Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

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.

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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.

No sampling (total universe)

Transcription of existing materials