Bibliography of Books Appearing in the Index to Ships in Books
Albion, Robert G. Five Centuries of Famous Ships: From the Santa Maria to the Glomar Explorer. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978.
Albion, Robert Greenhalgh. The Rise of New York Port, 1815-1860. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1970. NB: This volume was originally published in 1939. The original text remains; this is not a revised edition.
Albion, Robert G. Square-Riggers on Schedule: The New York Sailing Packets to England, France, and the Cotton Ports. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1938.
The American
Neptune. Salem, Mass.: Peabody Essex Museum, 1941-.
NB: At the moment, this index only covers ships mentioned in volumes 1
(1941) through 50 (1990). The contents were drawn from the Fifty-Year
Index to The American Neptune, published in 1997. The following notes
regarding use of the index, drawn from the print volume's Foreword, may be
useful:
"In addition to the ship's name (shown in italics), the
specific volume (in Roman numerals), and page number reference in which
they appear, most ship entries provide the category of vessel (bark,
schooner, steamer/steamboat, etc.), together with the year in which the
vessel was constructed (in regular type) or the year to which the vessel
is referred in the narrative (in italics)...
"Although Roman numerals are used to identify Neptune volume
numbers, sometimes they are used to refer to illustrative plates...
"A ship's name with the preceding 'ex-' indicates a former name of the
same vessel. The letter 'n' is used to denote a short note, rather than
the usual article presentation."
In summary: The Roman numeral is the volume number, the Arabic
numeral is the page number. Content from 'Pictorial Supplements' is also
included; these are generally illustrations. A year printed in regular
type indicates a ship's year of construction, and therefore appears with
the ship name. A year printed in italic type indicates a year of
mention, and therefore appears with the page numbering. I have not applied
this universally; in some cases multiple years in regular type appear in
one entry. I have not attempted to correct, much less clarify, these
variations.
The Fifty-Year Index to The American Neptune is a valuable
resource. In addition to these 11,650-odd ship names, the index "includes
the names of captains, masters, and some of the crew and passengers of
many of the vessels" mentioned in the journal. It also contains several
subject headings for each article that appeared in The American
Neptune's first fifty years, plus book reviews, geographical features,
and more. I owe special thanks to William T. La Moy and Nancy TenBroeck
for providing me with access to this index, and hope to add the next two
5-year indexes soon.
Baker, William Avery. A Maritime History of Bath, Maine, and the Kennebec River Region. Two volumes. Bath, Maine: Marine Research Society, 1973.
Baker is the only author who alphabetized ships named after people by
the family name, rather than the given name. So the schooner Florence
Randall appeared in the index under 'R,' rather than under 'F.' With
much effort, I have changed all entries so they appear in order with all
other entries in this index.
Vessels with just page numbers indicate those "built outside Kennebec
region or not otherwise identified" (1121). The following information
applies to all other entries:
"This index gives the place and year of construction of the vessels
listed in Appendix A plus page references to the text where any of these
vessels are mentioned.
"Key to Abbreviations of Towns in District: Arr = Arrowsic; Aug =
Augusta; Bdn = Bowdoin; Bhm = Bowdoinham; Bk = Brunswick; Ch = Chelsea; Dr
= Dresden; Far = Farmingdale; Gar = Gardiner; Gtn = Georgetown; Hal =
Hallowell; Hp = Harpswell; Ken = Kennebec; Lis = Lisbon; N.M. = New
Meadows; Per = Perkins; Ph = Phippsburg; Pit = Pittston; Pow =
Pownalborough; R = Richmond; Sid = Sidney; Top = Topsham; Vas =
Vassalboro; Wat = Waterville; Win = Winslow; Wool = Woolwich" (1071)
Beach, Edward L. The United States Navy: 200 Years. New York: Henry Holt and Co., 1986.
Braynard, Frank O. Famous American Ships: Being an Historical Sketch of the United States as told Through its Maritime Life. New York: Hastings House, 1956.
