Women Shipowners in the Nineteenth Century, 1824 - 1899

UKDA study number:6142

Principal Investigator

Doe, H.
University of Exeter. School of Humanities and Social Sciences . Centre for Maritime Historical Studies

Data Collector

Doe, H.

Distributed by

UK Data Archive, University of Essex, Colchester.

April 2009

Bibliographic Citation

All works which use or refer to these materials should acknowledge these sources by means of bibliographic citation. To ensure that such source attributions are captured for bibliographic indexes, citations must appear in footnotes or in the reference section of publications. The bibliographic citation for this data collection is:

Doe, H., Women Shipowners in the Nineteenth Century, 1824 - 1899 [computer file]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Archive [distributor], April 2009. SN: 6142.

Acknowledgement

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Copyright:
Helen Doe, University of Exeter. School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Centre for Maritime Historical Studies

Disclaimer

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6142 . Women Shipowners in the Nineteenth Century, 1824 - 1899
(Women Shipowners in the Nineteenth Century)

Depositor:

Doe, H. , University of Exeter. School of Humanities and Social Sciences . Centre for Maritime Historical Studies

Principal Investigator:

Doe, H. , University of Exeter. School of Humanities and Social Sciences . Centre for Maritime Historical Studies

Data Collector:

Doe, H.

Abstract:

The results shed new light on women as independent economic agents and show widows, spinsters and wives actively buying and selling shares in ships. Twelve per cent of the shipping shares in the five ports were held by women. One small but significant group are the number of wives who held shares in their own names before the Married Women's Property Acts of 1871 and 1882. These data will be of use to anyone studying women investors or shipping investment in the nineteenth century.

Main Topics:

A study of women shipowners in five ports in England. This study forms part of research on women in the maritime industry shortly to be published by Boydell and Brewer as Enterprising women in shipping in the nineteenth century. The data on women shipowners were extracted from the shipping registers of five ports, Exeter, Fowey, King's Lynn, Whitby and Whitehaven. The study comprises 867 women, investing in 692 ships and shows the history of the transactions over time - 1377 transactions are recorded showing how the shares were acquired, from whom and whether they were purchased, inherited or mortgaged. As an individual could have several shares in different ships and one ship had up to 32 owners, the data are presented in a relational form allowing for a wide range of queries. Information on the location of the shipowners, the ships (size and fate) and the name of the master are included.

Coverage:

Time Period Covered: 01 January 1824 - 31 December 1899
Country: England
Geography: Exeter; King's Lynn; Fowey; Whitby; Whitehaven
Spatial Units: No spatial unit
Observation Units: Individuals; Institutions/organisations
Kind of Data: Textual data; Numeric data; Alpha/numeric data

Universe Sampled:

Location of Units of Observation: Subnational
Population: Women shipowners in five English ports 1824-1899

Methodology:

Time Dimensions: Cross-sectional (one-time) study
Sampling Procedures: No sampling (total universe)
Method of Data Collection: Transcription of existing materials
Data Sources: Shipping Registers:
Cornwall Record Office (CRO): MSR/FOW/3-9 Fowey Shipping Registers
North Yorkshire Record Office (NYRO): NG/RS/WH/2, 9 and 10 Whitby Registers
Whitehaven Record Office (WRO) YTSR 1/9-12 and YTSR 16-21 Register of shipping
Devon Record Office (DRO) 3289s/3-17, 10 Exeter shipping registers
Norfolk Record Office (NRO): P/SH Shipping Registers: King's Lynn, Wells, Cley and Great Yarmouth 1825-1892
Additional Sources:
Census returns, Lloyd's Register

Control Operations: None
Weighting: no weighting used

Language(s) of Written Materials:

Study Description: English
Study Documentation: English

Access:

Access Conditions: The depositor has specified that registration is not required.
Availability: UK Data Service
External note: These data are available to any user for any purpose under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International Licence (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Contact: Get in touch

Date of First Release:

8 April 2009

Copyright:

Helen Doe, University of Exeter. School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Centre for Maritime Historical Studies

File last updated:

10 March 2015