Captains, such as Cook, had a limited say in selecting their crew. Sometimes men chose themselves through loyalty to a particular officer. For example, when Cook transferred from Grenville to Endeavour in 1768, eight members of the Grenville company followed him: William Howson, Isaac Smith, Peter Flower, John Charlton, Alexander Weir, William Grimshaw, Timothy Rarden and Thomas Hardman.
Occasionally, Cook requested particular men, as when he wrote to Philip Stephens, the Admiralty Secretary on 11 March 1776:
Mr Robt Mackie, Midshipman on board the Nonsuch, who was the late voyage in the Adventure, hath appli’d to me to go out in the Resolution – As I have great reason to believe, that he will, on many occasions, be a very usefull Man, I beg you will move their Lordships to Order hime to be discharged from the Nonsuch into the Resolution.
Far more often, men were allocated to a ship purely based on their presence in the same port and their availability. Cook did have a say, though, in appointing men to positions. The majority of crew were first entered as able seamen (ABs). Then, in the months prior to sailing, men’s abilities were assessed before they were promoted to positions such as quartermasters, boatswain’s mate and carpenter’s crew. Similarly, men could be demoted.
Extra people in the muster
Early in this article, I wrote “everyone supposedly on that vessel”. The reason for this phrase is that many captains included the names of men or boys not actually in the ship while others had people on board whose presence was not noted in the muster. James Cook was guilty of both of these actions.
It has been suggested that captains would enter their sons so that the time could be used later as part of the experience requirement for becoming a lieutenant. Others have suggested it was merely a ploy to gain more money for themselves. Whatever the reason, Cook had his two sons, James and Nathaniel, listed in Endeavour’s muster when they were still just little boys back home in Mile End. On the Grenville brig in 1767, off the west coast of Newfoundland, James Surridge, a seaman, died. William Howson’s name suddenly appeared on the muster. This change happened in a remote unpopulated area so he must have been on the brig all along but for some unknown reason his presence had not been acknowledged.
Another inclusion in the list on many ships was that of widows’ men. A widow’s man was a fictitious seaman entered on the muster whose wages would be set aside to be used to make payment to the families of dead crew members. The number of widows’ men on a ship was proportional to the ship’s size (one per hundred company members) so Cook’s small vessels only had one if they had one at all.
Extra pages in the muster
Each two-month set of musters would be signed by the captain, master and boatswain as a correct representation of what had taken place. A front cover page was also completed. This page carried a synopsis of the period and indicated the code letter for each week under consideration. It also showed totals for each week for the ship’s complement, the number of men actually borne and also those already discharged sick. A listing of all the men who had run was kept separately near the back of the document. When a ship returned to its home port all musters were handed in to the clerk of the cheque for wages, etc., to be calculated and distributed.
Muster records have proved most useful in the pursuit of information about the men who sailed with Cook. The date and place of birth have made searching such genealogical databases as the London Parish records offered by the London Metropolitan Archives and the website Ancestry.co.uk that much easier and certain, even allowing for some of the problems mentioned above.
Statistical analysis of the records is also interesting. For example, nearly as many men mustered in Resolution before the Second Voyage did not sail (89) as did sail (93). Of these 89: one person died, 30 were discharged and 58 ran.
John Robson