Category: Archives

Smith and the New Sailor’s Magazine

Posted on by hilary.carey

Back to the BL

After a long time waiting for the British Library to recover from the cyber attack earlier this year, it was exciting to be back and able to order in advance. On 4 December, I arrived early and found my orders waiting for me. Thank you BL staff!

British Library

Smith and the New Sailor’s Magazine

This time my principal target was the original – and undigitised – copies of the G.C. (‘Boatswain’) Smith’s issues of the Soldier’s and New Sailor’s Magazine (NSM), which was published by Smith from his headquarters in and around Wellclose Square in London from 1828 and continued, though with many changes of name, until Smith’s death in 1863. I was intrigued because historians have differed over the significance of this journal and Smith’s place in the marine mission movement.

Smith launched the New Sailor’s Magazine as an act of defiance following his dismissal as editor of the Sailor’s Magazine and acrminomious split from the main dissenting mission for seamen in London, the Port of London Society and Bethel Union (PLSBUS).New Sailor's Magazine

According to Kverndal (1986: 271), Smith was entirely the injured party, and had every right to take his talents elsewhere. He argues that Smith had triumphantly created the Mariner’s Church and its numerous satellite welfare and mission work for sailors’ and their families, while all Smith’s dissenting and Church rivals floundered without support or effectiveness. But was it really the case? Is it correct, as Kverndall (1986: 274) states, that the PLSBUS was motivated by sheer jealousy of Smith’s ‘continuing success, coupled with their own diminishing support’?

In fact, this is rather less than the whole story, as I soon discovered by reading Smith’s New Sailor’s Magazine, which proudly proclaimed Smith as the ‘late editor of the Sailor’s Magazine’.

As with all of Smith’s publications, marketing and branding were key features with attempts to entice subscribers and supporters through calls to patriotism, religion and national pride. The first volume included three separate publications, The Soldier’s Magazine and Military Chronicle, aimed at soldiers,  The New Sailor’s Magazine and Naval Chronicle, for supporters of maritime missions, and a monthly brochure for the Sailor’s Asylum and New Brunswick Institution, the precursor to the London Sailors’ Home.

The Soldier’s Magazine was brashly patriotic and included an engraving of Smith’s most important patron, Admiral Lord James Gambier (1756-1833). The cover was embellished with a header including flags, cannon, helmets, a trumpet and drum to the left, with naval emblems of an anchor, sails and masts to the right. Beneath was the logo: ‘Fear God. Honor the King’. It would take a wise reader to realise that the main business of the magazine was not to serving members of the military, but rather former soldiers and sailors of the merchant service and their urban patrons.

The cover of the New Sailor’s Magazine is less showy, but there are indications that Smith’s resources were rather less than he claimed. Unsurprisingly, there are no stories from the PLS and Bethel Union, and Smith instead resorted to publishing the sermon delivered by the Rev. William Scorseby, Anglican chaplain to the Episcopal Society for Sailors at Liverpool. Scorseby would soon become celebrated in his own right, as an Arctic explorer, and patron of Anglican missions to seafarers, especially deep sea fishermen.

With the editorial licence of The New Sailor’s Magazine, Smith would  denigrate the efforts of the Episcopal floating chapel in Liverpool and London, and the successful efforts of Anglican Evangelicals to make a success of the London Sailor’s Home, but for now he was dependent on Church rather than Chapel sources to fill the pages of his new magazine.

BFSSFS debt

The first sign of serious problems for Smith and his enterprises appear with the financial report published in the June 1828 issue of the New Sailor’s Magazine following the annual Meeting of the British and Foreign Seamen’s & Soldier’s Friend Society, or Mariners’ Church & Watermen’s Bethel Union (BFSSFS). While each monthly issue  always included a gratifying and minutely detailed list of all donations, big and small, this was the first set of fully audited accounts, as signed by William Hodge, W.G. Barnard, and R. Ward. These showed that from 17 May 1827 to 15 May 1828, income received had reached almost £2000, but there was a heavy debt of almost £800 for printing, stationers and ‘agents’ salaries’, ie payments to those employed full-time to collect funds for the society. Smith could not afford his grand publications, or his vision for a charitable empire based on the Mariner’s Church, nor could he afford to alienate the wealthier patrons who had earlier flocked to the Port of London Society and its signature floating chapel.