Brock, Rear Admiral P. W., CB, DSO. Steam and Sail: In Britain and North America. Princeton, New Jersey: The Pyne Press, 1973. A collection of photographs of British and American vessels, with some ship histories.
Bruce, Anthony, and William Cogar. An Encyclopedia of Naval History. New York: Checkmark Books, 1998. Page numbers in boldface indicate article titles. Those in italics indicate illustrations. [Curiously, it seems that ships without their own main entry do not receive any type of prefix, like "H.M.S." or "U.S.S." As a result, it may seem that some military vessels are merchants, when that is not the case. I would guess that this is because the indexing was done by someone other than the author.]
Butler, Daniel Allen. The Lusitania: The Life, Loss and Legacy of an Ocean Legend. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2000.
Butler, Daniel Allen. Warrior Queens: The Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth in World War II. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2002.
Calkins, R. H. (Skipper). High Tide: The Drama and Tragedy of Seattle's Waterfront. Seattle: Marine Digest Publishing, 1952.
Calore, Paul. Naval Campaigns of the Civil War. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2002.
Campbell, R. Thomas. Sea Hawk of the Confederacy: Lt. Charles W. Read and the Confederate Navy. Shippensburg, PA: Burd Street Press, 2000.
Canney, Donald L. Sailing Warships of the US Navy. London: Chatham Publishing, 2001.
Chapelle, Howard I. The American Fishing Schooners, 1825-1935. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1973.
Chapelle, Howard I. The History of American Sailing Ships. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1935.
Chapelle, Howard I. The History of the American Sailing Navy: The Ships and Their Development. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1949. Each entry in this index contains a brief history of the listed ship, plus various dimensions and statistics. When using the source, be sure to check the index itself for useful information.
Chapelle, Howard I. The Search for Speed Under Sail, 1700-1855. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1967. Most ship entries in this index include specific entries for "dimensions," "displacement," "midship coefficient," "block coefficient," "prismatic coefficient," "camber-length ratios," etc., etc. While the page numbers have not been removed from the Ship Name Index, these specific descriptive elements have, in the interest of brevity. Less common subheadings have been included. Any ship name with several pages of discussion in this work will include those dimensions and coefficients.
Clark, Arthur H. The Clipper Ship Era: An Epitome of Famous American and British Clipper Ships, Their Owners, Builders, Commanders, and Crews, 1843-1869. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons; The Knickerbocker Press, 1910. "Vessels not otherwise designated are American."
Clarke, Norman B. Index to Vessel Designs in Rudder Magazine, 1891-1950. Mystic, Conn.: Mystic Seaport Museum, n.d. URL: http://www.mysticseaport.org/library/initiative/rudderindex.cfm.
Accessed: 18 February 2002. [URL updated: 18 August 2006.]
This is an index to vessel designs in The Rudder, not an index to all mentions of specific vessels in the complete journal. The information in parentheses is as follows: Designer; vessel type; builder.
In some cases not all of this information was available. In the date
and page section, all of the years are in two-digit year formats. The
coverage is 1891 to 1950, so "Jun 09:552" means "page
552, June 1909 issue," and "Feb 98:44" means "page 44, February 1898
issue." I did not check these page and date numbers against the
originals.
Course, Capt. A. G. Windjammers of the Horn: The Story of the Last British Fleet of Square-rigged Sailing Ships. London: Adlard Coles, Ltd., 1969.
Cutler, Carl C. Greyhounds of the Sea: The Story of the American Clipper Ship.
Annapolis: United States Naval Institute, 1930. "To lessen repetition,
the given or Christian names of individuals are omitted for the most
part from text and appendices. The index supplies such information by
giving full names wherever available, thus making possible complete
identification in a majority of instances.
