Curious what a trans-Atlantic sailing year looked like during the PGM?

Question

For anyone who might be interested, I did an analysis a few years ago of all recorded sailings from the Pool of London to the English New World colonies in 1635, which I've just created a page for at the name study I'm doing [https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Blood_Name_Study_American-Colonial_Crossing]. My original purpose was to better understand what a typical sailing year looked like during the Protestant Great Migration, even though this isn't the year my ancestors departed England. Although this may also not have been the exact year your ancestors departed England or the port from which they left, it at least gives you a "year in the life" of a main English port during the height of the PGM.

Comments

Very nicely done, Garry. 

Did you pick London because its records were the most complete? Or was London perhaps where the Blood families originated..? I ask because your research FSP may also apply to a great many families that were part of the Great Migration period, and could be helpful to them as well.

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You got it, I picked London 1635 because as far as I can tell it's the only port and year for which there's a reasonably complete record to analyse. Out of pure luck, it's also the port I'm 99% sure my Blood ancestors passed through on the way to the Mass Bay Colony, but that was in 1639.

Answer 1

This is a great resource and very interesting! Thank you for taking the time to put it together.

Answer 2

Nice Job Gary. That is a lot of work!

I have a relative that sailed in 1635. Edward Earle was a passenger in August, 1635, on the ship Thomas, Captain Henry Tavener. He was listed as forty-five year old. The ship sailed from Gravesend, England, to Virginia.

Is Gravesend the main point of departure, one of the points of departure? When you say these ships sailed from London does that include Gravesend?

I have read that ships that sailed to Virginia made a stop at Barbados first. Do you know anything about that? Could someone on a ship headed to Virginia get off the ship in Barbados and not continue to Virginia?

If you have any information I would appreciate it.

Comments

Hi Glenn,

I grouped the Gravesend departures in with London because it appears that's how the English government of the time did it. But your comment reminded me that I meant to put in a note explaining that! As near as I could tell, some ships loaded passengers in London then stopped to pick up more in Gravesend (one definitely did that), but most either loaded at London or at Gravesend if the record is to be trusted.

As for Barbados, if any of the Virginia-bound ships in 1635 did that they didn't record it with the government record office. No Virginia-bound ship stated any other destination before it sailed, but no telling what happened when they got to sea. I think you may be referring to the Carribean-North America leg of the Triangular Trade, where English ships would load sugarcane molasses in Barbados then trade it in the American colonies for commodities they could sell back in England for a profit (e.g., tobacco from Virginia or New England rum made from that Barbados molasses). But sugarcane production in Barbados didn't begin until the 1640s, so I don't think that leg of the triangle was operating in 1635.

Update: Wow, I went down a rabbit hole! I've re-done the departures table to distinguish between ships that embarked passengers at London (35), ships that embarked passengers at Gravesend (19), and ships that embarked passengers at both ports (1). I've also added ship's masters' names, which caused me to realise most of the ships I thought had done two crossings in 1635 were actually just two or more ships of the same name.