FS Accounts 1827-28

The ‘agents’ salaries’ are a particularly worrying feature of the cash account. They show that about 25% of all donations had been expended in salaries to those responsible for raising funds. Moreover, ‘travelling expenses’ amounted to over £200 – more than a year’s salary for many clergy – much of which would have been incurred by Smith on his relentless promotional and lecture tours. This was not sustainable, and the reality was that Smith’s Mariner’s church enterprise, conducted in belligerent rivalry to that of like-minded dissenting and Anglican Evangelical supporters of the same cause, was a white elephant. Yet Smith continued to attract admirers and donations, which the following year, 1828-29, were reported by the Missionary Register as no less than £3462. Twelve months later, the same journal reported that the BFSSFS debt stood at £1500, inflating to £2500 in 1831 and to £3000 by 1832. (Adjusted for inflation, this is the equivalent of over £420,000 today). This was a colossal burden for any small, voluntary society, even today, but was an overwhelming and alarming liability in 1832. Smith’s solution was to exclude any mention of the debt from the New Sailor’s Magazine,  while continuing to solicit new donations and make a show of transparency by listing everyone who made a contribution.

These were heady days for the marine mission movement, with handsome donations and subscriptions recorded by the Missonary Register (1830: 517) for a range of maritime missionary causes, including £3393 for the venerable Naval and Military Bible Society, £597 for the Merchant Seaman’s Bible Society, and £1700 for the Sailors’ Home. Smith’s main dissenting rival, the Port of London Society received a modest £884, reflecting the competition for support especially in London, but was managing to survive and – importantly – remained solvent.

Smith’s legacy

I have scrutinised Smith’s legacy as the leading figure in the maritime mission movement for an article forthcoming in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History. Smith’s personality has divided critics, with those from within his own Baptist and dissenting tradition, including Kverndal (1986) and Dray (2013) keen to overlook his financial improprieties. I am more critical, not least because hundreds of people of very small means contributed to the cause, and were entitled to know that their donations were spent helping sailors, not chasing Smith’s grandiose and debt-laden ambitions.

It may not be possible to untangle the details at this distance in time, but there is a smoking gun, and a pattern of over enthusiastic promotion, unexplained or inadequately explained debt, and the reality that Smith would eventually be imprisoned four times for debt.

Sources

Dray, Stephen. 2013. A Right Old Confloption Down Penzance (Carn-Brea Media: n.p.).

Kverndal, Roald. 1986. Seamen’s missions: their origin and early growth (William Carey Library: Pasadena, Calif).

CMS. Missionary Register, 17-20 (1829-1832). Yale Mission Periodicals Online

NSM. Soldiers’ Chronicle and New Sailor’s Magazine, 1-2 (1828-29).

 

Liverpool archive trip: searching for lascar sources.

Posted on by Lucy Wray

On Wednesday 29th of November, I embarked on a four-day research trip to Liverpool. The purpose of my trip was to find material relating to lascars, a term used for seamen predominately from Asia, as well as Africa and the Caribbean who were employed in the merchant marine in large numbers in the long nineteenth century.

Liverpool has a rich history of mission activity to seamen in the nineteenth century, with myriad sailors’ homes, missions and rests operating during this period. While many of these institutions catered exclusively to British Sailors, some religious organisations focused on lascars. The Birkenhead Mission to Asiatic Seamen, for instance, opened in Morpeth Docks in 1900, and a year later amalgamated with the Mersey Mission to Seamen described as its Asiatic branch.

My search for sources relating to lascars, and religious organisations’ responses to them in Liverpool, led me to the archives centre at the city’s Maritime Museum and Liverpool Record Office. The archive centre, located on the second floor of the Maritime Museum, is open to the public Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, 10.30 am-12.30 pm and 1.30-4 pm. No appointment is necessary. I was able to find references to some material through a searchable online catalogue prior to my visit. However, upon arrival at the archive, I found that I was able to better assess the extent of relevant material available through printed archive catalogues and information sheets which organised collections thematically. In this archive, I was able to observe material from organisations like the Seamen & Boatmen’s Friend Society and the Mersey Mission to Seamen. These sources have informed my understanding of mission activity to seamen in Liverpool during the period. In many ways, the absence of non-British sailors in these sources is a point for further enquiry, as I explore archival silences and what they in turn reveal. 