"In the matter of names of firms and persons,
some discrepancy in spelling, initials, etc., is to be noted in records
of every description, official and otherwise. Such names are reported
as they were set down in contemporary accounts, in the belief that this
course will rarely mislead and, in some instances, may result in more
definite identification." Also note: Some phrases, indicating a mention
in an appendix, have been deleted from this index, though the page
numbers have been retained.
Cutler, Carl C. Queens of the Western Ocean: The Story of America's Mail and Passenger Sailing Lines.
Annapolis: United States Naval Institute, 1961. "WHEN the spelling of a
ship's name varies in the records, an alternate spelling is given in
parentheses: Abaellino (Abaelino).
"When there are more
than two ships of the same name, the rigs of the vessels are given
using the following abbreviations: Sl. = Sloop; Sch. = Schooner; Bg. =
Brig; Stm. Bg. = Steam
Brig; Bk. = Bark; Sp. = Ship; Stbt. = Steamboat; SS = Steam Ship
(paddle); St. Prop. = Steam Propeller. As a further aid in
distinguishing vessels of the same name, their tonnages are given in
parentheses.
"The letters (Cl.) after a vessel's name
indicate that she was clipper-built. The expression (tern) after a
schooner's name indicates that she was a three-masted vessel.
Eltis, David, Stephen D. Behrendt, David Richardson, and Herbert S. Klein, eds. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade: A Database on CD-ROM. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999. This database "contains the records of 27,233 trans-Atlantic slave ship voyages made between 1595 and 1866." The documentation claims 25,990 of the voyages contain ship names, though I counted 18,955. After deduplicating the file (since there's no need for duplicates in this index) I found 17,084 unique ship/year combinations, which were added to the index. If you find a mention of a vessel in this database, you can check the CD-ROM for further information, such as captain, number of slaves, information about the vessel's voyages, etc. Each entry also includes an indication of its source from among the hundreds of primary and secondary sources cited in the bibliography. Notes regarding ship names: "For most entries in the new data set, we maintained the spelling or wording of the names of vessels, captains, and merchants. Exceptions include corrections of obvious mistakes arising from the fact that the recorder of the information was often less than fluent in the language of the nation to which the vessel belonged. Even without this problem, variations of spelling were, of course, common before the nineteenth century and, as discussed below, we have standardized some spellings to facilitate sorting. We removed the article 'the' from vessel names; thus we deleted Le or La from French names. Occasionally sources reported different names for the same vessel. The Pretty Betty is also identified, for example, as the Pretty Peggy. In such cases, we separated the two names with '(a)' to indicate an alternate name/spelling, as in Pretty Betty (a) Pretty Peggy." (manual, page 11)
Fairburn, William Armstrong. Merchant Sail. Six volumes. Center Lovell, Maine: Fairburn Marine Educational Foundation, Inc., 1945-1955.
William Fairburn's Merchant Sail
is a remarkable work. I believe only several hundred complete copies
were printed, though I don't know a specific number. The title page
verso states, "The entire edition of this work will be distributed
gratis as a public service. The books will not be sold or offered for
sale." They are now rare, even after a reprint version was published,
and a complete set can now cost upwards of $2000-3000.
The Index of Vessels lists 13,278 names, drawn
from the six-volume set. The following information is drawn from the
"Notes on the Indexes":
"All vessels are American unless otherwise
stated; all are sailing vessels unless otherwise stated.... The date
and place of building follow the name of the vessel. If the date and
place are not available, then service, rig, or war, with date if
possible, is given to distinguish craft of the same name built at the
same time or place. If a vessel was renamed, that name is given
wherever available. If a vessel was built under another name, the
original name is listed."
If you want to find copies of this work, but
cannot afford to purchase them, I recommend visiting your nearest large
public or academic library, and asking the librarian to help you search
a database called "WorldCat," which will tell you if any nearby
libraries own any volumes. You may be able to request specific volumes
through InterLibrary Loan.
