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LLOYD's LIST


Michael Palmer

Lloyd's List is a British publication that gives details of vessel movements, marine casualties, and other information of interest to the merchant shipping community.

The name "Lloyd" derives from Edward Lloyd, the "coffee man", as he called himself, who operated a coffee house in London, originally in Tower Street, then, from just after Christmas 1691, in Lombard Street, near the General Post Office. Lloyd's coffee house served as a meeting place for merchants wishing to exchange news, as well as for merchants and underwriters wishing to negotiate insurance on vessels and cargo. No later than January 1692, Lloyd began publishing a weekly newsletter, Ships Arrived at and Departed from several Ports of England, as I have Account of them in London ... [and] An Account of what English Shipping and Foreign Ships for England, I hear of in Foreign Ports.

This was the forerunner to Lloyd's List, which is therefore, after the official London Gazette (which began publication on 16 November 1665), the oldest continuously published newspaper of any kind in the world. After Lloyd's death, publication of the newsletter was taken over by the association of underwriters that had taken its name from his coffee house, although it was not incorporated until 1871 as the Corporation of Lloyd's (familiarly known as "Lloyd's of London).

The earliest surviving copies of what was to become Lloyd's List date from 22 December 1696 and 27 September 1698, and are numbered 257 and 345, respectively [Public Record Office, Chancery Masters' Exhibits, C.104/128, pt. 2, Unknown Cause, Matthias Giesque & Co Papers, bundle 68]; the issue for 22 December 1696 is reproduced in John J. McCusker, "European Bills of Entry and Marine Lists: Early Commercial Publications and the Origins of the Business Press, Part II: British Marine Lists and Continental Counterparts," Harvard Library Bulletin, 31, No. 4 (Fall 1983), p. 318, Fig. 5].

In September 1699, Lloyd began a new series without changing either title or format, but shifting the day of publication from Saturday to Friday; copies of this second series survive for 19 May 1702 (no. 142) through 7 March 1703/04 (no. 225), less the issue for 8 September 1702 (no. 158) [House of Lords Record Office, Parliament Office Papers, No. 373; McCusker, op. cit., pp. 320-321, Table 7, lists the surviving issues for 1696, 1698, and 1702-1703/4].

About mid-March 1735, the list was revised again, with publication changed to twice a week, on Tuesdays and Fridays, and new numbering. Of this series, the earliest surviving copy is dated 2 January 1740/41, and is numbered 560 [reproduced in McCusker, op. cit., pp. 324-325, Fig. 6A and 6B]. In 1769, a rival New Lloyd's Coffee House was established, and began publication of New Lloyd's List, of which the earliest surviving issue dates from 1771. The two titles ran concurrently for several years, issues for Lloyd's List surviving for 1770 and 1772, and issues of New Lloyd's List for 1771.

From 1773 onwards, only New Lloyd's List survives, the "New" being dropped from the title in 1789. Lloyd's List, which since 1 July 1837 has appeared six days a week (Sundays excepted), was published by (what became) the Corporation of Lloyd's until July 1884, when it was merged with the Shipping and Mercantile Gazette (which had been published since 1838).

This arrangement persisted until June 1914, when the Corporation of Lloyd's again assumed responsibility for publication. Since 1973, Lloyd'sList has been published by Lloyd's of London Press Ltd [D. T. Barriskill, comp., A Guide to the Lloyd's marine collection and Related marineSources at Guildhall Library, Guildhall Library Research Guide 7 (2nd ed.; London: Guildhall Library, 1994), p. 11].

The issues of Lloyd's List and New Lloyd's List for 1741, 1744, 1747-1753, 1755, 1757-1758, 1760-1777, and 1779 to date are among the historic maritime records of the the Corporation of Lloyd's, which since 1979 have been deposited, on permanent loan, at the Guildhall Library, Manuscripts Department, Aldermanbury, London EC2P 2EJ, Great Britain, where they form the Lloyd's Marine Collection. (The volumes for 1745, 1746, 1754, 1759, and 1778, were stolen from Lloyd's sometime between 1928 and 1969.) In 1969, Gregg International Publishers Ltd, of Farnborough, England, reprinted the surviving volumes for 1741-1825, and microfilm
copies of the volumes for 1827-1850 and 1914-1969 (430 rolls) are currently available from the British Library Newspaper Library, Colindale Avenue, London. Copies of these reprint volumes and microfilms are available at a number of major university and maritime research libraries, most of which, however, consider them of such importance that they do not permit Interlibrary Loan.

The primary historical value of Lloyd's List is as a source of information on ship movements and casualties (losses or damages). Barriskill's Guide to the Lloyd's marine collection, referenced above, gives at pp. 11-14 a detailed account of the arrangement of the various sections of Lloyd's List from 1741 onwards.

Lloyd's List is accessed by two major indexes:

1. typescript indexes to casualties and "paragraphs" (news items), but not to ship movements, 1741-1763, 1767 1768, 1770-1771, 1775-1776, 1779, 1783 (indexes to other years up to 1799 in progress), placed in the volumes to which they refer; and

2. annual indexes to movements and casualties, arranged alphabetically by name of vessel, 1838-1927. These latter indexes have been microfilmed, and there are copies of these microfilms at many major maritime institutions, such as the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney and the Maritime History Archive at the Memorial University of Newfoundland in St. John's, Newfoundland. Ship movements from 1927 onwards are indexed in the "Voyage Record Cards". For further information on the Lloyd's List Indexes and Voyage Record Cards, see Barriskill, pp. 14-16.

Michael Palmer

Claremont, California

1999 06 09

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Last updated 21.04.02ef





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