The Royal Navy

Introduction

The majority of official and personnel records for the Admiralty are held at The National Archives, The Admiralty Library and the Royal Naval Museum (see research guide B3). To research ships in the Royal Navy, however, you will find the National Maritime Museum has many items which will help you. They can be found among lists, logbooks and the Museum's extensive collection of ship plans.

Ship lists and movements

Navy List 1782–present

The official Navy List shows Royal Navy ships, their commanders and officers, coastguard vessels, hired vessels and packet ships. Early-19th century volumes also list French, Spanish and American ships taken during the Napoleonic Wars and British ships lost, captured or destroyed.

Commissioned Sea Officers list 1660–1815

These 12 volumes include all officers (lieutenant and above) who served in the Royal Navy between 1660 and 1815, annotated with the ships on which they served.

Warship histories (HMS)

A microfiche compiled by museum staff, it lists alphabetically all British warships from c.1650–1950. Entries include launch dates, size, number of men and guns, and brief outlines of ship careers, with commanders.

Admiralty movement books

Cover movements of Royal Navy ships (also vessels of the Royal Australian, Canadian and Indian Navies) during World War II. They include vessels on government service down to trawlers but not landing craft, hired vessels or troopships. The books are in two sequences: one for surviving vessels, another for those sunk. Both sets are in alphabetical order by name of ship. Vessels are distinguished by type as well as name, but there are some oddities; for example, many corvettes are listed simply as 'patrol vessel'. Details of departures and arrivals are shown and may include convoy numbers, repairs, and incidents such as crews rescued from torpedoed vessels. For trawlers used as minesweepers, movement details are restricted to transit between bases and there is little information on ship movements in the Pacific.

20th century warship histories

An unpublished typescript compiled by the Naval Historical Branch, MOD. It gives service summaries for 20th century Royal Naval vessels, with more detail on ships serving in World War II.

Royal Navy Lieutenants logbooks

Lieutenants logbooks, from 1673 to 1809, total 5205 volumes. Although this is a very full series of records it is not always certain a log exists for a particular ships commission. A detailed index of logs by ship is in the Manuscripts Section.

Lieutenants logs record weather, navigation and ship routines, as well as incidents occurring during a ships commission. They may record loss or damage to stores and disciplinary action. In 1805 the Admiralty laid down a standard form, when the practice of starting the days log at noon was altered to coincide with the civil calendar, by starting logs at midnight. At each year end a lieutenants log had to be deposited in the Admiralty Office. The Admiraltys chief clerk abstracted details of the voyage and, in return for a fee, sent the log to the Navy Office. There, a clerk in the Clerk of the Acts office made out a certificate entitling the lieutenant to be paid. At the Navy Office, individual logs were bound into volumes.

Captains and Masters logs are held by The National Archives at Kew.

Ship plans and Historic Photograph collection

The National Maritime Museum holds the largest collection of ship plans in the world and almost every type of Royal Navy ship is represented: aircraft carriers, battleships, submarines, frigates and tugs. The Historic Photograph section holds over a million prints and negatives.

Ship models

The National Maritime Museum houses the largest ship models collection in the world The Navy Board models were made from 1655–1715 and are an accurate representation of the various types of warship and provided a practical way of illustrating their construction, decoration and layout together with variations in rigging. The Museum also has a large collection of nineteenth and twentieth century warship models, one of the most recent being a waterline model of the Trident D-II nuclear submarine Vanguard, launched in 1992.

Next steps

Other guides in the series which may be useful for researching the Royal Navy:

• Research guide B1: The Royal Navy: Tracing people
• Research guide B3: The Royal Navy: Sources for enquiries
• Research guide B5: The Royal Navy: Dockyards
• Research guide B6: The Royal Navy: Adminstrative records

For general research help see:

• Research guide A2: Principal records for maritime research at the National Maritime Museum
• Research guide A3: Tracing family history from maritime records

Although care has been taken in preparing the information contained in this document, anyone using it shall be deemed to indemnify the National Maritime Museum from any and all injury or damage arising from such use.

Last updated March 2006

© National Maritime Museum 2000. All rights reserved

National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London SE10 9NF
Tel: +44 (0)20 8858 4422 ~ Fax: +44 (0)20 8312 6632.