Gibbs, Jim. Disaster Log of Ships. Seattle: Superior Publishing Co., 1971. This book consists primarily of pictures of sunk, beached, rammed, and otherwise suffering ships. Nearly every reference refers to a photograph, though there is some text, as well.
Gimpel, Herbert J. The United States Nuclear Navy. New York: F. Watts, 1965.
Greenhill, Basil. The Merchant Schooners. Two volumes. London: National Maritime Museum, 1978. (Originally: Percival Marshall & Co., 1951.) Modern Maritime Classics Reprint Series, no. 1. "Illustration pages are indicated by italics."
Hastings, D.J. The Royal Indian Navy, 1612-1950. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 1988.
Hegarty, Reginald B., comp. Addendum to "Starbuck" and "Whaling Masters": New Bedford Customs District.
New Bedford, MA: New Bedford Free Public Library, 1964. This
compilation "involve[s] whaling voyages clearing through the New
Bedford Customs District; namely, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, New Bedford,
Rochester or Mattapoisett, Sippican or Marion, Wareham, and Westport...
[I]n relation to Starbuck's great work [see Starbuck, Nathaniel, History of the
American Whale Fishery, From its Earliest Incetion to the Year 1876, below],
[this list] falls into three categories; missing names of captains,
dates, and/or voyages. In each instance sufficient additional
information in included to identify the voyage."
Also, as noted in the index to Starbuck, which
is also in this index, "repeated page numbers indicate more than one
voyage in the same year by a vessel or more than one vessel with
similar name."
Hollett, David. Passage to the New World: Packet Ships and Irish Famine Emigrants, 1845-1851. Abergavenny, Great Britain: P.M. Heaton Publishing, 1995.
Howarth, Stephen. To Shining Sea: A History of the United States Navy, 1775-1991. New York: Random House, 1991.
Howe, Octavius T., M.D., and Frederick C. Matthews. American Clipper Ships, 1833-1858. 2 vols. Salem, Mass.: Marine Research Society, 1926.
Hyde, Francis E., and J. R. Harris. Blue Funnel: A History of the Alfred Holt and Company of Liverpool, from 1865 to 1914. Liverpool, England: Liverpool University Press, 1957. "The names of ships in brackets refer to the type of ship."
Kemp, Lieut.-Cmdr. P. K., O.B.E. History of the Royal Navy. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1969.
Labaree, Benjamin W., William M. Fowler, Jr., Edward W. Sloan, John B. Hattendorf, Jeffrey J. Safford, and Andrew W. German. America and the Sea: A Maritime History. Mystic, Conn.: Mystic Seaport, 1998. References to illustrations are included in the Ship Name Index, but are not marked as illustrations.
Laing, Alexander. The American Heritage History of Seafaring America. New York: American Heritage Publishing Company, 1974.
Lander, Patricia. Guide to Ferryboats of Puget Sound: Past and Present. Annapolis, MD: Lighthouse Press, 2002. NB: This volume does not contain an index; I compiled the entries in this volume. Numbers in bold indicate main entries by vessel name; numbers in italics indicate photographs. Some entries may be a paragraph long; many are just a sentence or two. The note "(def.)" indicates an entry in the "Definitions of Boat Names" section.
Lass, William E. A History of Steamboating on the Upper Missouri River. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1962.
Lubbock, Basil. The Colonial Clippers. Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, 1948. "All ships named are sailing vessels except those marked s.s. (steamer) or aux. (auxiliary)." [NB: "e. s." = "et seq.", or, "and following"]
Lubbock, Basil. Last of the Windjammers. Two volumes. Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, Ltd., 1927, 1935.
Lubbock, Basil. The Nitrate Clippers. Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, Ltd., 1932.
Lubbock, Basil. The Opium Clippers. Glasgow: Brown, Son, & Ferguson, Ltd., 1933.
