Description:

Ships’ muster rolls from 1753 – 1754; Society of Merchant Venturers’ archive.
Muster roll no: 59.

Muster roll for the ship, the Pearl, sailing from Africa and St Christophers, 1752.
The Pearl sailed for Angola in West Africa and traded there for enslaved Africans. The numbers bought and sold are not known. The Angolan slaves were not highly thought of, but no slaving ships had stopped at St Kitts for a while and the slaves were all sold at the good price of about £20 (equivalent to £1,000 today).

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: 1752

Copyright: Copyright The Society of Merchant Venturers