View from Maritime Archives
View from Maritime Archives

 

Mersey Maritime Museum Archives
Mersey Maritime Museum

The Liverpool Record Office, located on the third floor of the city’s central Library, open Monday to Friday 9 am to 8 pm, contains a diverse range of archives, rare books, microfilm and other material relating to Liverpool’s history. Booking is required for this archive, and the number of items readers can view per day is limited and must be requested 72 hours in advance of their visit. While I was able to see some items pertaining specifically to lascars, other archival material enriched my broader understanding of religious philanthropy, attitudes towards race, migration and mariners, as well as poverty in Liverpool in the nineteenth century. I was able to view copies of The Liverpool Review on microfilm, which I found particularly insightful. This was due to the presence of articles relating to non-British sailors, and the fact that this was a heavily illustrated newspaper, appealing to my interest and expertise in visual sources. 

 

Ceiling central library
Ceiling of Bristol Central Library

 

During my spare time in Liverpool, I visited local museums and galleries including the World Museum, Museum of Liverpool, the Maritime Museum and the Walker Gallery. My observations, both of the presence and absence of representation of themes of race, religion and sailors will inform and inspire my planning of the project’s forthcoming exhibition in 2025. 

 

Display at World Museum
Display at Liverpool World Museum

 

 

Bristol Channel Mission – Bristol Archives

Posted on by hilary.carey

I very much enjoyed getting down by the River Avon to explore Bristol Archives, which is part of Bristol Museums.

The Archives are a welcoming place, housed in B Bond Warehouse hard by the River Avon and the impressive engineering works that created the Floating Harbour. I was there to explore the one surviving Book of Minutes, 1843-1844, for the Bristol Channel Mission Society (BCMS), a forerunner of the Anglican Mission to Seafarers.

BCMS Minute Book
Bristol Channel Mission Minute Book. Source: Bristol Archives, 12168/18.

The BCMS originated in the efforts of the Rev. John Ashley to visit isolated maritime communities in the Channel, as well as the much larger number of ships moored in the Channel’s roadsteads waiting for wind and tide to take them to their next port. A ‘roadstead’ or ‘roadstay’ is a nautical term for a sheltered stretch of water, where it is (relatively) safe to anchor. In the Bristol Channel, hundreds of ships could be found anchored at Kings-road off Portishead, the Penarth roadstead, and other locations in the notoriously dangerous waterway. One sailing guide describes a roadstay near Ilfracombe, which was visited several times by Ashley on his lecture tours on behalf of the mission, in this way: ‘Ilfracombe is a little pier harbour, drying at low water; on its western point is a lighthouse…  [O]utside of the pier there is a roadstead with good anchorage from 5 to 8 fathoms. This part is much frequented by coasting vessels; and pilots generally may be had here to conduct you to King’s-road.’ [J.W. Norie, New and Complete Sailing Directions for St George’s and Bristol Channels (London: Norie, 1816), p.1.]

Although Ashley is usually said to have begun his ministry in 1839, it is necessary to rely on newspaper reports for much of the early history of the mission. According to the Bristol Mercury (one of 13 local newspapers serving the busy port city), Ashley was instrumental in creating the first roadstead mission and trying to reach seafarers afloat and at work. It was through his advocacy that funds were raised for a specially fitted vessel, the Eirene, which was built at Pill to Ashley’s specifications in 1841. The Eirene  served not just to visit ships and distribute tracts, but also as a floating chapel. Along the busy roadsteads of the great Severn estuary, Ashley would preach, deliver sermons in aid of the mission, and advocate on behalf of the merchant seaman. Along the ports of the Bristol Channel, ‘it happened that considerable fleets of 200 to 300 sail were detained by contrary winds in Kings-road and the Penarth-roads’. [‘Bristol Channel Mission’, Bristol Mercury, 6 June 1840]. Most were commercial vessels, serving the coastal trade in goods such as coal, as well as imports from the Americas,  sugar, tobacco, wine and spirits, meat, live cattle, fruit and timber. A lithograph in the Bristol Museums collection, dated 29 November 1843, shows the Mission Cutter Eirene, anchored among these vessels off Penarth, signalling that was time for divine service.