MacGregor, David R. Merchant Sailing Ships, 1775-1815: Sovereignty of Sail. London: Conway Maritime, 1985. "Figures in italics refer to page numbers of illustrations."
MacGregor, David R. Merchant Sailing Ships, 1815-1850: Supremacy of Sail. London: Conway Maritime, 1984.
MacGregor, David R. Merchant Sailing Ships, 1850-1875: Heyday of Sail. London: Conway Maritime, 1984. "Figures in italics refer to page numbers of illustrations. No steamers listed in the Appendices are included. No ships are indexed from Appendices III and VI."
Miller, Nathan. The U.S. Navy: An Illustrated History. New York: American Heritage Publishing; Annapolis: United States Naval Institute Press, 1977. "Numbers in boldface refer to illustrations."
Mills, Randall V. Sternwheelers Up Columbia: A Century of Steamboating in the Oregon Country. Palo Alto, California: Pacific Books, 1947. [NB: Ship names in Appendix A were not included in the book's printed index, but they have been added to this index. Multiple entries for single ships from Appendix A have been combined.]
Mystic Seaport Museum: G. W. Blunt White Library.
Westward
by Sea: A Maritime Perspective on American Expansion, 1820-1890.
In Library of Congress, American Memory:
Historical Collections for the National Digital Library. Mystic,
Conn.: Mystic Seaport Museum;
Washington, DC: Library of Congress,
2002. URL: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award99/mymhihtml/mymhihome.html.
Accessed: 5 February 2002.
"This selection of items from Mystic
Seaport's archival collections includes logbooks, diaries, letters,
business papers, and published narratives of voyages and travels. The
unique maritime perspective of these materials offers a rich look at the
events, culture, beliefs, and personal experiences associated with the
settlement of California, Alaska, Hawaii, Texas, and the Pacific
Northwest. A number of photographs, paintings, maps, and nautical charts
are also included to illustrate the story of Americans' western seaborne
travel. Various themes are touched upon, including whaling, life at sea,
shipping, women at sea, and native populations."
The site contains the transcribed full text of
each document, plus scanned images of each page. One can do full-text
searching across the collection. For each of the 311 vessels included
in the index, clicking on the word "Online" will take one directly to
the source mentioning the vessel, or to a list of relevant entries, if
there are more than one.
Newell, Gordon, ed. The H. W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest.
Seattle: Superior Publishing Company, 1966. Subtitled, "An illustrated
review of the growth and development of the maritime industry from
1895, the date of publication of the last such comprehensive history,
Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest, to the
present time, with sketches and portraits of a number of well known
marine men." N.B.: I am aware that there are a lot of errors in this
listing. '5's and '6's were often confused, and I could not check all
of them. Perhaps some time in the future I'll have an opportunity to go
through the 159 pages of this file and check all the numbers. For now,
it's enough to know that all the ship names should be correct, and you
can check the index yourself to be certain. I welcome all corrections
and will incorporate them into the file.
CAPITALIZED ship names indicate entries in the
"Picture Index." In the case of ship names that are always capitalized
(such as "AVP-55"), I have added "(ill.)" after the page number. Some
of these say an image is "opp." (opposite) a specific page, but the
volume I used did not contain these plates.
Newell, Gordon. Ocean Liners of the 20th Century. Seattle: Superior Publishing Company, 1963. This volume is primarily a collection of photographs, and the index is just a "Picture Index": the text is not indexed. Every reference is to a photograph, drawing, or painting.
Newell, Gordon R. Ships of the Inland Sea: The Story of the Puget Sound Steamboats. Portland: Binfords & Mort, 1960.
Norman, Andrew. HMS Hood: Pride of the Royal Navy. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2001. "Page numbers in italics indicate illustrations."
Paine, Lincoln P. Ships of Discovery and Exploration. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000. "Page numbers in bold type indicate main entries. Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations." Special thanks to Mr. Paine for providing me with an electronic copy of his index to this book.
