Read our blog to get the lowdown from our experts and go behind the scenes at Royal Museums Greenwich.
Photograph from the Admiralty Compass Observatory Collection (ACO) ACO/S&T/16/4
Discover records relating to the Women’s Royal Naval Service in this new Caird Library and Archive display, February - June 2018.
The East Indiaman 'Princess Royal' (BHC3564)
James Creassy’s journal (Item ID: JOD/304) is over 300 pages long and written in perfectly legible handwriting – a rare find for material from 1777! He does not say why he is travelling to Bengal, but records in detail the entertaining, dramatic and sometimes rather distressing events that take place during the journey.
Inuit spearfishing for salmon.
For February’s item of the month I have chosen JOD/133 a logbook written by T.F. Miller, the gunner on the whaling ship ‘Erik’ which records a voyage undertaken in 1876 from Dundee to the Davis Strait and Baffin Bay between Canada and Greenland.
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What does a recent auction of a piece of a flag flown on HMS Victory have in common with this recently catalogued Dobbie collection?
Photograph of Lecky (LKY/1/3)
The spine labels of The King’s Ships, by H. S. Lecky show that ships from ABOUKIR to JUPITER are included in these volumes, the title page states that this is a six-volume work, and the introduction explains that they contain a ‘history of all those ships which are in the Naval service of the Empire’. So where are the last three volumes?
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Kent's archives contain details of many aspects of the county's maritime history including shipwrecks, salvage, smuggling and piracy.
The title page of the Fragments of Voyages and Travels Volume 3, Second series (RMG ID: PBE0288)
The rare book collection at the Caird Library holds numerous delights. One of our readers requested this book and it particularly caught my eye as it is written by an officer who began service in the Royal Navy as a young lad in the 1800s.
Sinking of the Lancastria, 17 June 1940 (BHC0673)
Contrary to popular belief, the Titanic disaster of 1912 was not Britain’s greatest loss of life at sea. The Lancastria disaster of 1940 is the most catastrophic loss recorded, see our following story of the event.
Winsome Mary Kemp (nee Bull), Assistant Principle, First World War Scrapbook (WRN/14)
One of my favourite things about being an Archives Assistant is that I am able to rummage around in the uncatalogued collections and rediscover items which were acquired for a specific and important reason or event, but have since lost prominence. With the centenary of the formation of the Women’s Royal Naval Service falling this year, I felt it was time some of our uncatalogued Wrens material received some attention!
The 'Dreadnought' off Greenwich
We’re very pleased to announce the launch of the Dreadnought Seamen’s Hospital online resource. As part of a collaborative project, a team of e-volunteers have generously devoted their spare time to transcribing details from records held at the National Maritime Museum. The Dreadnought Seamen's Hospital Admissions and Discharges, 1826-1930 can now be searched and viewed on the Ancestry family history website.