsh miner William Brown, born on 2 December 1883 onboard the Waroonga, who was named Elizabeth Waroonga Brown.
Search for your British ancestors who been born, married or died at sea.
FTC Statement: GenealogyBlog has no affiliate relationships with the the British National Archives or BMDRegisters.co.uk.