Paine, Lincoln P. Ships of the World: An Historical Encyclopedia. With contributions by James H. Terry and Hal Fessenden. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997. "Page numbers in bold type indicate main entries. Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations." I located a lot of errors in the printed index to this book, especially toward the end of the alphabet. I corrected the ones I identified, but undoubtedly missed many more.
Paine, Lincoln P. Warships of the World to 1900. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000. "Page numbers in bold type indicate main entries. Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations." Special thanks to Mr. Paine for providing me with an electronic copy of his index to this book.
Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society. Maritime Seattle. Images of America Series. Chicago: Arcadia Publishing, 2002. Note: This volume consists primarily of photographs; nearly every vessel in the index is illustrated in the text.
Ritchie, David. Shipwrecks: An Encyclopedia of the World's Worst Disasters at Sea. New York: Checkmark Books, 1996. "This index is designed to be used in conjunction with the cross-references within the A-to-Z entries. The main A-to-Z entries are indicated by boldface page references. The general subjects are subdivided by the A-to-Z entries [here indicated as underlined]. Italicized page references indicate illustrations; 'c' following the locator indicates the chronology."
Rogozinski, Jan. Honor Among Thieves: Captain Kidd, Henry Every, and the Pirate Democracy in the Indian Ocean. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2000. NB: When known, captains' names are included in parentheses.
Roscoe, Theodore. On the Seas and In the Skies: A History of the U.S. Navy's Air Power. New York: Hawthorn Books, 1970.
Rowe, William Hutchinson. The Maritime History of Maine: Three Centuries of Shipbuilding & Seafaring. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 1948.
Sea Chest: The Journal of the Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society. Seattle, 1967-. [NB: This index only covers ships mentioned in volumes 21 (1987) through 32 (1998). Numbers in bold indicate the volume number. The following legend identifies qualifier abbreviations: FISH = Fishing vessel, any rig or propulsion; HMCS = Her Majesty's Canadian Ship; HMS = Her Majesty's Ship; MS = Motor ship, oceangoing; MV = Motor vessel, inland; NOAA = National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration; Sail = Sail powered vessels, all rigs; SDWHL = Side paddle wheel; STWHL = Stern paddle wheel; SS = Steamship, oceangoing; STR = Steamer, inland; Tug = Towboats, steam or diesel; USAT = US Army Transport; USC&GS = US Coast & Geodetic Survey; USCG = US Coast Guard; USCS = US Coast Survey; USLHS = US Light House Service; USPHS = US Public Health Service; USRCS = US Revenue Cutter Service. Special thanks go to Hal Will for creating and providing this index, and to Gil Joynt and John Carver for assistance in obtaining the Sea Chest index for use in this database. - PMc]
Sontag, Sherry, and Christopher Drew. Blind Man's Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage. New York: Public Affairs, 1998.
Starbuck, Alexander. History of the American Whale Fishery, From its Earliest Inception to the Year 1876. 2 vol. New York: Argosy-Antiquarian, 1964. Note: This book was first published in part IV of the report of the U.S. Commission on Fish and Fisheries, Washington, 1878, and also issued privately by the author in 1878. Entries for this title are taken not from Starbuck's work, but from Reginald Hegarty's Addendum to "Starbuck" and "Whaling Masters" (New Bedford: New Bedford Free Public Library, 1964), in which Hegarty compiled an index to Starbuck, and also included an addendum with further information on some vessels. Hegarty's addendum is also included in the Index to Ships in Books.
Tucker, Spencer C., ed. Naval Warfare: An International Encyclopedia. Three volumes. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2002.
Wall, Robert. Ocean Liners. Secaucus, NJ: Chartwell Books, 1977. "Figures in italics refer to illustrations."
Williams, Greg H. Civil and Merchant Vessel Encounters with United States Navy Ships, 1800-2000. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2002.
Last updated: 17 November 2003.
Current number of entries: 103,202.