The Bristol Channel Mission Cutter EIRENE. from a Sketch taken in Penarth Roads before Monring Service, November 29th 1843, and Dedicated to the Revd. John Ashley, LL.D> Chaplain to the Mission. By James Edward Fitzgerald.
The Bristol Channel Mission Cutter Eirene, 29 November 1843. Source: Bristol Museums, Galleries and Archives. Object Number J129.

Ashley would later write about his mission in these terms:

Truly I pass from roadstead to roadstead here; as a dying man preaching to dying men. Every heavy gale that sweeps the sea buries in its abyss some of the Bibles I have sold, the books and tracts I have given, and in the prime and vigour of life, the men whose hands received them from mine. [‘Missions to Merchant Seamen‘, Churchman 4 ( 1881 ), 329.]

The Minute Book shows that Ashley and the BCMS had high-level support in the city, at least at first. The Society was formed ‘under the auspices of the Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol [ie. James Henry Monk] for the purposes of sending a Clergyman to officiate among the fleets in Penarth-road, Kings-road, etc.’ [Taunton Courier, 22 Feb. 1842]. A sub-committee held at Sundon House, on 21 April 1843, was chaired by Charles Pinney (1793-1867), a Bristol merchant who had been Mayor of Bristol during the disastrous riots following the House of Lords’ rejection of the 1831 Reform Bill. Like the Ashley family and many wealthier Bristolians, Pinney is listed in the Legacies of Slavery database, and benefitted substantially from slave labour. Also on the BCMS committee was a future Mayor of Bristol, Thomas Porter Jose (1801-1875), a colliery owner and director of the Ashton Vale Iron Company, and George John Hadow (1789-1869), formerly of the Madras civil service and assistant under collector of sea customs. Hadow was an active philanthropist, and in 1838 also served on the committee of the Bristol Asylum for the Blind.  Sundon House was Hadow’s Clifton home. At the second anniversary of the Society, the meetings was held in the Victoria Rooms, and was chaired by the then mayor of Bristol, James Gibbs. [Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian, 6 May 1843].

While Ashley was also on the committee, it is evident from the minutes that things were not all as they should be. For undisclosed reasons, Ashley demanded that the captain of the missionary cutter, the Eirene, be dismissed. While he was able to achieve his wish, it was not long before there was  a parting of the ways.

As the Society’s debts mounted, Ashley and the Committee were on a collision course. Ashley failed to attend the Annual Meeting held in the Victoria Rooms on Thursday 25 April 1844. Money seems to have been the main issue. In June 1843, the Society decided to set the chaplain’s salary at £250 – backdated to 31 March 1843.  Ashley seems to have declared war on the Committee, and began withholding subscriptions, including from the Merchant Venturers.

By December 1844, most of the Committee had had enough, and almost all of them resigned. This removed the treasurer, both Secretaries, W.C. Bernard and Jose, as well as the Committee’s leading cleric, the Archdeacon of Wells [Henry Law], along with seven clergy and seven laymen, including Charles Pinney. Ashley promptly offered to fill up all the vacancies with his own choice of officers, but – unsurprisingly – his offer was not accepted. At this rather exciting moment, the Minute Book ends.

Excerpt from BCMS Minute Book
The BCMS Committee resigns, Dec. 1845. Source: BCMS Minute Book, Bristol Archives.

There are press reports of accusations and counter accusations exchanged between Ashley and the Committee, though the pamphlets distributed by the warring parties have not survived. Perhaps this is just as well. In their reply to Ashley, the Committee quoted scripture: ‘He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him.” – Proverbs 18, v. 17 [Bristol Times and Mirror, 5 Feb. 1845]

Newspaper cutting
The NCMS Committee v. the Rev. John Ashley, Bristol Times and Mirror, Sat. 8 February 1845.

