Description:

Ships’ muster rolls from 1787 – 1788; Society of Merchant Venturers’ archive.
Muster roll no: 149.

Muster roll for the ship, the Emilia , sailing from Africa, 1787.
The Emilia sailed for Bonny in West Africa with orders to buy 450 slaves. It is not known how many were bought and sold at St Thomas or St Kitts, in the Caribbean.

The muster roll is a list of all crew signed on for all or part of a voyage, which was used to calculate the money each man should pay to the Sailors’ Hospital Fund (insurance).

The Society of Merchant Venturers is a Bristol-based organisation, which was formed in 1552 as an elite body of merchants involved in overseas trade. The Society still exists today.

Date: 1787

Copyright: Copyright The Society of Merchant Venturers