If you have no details of the ships that a seafarer sailed on, you will need to rely on indexes. There is no single index anywhere for this period, and probably never will be. However, there is some hope - many indexes do exist as you can see below. This page details:

• Census indexes
• The MHA CD-ROM
• Indexes at local record offices
• Indexes on-line
• The CLIP crew names index
• Seamen's tickets after 1913
• Indexes at The National Archives
• General Register Office indexes

Censuses included ships which were in a British port on the night of the census.
 
The 1861 census includes an index of people on board ship. This is available on microfiche at the Family Records Centre, LDS centres etc.
 
The 1881 census was indexed by the LDS Church and is available on CD-ROM and at LDS family history centres.
 
The 1901 census is available on-line at The National Archives site.
 
There may be local census indexes which cover a port in which you are interested.
 
The Maritime History Archive (MHA), Newfoundland has a database which is available on CD-ROM, giving details of 80,000 seafarers on British registered ships and 120,000 on Canadian registered ships. The cost is about £25 - you can order on-line. Some British record offices and reference libraries may have a copy of the CD-ROM, but we’ve not found one yet! You can check a list of the surnames on the CD on the MHA's web site.
 
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Several record offices have indexes of seamen from the crew lists and agreements they hold. The format varies - card indexes, printed or as part of the catalogue. Some ROs have indexes of masters and owners only. It's worth searching all of them because seafarers often sailed on ships registered in other parts of Britain, not just their own home port. There must be over 500,000 entries on these indexes in all. The table below shows the record offices which have at least partial indexes.
 

Record Office	Index
Berwick-upon-Tweed Record Office	RO catalogue includes partial index of crew names, recently transferred to electronic format by CLIP (at RO).
Bristol Record Office*	On fiche and available from Bristol FHS
Ceredigion Archives Service	Part of catalogue of crew lists, small enough to be searched quickly
Devon Record Office	Masters and Owners, printout
Flintshire Record Office*	Bound typescript volumes at the RO
Glamorgan Record Office	Masters ( on-line at Bob Sanders' site)
North East Lincolnshire Archives, Grimsby	Card index including fishing lists after 1884
Somerset Record Office*	Aubrey Brown's pioneering index is also available on-line
Suffolk Record Office, Ipswich	Card index
Suffolk Record Office, Lowestoft	Card index
West Sussex Record Office	Card index in progress

 
* These indexes are included in the CLIP online crew names index (see below)
 
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The following web sites have databases of seafarer's names:
 
Swansea Mariners - 61,600 entries from Swansea crew lists (at the last visit)
Cardiff Mariners - 2,200 entries from Cardiff crew lists (at the last visit)
Welsh Mariners - 22,000 Welsh Master Mariners
Irish Merchant Seamen - 12,000 Irish merchent seamen, taken from the C10 record cards for 1918 to 1923 at Southampton City RO.
Guernsey crew lists - Stephen Foote's index of Guernsey Crew Lists
Mariners and Ships in Australian Waters - Index from the New South Wales Inwards Passenger lists (includes crew members)
Lloyd's Captains Register - an index to most of the Lloyd's Captains Registers held by the Guildhall Library Manuscripts Section.
 
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The CLIP database reached over 260,000 entries from crew lists - only a small percentage of all the records, but it's the largest crewlist database there is. The data includes the indexes made at Bristol, Flintshire and Somerset record offices (with permission).
 
NEW! We're delighted to say that the CLIP crew names index can now be searched online at findmypast.
 
NB We are delighted to help with general advice about finding records (that's what CLIP and this web site is about) but please do not contact us for searches for individual crew lists or seafarers - all the data we have is either on this site or available for sale as above. We are happy to do privately commissioned research, but please be aware that we are also happy to charge for it at professional rates.
 
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A system of registration for seafarers was re-introduced in 1913, including 'tickets' for seafarers, recording their service at sea. Tickets may possibly show service before 1913. The tickets are held in the Central Index Register of Merchant Seamen at Southampton City Record Office.
 
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If the seafarer was (or might have been) a Master, Mate or Engineer, search at The National Archives (TNA) in the registers of certificates (BT 122 - BT 130 and BT 138), Lloyds Captains’ Register and Engineers’ certificates registers (BT 139 - BT 142). However, many officers did not have certificates.
 
The 'seamen's pouches' for the period from 1913 to 1972 are in BT 372 and may contain records of seafarers whose service began before that time. You can search this part of The National Archives catalogue on line by seafarer's name. Enter the name and initials in the 'Word or Phrase' field and the series code, BT 372, in the 'Department or Series Code' field and click 'Search'. This will give you the reference for the record. Thanks to Bryan Richards for this information.
 
It may be worth searching the indexes of apprentices in BT150.
 
If the seafarer died at sea, the death may be recorded in the registers and indexes listed below:

• Registers and wages and effects of deceased seamen, 1852-1881, 1888-1889 (BT 153, indexed in BT 154);
• Monthly lists of deaths of seamen, 1886-1889 (BT 156);
• Register of seamen's deaths classified by cause, 1882-1888 (BT 157);
• Registers of births, marriages and deaths of passengers at sea, 1854-1890 (BT 158, partially indexed in BT 158/7 and BT 158/8);
• Registers of deaths of British Nationals at sea, 1875-1888 (BT 159);
• Registers and indexes of births, marriages and deaths of passengers and seamen at sea, from 1890 (BT 334);
• General Register Office: Miscellaneous Foreign Returns (RG 32);
• Miscellaneous Returns of Births Marriages and Deaths: Indexes (RG 43)

If the death is recorded, it may be possible to obtain a certificate of death from the General Register Office (GRO) - see below.
 
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The General Register Office (GRO) has recorded births, marriages and deaths from 1837 including events at sea, which were reported to the Registrar General with varying efficiency.
 
They were entered into registers similar (but not identical) to those now held at The National Archives which has a leaflet setting out the details.
 
The indexes show the age at death and the ship's name (but not her official number) from 1875 onwards.
 
You can look up the indexes on line at findmypast which has useful information pages. There is a charge for viewing the index images.
 
Death certificates, which are copies of the register entries (and could therefore include details such as the ship's official number), can be obtained by fax, phone, post or online from the General Register Office.
 
If all indexes fail, you can only search through all the records for a particular port or ship which may have links to the seafarer. This is not recommended. You may be inspired to start making your own index - if you do, let us know!