Offer:Look-up Liverpool (Mersey) Pilots 1734/1990

[nainmaddie]

Hi BY

Thanks for the great news !!!

I am guessing that she was about 60 making his dates approx 1900-1910.

Will update you later when I have found the photo and done some more research as to who he could be !!

Many thanks

Nainmaddie

[imd6662]

Have just received and devoured Barrie Youde's charming history.

Do any experts (dave? BY?) have any more detail about the ownership/mastership of boat 12 Perseverance?

[BY]

Hi, imd!

Am pleased that you enjoyed Beyond The Bar; and many thanks for your kind comment.

Perseverance is mentioned in some detail in JS Rees's History of the Liverpool Pilotage Service (1949), including log extracts from two cruises during the summer of 1864.

Sadly there is no indication as to who might have been her Master.  As to ownership, the probability (if not the certainty?) is that she would have been owned by a syndicate; and it is recorded that her cost price, constructed and equipped in 1842, was £2,121.00.

Merseyside Maritime Museum might be able to help further.

v. best,

BY
ps
On reading a little further into  Rees, it becomes clear that Perseverance, when newly built, was owned by a syndicate of 46 pilots. As Rees puts it, "In all 46 pilots were allotted shares, the fact that the Act of 1823 (shares in ships) limited the shareholders in a vessel to 32, being quite overlooked, furthermore, the Act required the names of the shareholders to be endorsed on the back of the ship's certificate of registry."

pps

On reading yet further, there were two pilot-boats named Perseverance. Each one was Number 12. 

The first was a cutter, built in 1842 by Thomas Royden at Liverpool and replaced in 1860. This is the boat referred to as being owned by a syndicate of 46 pilots.

The second was a schooner (and much larger) built in 1860 by Thomas Harvey and Sons of Ipswich. Almost certainly, she also would have been owned from construction by a syndicate of pilots. She was one of the fleet purchased in 1883 from the pilot-syndicates by the Mersey Docks & Harbour Board.  (1883 was also the year in which the new Pilot Office at Canning Pier Head was built.)  In 1885, this second Perseverance was re-numbered as Number 9. She survived in the Pilot Service until 1898, by which time the first four steam-driven pilot-cutters had been introduced. She was then "sailed to the West Indies to trade between the Islands", according to JS Rees.

Rees's log-extracts for 1864 clearly refer to the later Perseverance rather than the earlier boat "replaced in 1860". Am not sure which Perseverance you refer to, but it  has been a pleasure to do the train-spotting!  Many thanks!

BY

[lilycottage]

Hello

If you are still willing to look up Liverpool pilots...I am researching Charles Ogilvy (abt 1832-1890), who I believe worked for the pilot service. He was also an artist and painted several pictures of Pilot schooner #6, Pioneer, so I have wondered if he served on her. Any info you can give me would be much appreciated.

[davecigar]

Hi Lily,

Definitely NOT on the list of Liverpool Pilots.

I googled his name (artist+charles ogilvy) and came up with a few sites.
www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/maritime/.../artsea/.../1860.../queen.aspx was the best and described him as a Marine Artist in 1868.
I suggest you pursue this line.

Happy researching
Dave

[imd6662]

Thanks Barrie for the update on Perseverance.

My great-great-uncle, John Hughes (x) joined, presumably the 'new', Perseverance as an apprentice pilot in 1860 at the ripe age of 25, and served on it for most of his career, becoming shoremaster about the time the boat was bought by the board. Unfortunately fell in to some disrepute a little later and eventually finished his career on one of the steamers, retiring in 1906. All this time he lived at New Brighton.

Presumably ownership information will be found in the Liverpool Register of Shipping archives held by the Merseyside Maritime Museum.

At some stage it will be interesting to see the pattern of ownership and in particular if the Hughes family had shares in either of the Perseverances and whether or not the other owners were from New Brighton/Birkenhead.

Cheers

Ian

[BY]

Hi, Ian,

Many thanks. It is always good to see flesh put on the bones of anything.

The career of John Hughes (x) cannot have been wholly disreputable if he continued to hold a licence to the age of  71!

Best wishes,

BY

[fjaney]

Hi Dave

Thanks for your kind offer to look up Liverpool (Mersey) Pilots.  My ggggrandfather apparently worked as a river pilot in the Liverpool area.  I wonder if I could impose on you to look him up: John Alfred Martin - born 1828, died in 1856.
Thanks

fjaney

[davecigar]

Fjaney,

Bit of a mystery!
There are 4 John Martins in 'Tebay' (List of Pilots since 1766) but none of them fit the criteria regarding the dates that you have supplied.

However in Returns Relating to Pilots and Pilotage for 1854 there is a John A Martin, age 27, who is listed as a Journeyman Pilot restricted to piloting 'vessels drawing not more then 14 1/2 feet of water'. He seems to tie in perfectly with your dates.
He was attached to No 11 Pilot Cutter "Mersey" which was built in 1847 by Thos Royden. She was 55'7"x14'6" beam, 8'7" draft and 47grt (gross registered tons).

I can only assume that his name was inadvertently omitted from 'Tebay' but recorded in the Pilot Character Book at the MMMuseum, Albert Dock, Liverpool. Whether the staff at MMM will do a 'look up' for you, I'm not sure, but email may bring a result.

Regards
Dave