Navy Records
The following series of Navy records are available to download from DocumentsOnline. Select the headings to be taken to an in depth guide to each series.
- Royal Marines Service Records (ADM 159)
Service records of those who joined the Royal Marines,
1842 -1936. Search
- Registers of Seamen's Services (ADM 139, ADM 188)
Service registers of more than 600,000 seamen in the Royal Navy, 1853 -1923. Search
- Royal Naval Division service records (ADM 339)
Service records of more than 50,000 officers and men who joined the RND, 1914 -1919. Search
- Royal Naval Officers' Service Records (ADM 196)
Service records of officers who joined the Royal Navy,
1756 -1917. Search
- RNVR service records from WW1 (ADM 337)
Service records of those who served in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve during the First World War. Search
- WRNS: Women's Royal Naval Service (ADM 318, ADM 336)
Service records of more than 7,000 women who joined the WRNS (1917-1919). Search
- Wills of Royal Naval Seamen, (ADM 48)
A collection of around 20,000 wills made by seamen of the Royal Navy, 1786 -1882. Search
- French Muster Rolls from the Battle of Trafalgar (HCA 32)
Documents seized from four French ships captured after the Battle of Trafalgar by a Royal Navy squadron. They list details about the sailors, soldiers and passengers of each vessel. Search
- Medals issued to Merchant Seamen, Second World War (BT 395)
Records of Second World War medals claimed and issued, 1946 -2002. Search
- The Victoria Cross Registers (WO 98)
The Victoria Cross was instituted by Royal Warrant on 29 January 1856 and awarded to members of the Royal Navy and the Army who 'shall have performed some signal act of valour...' Search
- Recommendations for Honours and Awards (WO 373)
Honours and awards made to British army personnel and those of the dominions, 1935- 1990. Search
- Second World War Merchant Shipping Movement Cards (BT 389)
Cards recording the movements of merchant ships during the Second World War.
Search
- Logs and Journals of Ships on Exploration (ADM 55)
Download logbooks of the Royal Navy’s voyages of scientific discovery. Search
- Digital Microfilm
Free of charge. Download selected Army and Navy records as part of our pilot project. Search
Also available
The National Archives has digitised some of the individual documents which are most frequently ordered by our readers. Some of these documents are single pieces within a series. The documents available for download include:
- Royal Marines: selected Plymouth attestations (ADM 157/140)
This volume holds Royal Marines Attestation Forms for Plymouth Division, 1805 - 1848. It also includes Portsmouth and Woolwich Divisions. The forms gathered a considerable amount of personal information about the Marine, such as date and place of birth, his trade, physical characteristics, details of his enlistment and attestation and sometimes even references to next-of-kin.
- Indexes to seamen's names (BT 154/4-6)
The Board of Trade managed the records of the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen and its predecessor, the General Register and Record Office of Seamen which was in operation from 1835 to 1872.
The files in DocumentsOnline contain indexes to the registers of merchant seamen's names for the period 1860 -1867- (the full BT 154 series of indexes covers the period 1852-1889-). The indexes are used to locate the records of receipt of dead sailors' wages and effects, or their proceeds. They are ordered by year and, within each year, by surname. They give the page and column reference and include the name of the ship.
The seamen's documents were passed to Shipping Masters by the masters of British ships under the Seamen's Fund Winding-up Act 1851 and they are filed in the series BT 153 (not available online).
Further Research
