16th Century Merchant Fleet Details

1. Vessels returning from the 1533 Iceland cod fishery voyage: 22 Dunwich, 7 Lowestoft, 7 Orwell Haven [Ipswich] and 1 Orford – making 37 in all. Source: National Archives (Kew), SP 1/80 f.65v.

Lowestoft details

• All names have been left in the original spelling because of the difficulty of converting some of them to modern forms. Rogir Cannsell is Roger Chancellor.

• The vessel names all have religious associations. Margaret was St. Margaret of Antioch, patron of the parish church and town; James was the disciple brother of John, executed in Jerusalem in 44 A.D. by Herod Agrippa; Christopher was the apocryphal saint and protector of travellers; Mary was the mother of Christ, and the Mary Grace form of the name given here reflects both her votive prayer (“Hail, Mary”) and “The Magnificat”; John (Johanne is a Latinised form)was the disciple, Gospel writer and creator of The Book of Revelation.

• The carrying capacity per vessel was reckoned as the number of tuns (casks of 252 gallons volume, used to store wine) able to be conveyed, the term tonne (or ton) – as used here – therefore having nothing to do with the weight of cargo or of the vessel itself. The craft listed here were of medium size. The tun itself was far too large to load onto ships and the casks used for both wet and dry goods were of manageable size, with firkins (nine gallons) and half-barrels (eighteen gallons) being the ones mainly used. Therefore each tun unit would have consisted of twenty-eight firkins and fourteen half-barrels.

• It is unlikely that any vessel (regardless of size) was ever loaded to its full notional capacity because of the risk to its sea-worthiness in adverse conditions.

• Most, if not all, of the vessels listed would probably have been employed in carrying general cargo, when not engaged in fishing activity.

• The merchant column represents the possibility of the vessels being hired by operators other than the owners. It did not apply in the case of Lowestoft.

• The final column records the levy known as composition fish or prise fish, which was paid by people financing the Iceland fishery during the sixteenth century. It was introduced during the reign of Henry VIII and remained in place until the 1590s. Each vessel returning from northern waters was taxed at the rate of the sale-price of 120 ling or 240 cod (both salted and dried) – this differential reflecting the relative commercial value of the two species. The amounts of money paid here in tax suggest a profitable voyage. In c. 1600, good quality, re-processed Iceland cod (hydrated and re-salted), of good size, retailed at about 1s 6d a pair. The species was much in demand as a source of winter food, with a variety of recipes available for cooking it.

2. The 1544 Vessel Survey: the number of vessels suitable for military use in Norfolk and Suffolk townships, with carrying capacity rated in tons [tuns] per vessel (columns two to twelve). Source: Letters and Papers Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, vol 19(i), p. 76.

• The sequence of townships in the table is presented in league-table order, according to the overall number of vessels listed. The original order was as follows: King’s Lynn, Wells, Burnham, Blakeney, Wiveton, Cley, Sheringham, Yarmouth, Lowestoft, Aldeburgh, Dunwich, Walberswick, Southwold, Ipswich/Orwell. Thus, although there was movement eastwards (at first) and then southwards through the two counties, strict geographical progression from place to place was not observed.

• Two vessels in the 40-ton [tun] category (Walberswick and Blakeney) have slightly lesser carrying capacity recorded.

• It is noticeable that 104 of the overall total of 143 vessels are found in the medium-range of 30-60 tons (73%).

• If taken at another time, this survey would have shown considerable differences in the ranking of the various townships, as maritime fortunes rose and fell.

3. Survey of merchant ships made by Thomas Colshill (1572) – Source: Victoria County History Suffolk, vol. 2, p. 216, drawing on information in Calendar of State Papers Domestic, Elizabeth I, Addenda, vol. 22.

Suffolk details

• Again, the sequence of townships is presented in league-table order, the original one being as follows: Ipswich, Woodbridge, Aldeburgh, Orford, Dunwich, Southwold, Walberswick, Gorleston, Lowestoft. The geographical progression was therefore from south to north, but not in strict order.

• A total of 66 vessels in the 20 tons [tuns] and under category represents 45% of the whole. This either reflects a process of including smaller craft than was the brief in the preceding table or a reduction in construction-size.

• It is noticeable that Lowestoft had lost 12 craft in the 60-120 ton [tun] range between 1544 and 1572. Half of its fleet in 1572 consisted of vessels of 20 tons and under carrying-capacity. Southwold and Walberswick show even larger proportions of smaller craft (59% and 72%, respectively).

• According to the Victoria County History, Suffolk, vol.2, fishing craft were not included in this survey.

Names of Lowestoft vessels in the table above

• The list above shows 18 vessels, not 16 as shown in the previous table: with one extra craft in the 20-50 tons [tuns] category and another in that recording 20 tons and under. Thus, it is possible that there are other concealed errors in the data.

• The names with asterisks are those of known Lowestoft residents (eleven of the eighteen listed), traceable through the parish registers or other documentation. Of the remaining seven, some could have been living in the town at the time the list was compiled, while others may have been based in either Kirkley or Pakefield.

• The names of the vessels are largely (but not completely) religious, the symbol (r) indicating ones which definitely are. Grace of God and Jhesus [sic] speak for themselves; John and James were explained in the notes following the first table above; Clement was an early Bishop of Rome, venerated as saint and martyr and a patron of mariners (his emblem, an anchor); Mary Fortune was a name used to invoke the influence of the mother of Christ; Danyell [Daniel] was the great Old Testament prophet of the Babylonian Captivity period; Peter was leading disciple and first Bishop of Rome; and Gabriel was the archangel of The Annunciation.

• Of the remaining names, Charitie may well have had religious thinking in its choice to name a boat (its most famous use being in 1 Corinthians 13., where the Apostle Paul uses the word to mean Christian love in its widest and most embracing way. William and Thomasyn [Thomasine] are male and female Christian names, while Henne [Hen] and Phenix [Phoenix] represent the most common type of domestic poultry and the mythical, self-combusting bird of Arabia (extremes of feathered kind, one is tempted to say!).

• The appearance of non-religious names may reflect changes in thought and attitude caused by the disappearance of the old Roman Catholic order and the establishment of Protestantism as the official religion of England – though the Elizabethan settlement in Church and State was only four years old at the time the survey was carried out.

CREDIT: David Butcher