So what happened? The Society limped on, and Ashley himself went on an heroic fund-raising tour in 1852, moving from ‘town to town’ to support the cause. Ashley’s tour ended in London where, at a meeting chaired by Lord Shaftesbury, Ashley spoke for three hours on behalf of the mission he had founded. [Morning Chronicle, 11 June 1853]:

But it was not enough.  In July 1856, the Bristol Channel Mission Society held its final meeting. There was a very poor attendance as the Committee explained that the Society would be wound up and incorporated into a new national organisation, based in London [Bristol Mercury, 5 July 1856]. With relief, it was also reported that the new Society would take over their debt of £450.  This included all that was owed to Ashley, who had agreed to resign on being paid his full stipend of £400, an enormous salary by the standards of any other missionary society. By this stage, Ashley had already been replaced by three new chaplains, the Rev. T.C. Childs, well known for his mission to emigrants now extended to seamen from his base at Ryde on the Isle of Wight, for the English Channel, the Rev. C.D. Strong for the Bristol Channel, and the Rev. R. B. Howe for the Great Harbour of Malta. Putting on a brave show, the committee reported: ‘Feeling then that the time is come – that already the adequate discharge of our duty as a mission to the seafaring population of Great Britain is entirely beyond our strength as a small local committee, we propose that this society be now dissolved in favour of the society for promoting missions to seamen at home and abroad.’ [Bristol Mercury, 5 July 1856]

The Missions to Seamen (1856), incorporating both the Bristol Channel Mission Society and the Thames Church Mission Society (1844) was launched under new, more effective management. Ashley himself never recovered from the collapse of his vision, though fondly remembered as a pioneer of the Anglican Missions to Seafarers, and the first to attempt a direct mission to seafarers isolated on the roadsteads of the Bristol Channel. Based on the BCMS Minutes, the mission he pioneered succeeded despite rather than because of his involvement with the cause. However, given the many gaps in the record, it may not be possible to understand the full story.

 

Sources

Bristol Archives, 12168/18. Bristol Channel Mission, Minute Book, 1843-1844.

For accounts of the BCMS and the Rev. John Ashley: Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette, Bristol Times and Mirror, Bristol Mercury, Exeter and Plymouth Gazette, Morning Chronicle (London), Southampton Herald.

Miller, R.H.W. Dr Ashley’s Pleasure Yacht: John Ashley, the Bristol Channel Mission and all that Followed. London: Lutterworth, 2017. [Available as an ebook here]

Miller, R.H.W. ‘Thomas Cave Childs: Pioneer chaplain to female emigrants and the Missions to Seamen’, The Mariner’s Mirror 106.4 (2020), 436-449.

For older views of Ashley:

Strong, L.A.G. Flying Angel: The Story of Missions to Seamen. London: Methuen, 1956

Walrond, Mary L. Launching out into the deep; or the pioners of a noble effort. London: SPCK, 1904.

 

 

 

 

Mersey Mission to Seamen – Liverpool Central Library

Posted on by Manikarnika Dutta

The Mission to Seamen opened a branch in Liverpool in 1856 to expand their spiritual and moral welfare objectives for British seamen. The Mersey Mission to Seamen was established in 1873 as a more autonomous body. It operated out of several premises in places such as Runcorn, Birkenhead, Bootle, and Garston, aside from Liverpool, before moving into a new building on Hanover Street in 1885. The Mission’s logo, an angel in flight with a book in hand, made no secret of their gospel-preaching ambitions and widening reach.

Source: ‘The Mersey Mission to Seamen: Its Work and Needs’, Elder Dempster Magazine 7, no. 2 (1923): 178-81 (Liverpool Central Library H 387.31805 ELD_2)

I visited the Liverpool Central Library to consult their records (LCL 361 MER), the Beatles’ version of Maggie Mae ringing in my ears. This collection includes 9 volumes of minute books (1866-1967), 40 miscellaneous documents (1848-1953), and 123 photographs (1895-1967). I read the annual reports of the Mission from 1889 to 1914, among other documents, which provide a useful snapshot of the nature of spiritual service and material benefits for seamen. The reports generally declared the Mission’s ever-increasing influence on seamen and acknowledged the support of the public towards its activities.

