Shipping Registries and old Crew Agreements

[Paul Manos]

Hi folks

If I understand correctly, a ship's crew agreement is deposited at voyage end with officials in the ship's port of registry.

If that's the correct starting point, I am looking for a 1924 crew agreement for the Greek vessel "Rokos Vergottis" (5202 tons), registered at Argostoli, Kefalonia, Greece. It sailed to Australia leaving Hamburg or Antwerp (Feb. 7) (depending on the newspaper reports, passing through Newcastle (Shields Feb. 6, where it apparently loaded with coal); via Suez to Cairns, Sydney (April 25) & Port Pirie (to load with wheat) apparently the first Greek freighter to come to Australia since the war.

My uncle was on this ship but NAA advised their Customs records for that period have gaps.

I can't find online a registry still in Cephalonia, and can't find in the Greek bureaucracy which agency or department or where is the Greek Registry today - which you'd think would be an easy find given the Greek merchant fleet is apparently either No. 1 or No. 2 in size in the world.

I would happily bypass the bureaucracy and go straight to the Maritime Archives but I can't find that either. Wondering if the Archives are subsumed within a different department with an unrelated name.

I looked also at the NAA - no luck there.

Would appreciate your thoughts or suggestions.

201503011801050.WARBEGONIA1919asROKOSVERGOTTIS.jpg

201705260629450.ROKOSVERGOTTISDoxFrost.jpg

Launched as War Begonia Built for and Country

Panaghis Vergottis

Argostoli, Greece

[Brenda Shackleton]

Hello Paul,
City of Vancouver Archives have several photos of R.V. Apparently she was built in Sunderalnd by W Doxford & Sons Ltd and launched as SS WAR BEGONIA. Sold to Greeks immediately and became SS ROKOS VERGOTTIS. The only number I can find for her is 49. Quite bizarre, I think, as Official numbers were quite lengthy.

This becomes a problem when you want to trace Crew Lists as catalogues always ask for the Off. Number. Maybe if you go to City of Vancouver Archives. searcharchives.vancouver.ca they might be able to help you. They have a link to R.G. Go to item CVA 447-2636. SS ROKOS VERGOTTIS.

Not much help, I'm afraid. Sorry. Many Crew lists are held in Nova Scotia, Canada. They are very obliging .
Best of luck
Brenda

[Mark Keever]

I find an " official " LLOYD'S number as 1417055. The attached may offer faint hope about the owners in 1931. Maybe more information can be located about the company and their depository of company records somewhere ?

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Sorry, maybe the PDF opens larger...

[Kathryn Atkin]

Crew List Index Search:
https://www.mun.ca/mha/holdings/searchcombinedcrews.php

https://www.mun.ca/mha/holdings/view...ial_No=1417055
Search results for Crew Lists in the Maritime History Archive
Types of Agreements and Accounts page provides an explanation for the codes referring to
the crew agreements held at the Maritime History Archive.

Official_No: 141705

1924: B2
1928: B2
1929: B2
1933: E2

Kath.



Added for assistance only
https://www.mun.ca/mha/holdings/view...cial_No=141705

[Brian Grace]

90% of crew lists are held by the Newfoundland University, all you have to supply to them is the name of the vessel and the year, another 5% are held by the Maritime Museum and another 5% by the National Archives

[Paul Manos]

Thanks, Brian.
Newfoundland University's Maritime Museum Research department helped point me towards the 1909 Crew Agreement of my great-uncle (on another thread), which turned out to be in the Glamorgan Archives in Cardiff; expecting to receive those documents later this month.

I've written to them again, hoping for similar advice regarding my uncle's 1925 crew agreement, because in their emails to me they indicated they only carry Crew Agreements on British registered ships.

The first 4 registrations of the "Rokos Vergottis" were all at the same Greek port of registry, Argostoli, on the island of Cephalonia in Greece.
Only later, it seems, in 1938, was it registered in London.

[Patricia Meiring]

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Hi folks

If I understand correctly, a ship's crew agreement is deposited at voyage end with officials in the ship's port of registry.







I looked also at the NAA - no luck there.

Would appreciate your thoughts or suggestions.


Launched as War Begonia Built for and Country

Panaghis Vergottis

Argostoli, Greece

Hi Paul,

I don't know if this information will be relevant to your research but I found the following sites the most useful in the search for crew agreements and voyage records when writing my late father's biography. He was a marine engineer with the merchant navy betwen 1934 and 1955 in Britain and New Zealand.
Crew Agreements -
National Archives - The National Archives BT99/4274
Royal Maritime Museum Greenwich (for years ending in 5) - library@rmg.co.uk
Maritime Museum Newfoundland - Crew List Index Search Results - then list the ships number
Voyage Records
Lloyds Marine Collection, Guildhall Library, Aldermanbury, London, EC2V 7HH. www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/guildhalllibrary

Best of Luck with your research,
Jane Patton

[Keith Nicholls]

Just re-read the article once more and, in the case of British Registered vessels, Articles of Agreement were deposited with either the Shipping Master, or the British Consul at the port where the Agreement was terminated, which may not have been the port of the vessel's registry.