The 40th annual report, for instance, says that a large number of seamen used the Central Institute (in Liverpool) for games, seeking advice from the staff of the Mission, and to enjoy the ‘freedom and security of a carefully managed Social Club’ (Report of the Mersey Mission to Seamen Society for the Year 1897, p. 7). The Mission encouraged seamen to write letters (10,712 written in a year), attend religious meetings, enroll in a Communicants’ Union, and learn first aid with the St. John’s Ambulance Association.

Source: Mersey Mission to Seamen Annual Report for the Year 1897 (Liverpool Central Library 361.3 MER)

A key feature of this report was the information regarding the establishment of a women’s association named ‘Mersey Mission Helpers’ (Ibid, p. 12). I will further explore women’s role in seamen’s missions in Liverpool and other port cities. Another interesting fact was the individual efforts of the clergy in connecting and keeping in touch with the seamen who passed through these institutes. The reader-in-charge of the Garston branch, for example, wrote 226 letters to seamen and saved all their responses. He was even invited to visit their homes (Ibid, p. 21). Such narratives are helpful for unpacking the capacity, authority, and impact of the Mersey Mission.

Hull History Centre

Posted on by Manikarnika Dutta

The Hull History Centre, located in a quiet yet central neighbourhood not far from the Maritime Museum and the original site of the Hull Sailor’s Home, houses the extensive records of the Anglican Mission to Seafarers (U DMS). Founded in 1856, the Mission to Seafarers ministered to the spiritual and moral welfare needs of seamen. The records covered all aspects of their activities in Britain and abroad and included minutes, annual reports and accounts, port files, personnel files, committee files, publications, photographs, diaries and scrapbooks, and documents from local branches and amalgamated societies.

The Hull History Centre holds some of the most significant source materials for understanding the everyday life of British seamen. I had been in touch with the archivist Claire Weatherall, who kindly helped me to scope out the materials before my first visit. I went through the records of the Hull branch of the Mission to Seamen and the Port of Hull Society for the Religious Instruction of Sailors, which was established in 1821 to care for seamen and their families through various welfare initiatives. These records offered a very interesting history of the mission’s care for the families of sailors.

The Mission – Seaman’s Mission converted into a pub (Image Manikarnika Dutta, June, 2023)

In particular, the records of the Seamen’s and General Orphanage (C DSHO) turned out to be a fantastic resource for understanding the Mariners’ Church Orphan Society’s operations since 1853. The society ran a boarding house and a school that provided food, clothing and education to orphaned young boys and girls whose fathers were victims of accidents at sea. It operated on a modest budget and saw some children return to their families to earn and take care of younger siblings. The number of children yet continued to increase, especially after a permanent care home was opened in Spring Bank in 1866.

Report of the Hull Mariner’s Church Sailors’ Orphan Society, 1858 (Source: Hull History Centre C DSHO/1/57)

The building, modelled after a barrack, was abandoned as the Port of Hull Society wanted to relocate the children out of the city into a cottage home. It found an ideal place in Hesslewood in 1921. The annual reports, minutes, and publications about the orphanage offer interesting insights into the Hull context of the projection of elitist civilisational sensibilities onto subaltern orphans in order to transform them into model citizens. The discussions on mundane decisions such as appropriate books and clothing for children of various ages shed light on a hidden chapter of child welfare that integrate religious, maritime, and family history of Victorian Britain.

Researching Lascars: Exploring India Office Records at the British Library, London

Posted on by Lucy Wray

In this blog, Lucy Wray discusses her first archival trip for the lascars strand, where she visited the British Library to explore records relating to the Stranger’s Home for Asiatic, held within the India Office papers.

On the week of beginning 15th May, I embarked on my first research trip to London to explore collections relating to the lascar strand of the Mariners’ project. While I concluded my week in the National Archives at Kew, I spent the majority of my time at the British Library. A trip to the British Library is a delight for any researcher, but I was particularly excited as this was my first visit to the site since my doctoral placement, undertaken at their visual arts department in 2020. Despite being in very familiar surroundings, this was my first experience using these archives to research lascars and my first venture in using the India Office Papers .

Gates at British Library, Image Lucy Wray, May 2023

What was I looking for?

Working alongside Dr Sumita Mukherjee, I conduct research for the ‘lascar’ strand of the Mariners project. Lascar is a term often used for non-European seafarers who worked on British ships. Lascars were predominately from Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean and employed in large numbers by the British Merchant Marine from the nineteenth century. In addition to facing myriad difficulties and injustices relating to pay and conditions aboard ship, Lascars often struggled to secure accommodation at UK ports. For most of the nineteenth century, voluntary religious societies and missions were key providers of support and accommodation for these men. I aim to use visual and print sources to explore gendered and racialised ways missions and lascars interacted across the century.

The British Library is the UK’s National Library and one of the largest in the world, boasting around 200 million items. A researcher’s greatest obstacle is not a scarcity of sources but deciding where to begin. To get the ball rolling and hone my scope, I began by exploring sources relating to one of the best-known and most influential homes that interacted with lascars: Strangers’ Home for Asiatics, Africans and South Sea Islanders. Opened in London’s West India Dock in 1857, the Home provided accommodation, support and mission activity for lascars.

Most sources relating to the Stranger’s Home are held in the East India Office Papers. This is due to two key reasons: The East India Company provided regular revenue to the Home, and a large percentage of lascars were natives of India. Most of the records were, therefore, correspondence between the Home and the Indian Office relating to the finance and running of the Home and the cases of specific individuals from India.

What are the India Office Papers?

The India Office Records are the archives of the administration in London of the East India Company and the pre-1947 government of India. The British Library collection guide for this collection states, ‘The 14 kilometres of shelves of volumes, files and boxes of papers, together with 70,000 volumes of official publications and 105,000 manuscript and printed maps, are public records comprising the archives of the East India Company (1600-1858), of the Board of Control or Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India (1784-1858), of the India Office (1858-1947), of the Burma Office (1937-1948), and of a number of British agencies overseas which were officially linked with one or other of the four main bodies’.[1]

The India Office Papers and Private Papers archive is immense, rich and diverse, revealing details of commerce, politics and migration. They give insight into the lives of many individuals, including civil servants, medical staff, chaplains, missionaries and, of course, mariners.

What did I view?

On this trip, I focused my search on the ‘Public and Judicial Departmental Papers: Annual Files’ IOR/L/PJ/6. These records cover the period 1880-1930 and amount to a whopping 2,024 volumes. I also examined some records from the Economic Department Records, IOR/L/E (1786-1950), comprised of approximately 4245 volumes/files and 960 boxes. Given the volume of these records, it’s safe to say this will be the first of many trips.

Here is an example of a volume of the Public and Judicial papers. Records are organised in Volumes, usually relating to one year, and each ‘item’ is indexed with a reference number. When leafing through these volumes, it’s difficult not to get distracted by other intriguing records along the way.

Strangers Home for Asiatics, Africans and South Sea Islanders, c. 1900. Creator unknown.

Have you encountered any interesting sources?

I am in the process of transcribing the material I viewed and photographed during my visit. Lots of these sources will be essential in understanding the relationship between lascars and organisations like the sailors home for Asiatics. This includes fascinating correspondence between the Stranger’s Home for Asiatics and the India Office in 1902.[1]

Addressing his letter to Mr Wylie of the India office, Mr Chamier of the Stranger’s Home asked if deserters should be admitted. He expressed his view that only ‘the worst of the lascars’ dessert due to their difficult financial positions and provided an anecdotal example of a ‘Goa boy’ who deserted and was currently staying at the Home. Chamier also asked, ‘How long is a destitute of India to receive free board’ suggesting it should be at least one month.

A second letter records Mr Wylie forwarding these queries to Sir Charles Lyall of the India Office, requesting his observations. Here, Wylie states, ‘Deserters have no claim to admission to the Home but if they become destitute after deserting what is to become of them? Are they to be allowed to die in the street? The Home is the only place perhaps where they can be understood’.

In a third letter, Lyall responds to Wylie, Stating, ‘The treatment of Lascar seamen is one for the revenue department, not for the Judicial and public department’. He continues to state his opinion that there was no risk involved in a native of India dying in the street upon refusal to the Home, as the workhouse was ‘always open’ to them, and Indians could be found there in ‘large numbers’.

Lastly, Chamier stated that he had no objection to ‘one month being fixed’ for the lodging of destitute men, provided the case was reported immediately to the India office. (see IOR/L/PJ/6/610, File 1733)

While short, this exchange is telling. It points to the close relationship between government bodies and mission organisations, shows a spectrum of stances regarding empathy and aid extended to lascars and even the lack of clarity regarding which governmental departments dealt with specific matters relating to these mariners. It also references other institutions that housed lascars, such as workhouses.

I look forward to returning to the British Library in July to look at more records.

 

 References

[1] ‘Question of admitting deserters into the Strangers’ Home for Asiatics’ IOR/L/PJ/6/610, File 1733: 15 Aug 1902, British Library, London.

[1] https://www.bl.uk/collection-guides/india-office-records

 

 

Mariners at the Lambeth Palace Library

Posted on by hilary.carey

Last week I visited Lambeth Palace Library, checking for correspondence relating to missions to seamen in the national library and archive of the Church of England. I found plenty to catch the interest of the historian of missions to seafarers, especially as this was my first visit to the spectacular building, which was completed in 2020 in the middle of the pandemic.

Lambeth Conference 1968

What was evident from the papers of the Lambeth Conference of 1968 is how the central idea of the mission has changed since its Victorian foundation. According to John Chelmsford, Chairman of the Council of the Mission to Seamen, and Rev. Cyril  Brown (1904-1997), General Secretary of the Society, the ‘main reasons for the existence of the Society’ inluded the need to provide for transients outside settled dioceses. But the ‘first duty of chaplains’ was to ‘meet seamen where they can be found – i.e. on board ship, whether alongside wharves, in roadsteads or harbours or at the isolated oil, bulk carriers and container terminals which are a feature of the modern shipping industry’. (LPL, LC 203/4, f. 285.)

This commitment to an essentially welfare orientation is a signficant change from the bombastic nationalism which was a notable feature of the Society’s literature until at least the 1950s. For example, a speech annotated and possibly delivered by Geoffrey Fisher, archbishop of Canterbury from 1945 to 1961, is unreconstructed in its evocation of Britain’s maritime greatness, going back to the glory days of the defeat of the Spanish Armada.

It was in the reign of Queen Elizabeth the first that the seamen of England first captured the interest and the imagination of all Englishmen,  and took their pre-eminent place in the affectionate regard of our people. Their achievements expressed on a great scale and with a new found confidence the varied genius of our race. They pushed out fearlessly to explore the unknown and bring it under man’s control: under God they were champions of our liberty and preserved freedom for England and the English Church against the assaults of alien tyrannies: they created and protected our commerce over all the world by which this county grew and prospered, lived and lives. (LPL, Fisher 177, f. 183)

The speech ended by giving thanks that the Duke of Edinburgh was leading the Society in the years ahead. Prince Philip took an active interest as President and this enabled a burst of new fund raising and support for the British merchant marine, but he also looked ahead to a much more diverse Society. A turning point from the old to the new was marked by the Centenary of the Society, which was celebrated in July 1956.

Mission to Seafarers Centenary, 1956

From the top of the new Lambeth Palace Library, there is a wonderful view of the city of London, overlooking the Thames, the Houses of Parliament and the Archbishop’s Garden below. The latter site was the location for the Centenary Garden Party of the Missions to Seamen, celebrated on July 18th, 1956. This was a grand occasion, with about 800 people in attendance. In his briefing letter to Fisher, Cyril Brown noted how important the work of the Honorary Secretaries was to the running of the Society, and that the Society could ‘scarsely continue’ without their help. He also noted that many of them were women, and ‘by no means young.’ (Brown to Fisher, 9 July 1956, LPL, Fisher 177, f. 192)

View of Lambeth Palace and the Archbishop's Garden.
The Archbishop’s Garden from the New Lambeth Palace Library. Source: Hilary Carey, 26 June 2023.

Women’s work for mariners

This alerts us to an important theme, which we hope to develop as the Mariners project develops. Although in the time period of this project, seafarers were nearly always men, the work of the missions to seafarers, based on land and in and around ports, was significantly enabled by women. I like to think that the women who attended the centenary party in the Archbishop’s Garden in 1956 enjoyed their day, and the recognition of their work. Hopefully, this project will continue to uncover more of their contribution as we work through the archives.

Hilary Carey

29.6.2023