ROB ROY

Date1819

Object NameBRIG

MediumWOOD

ClassificationsShip

Dimensionslength 92' x breadth 24 5/6' x depth 15 7/12'
Registered Tonnage: 241 ton

Object numberABDSHIP001784

Keywords

Aberdeen Built Ships

About MeYard: James Adamson

Fate: wrecked at L'Islet, St. Lawrence river, Quebec, 30 April 1827.

Propulsion: Sail
Description: Brig rigged, 1 deck, 2 masts, standing bowsprit, square stern, carvel built, a man bust figurehead.

Owners:
1825: Registered at Aberdeen for subscribing owners;
Robert Catto, 12 shares; William Catto, 6 shares; John Catto Jnr., 2 shares; all Aberdeen merchants.
Other Shareholders in 1825:
George Pirie, 2 shares; William Pirie, 2 shares; George Thomson, 4 shares; William Simpson, 4 shares; all merchants. William Kenn, shipmaster, 4 shares; John Cadenhead, gardener, 2 shares; William Caie, slater, 2 shares; John Bruce, baker, 2 shares; John Sutherland, wigmaker, 2 shares; William Willox, saddler, 2 shares; William Donald Jnr., merchant, 2 shares; James Laurence, manufacturer, 6 shares; The representative of the late William Nairn, shipmaster, 4 shares; all Aberdeen. Frances Weir Esq., Deecastle, Aberdeenshire, 4 shares.
(Source: Aberdeen Register of Shipping (Aberdeen City Archives))

Masters:
1821: Master W. Nairn
1821-27: Master William Kenn (sometimes Kean in Lloyd's)

Voyages (from Lloyd's underwriters):
1821: Greenock - Miramichi (New Brunswick)
1822-23: Belfast - New Brunswick
1824-25: Belfast - Quebec
1826: Liverpool - Canada
1827: Belfast - Quebec

General History:
In April 1819 the ROB ROY, under the command of Capt. W. Nairn, carried seven passengers to Quebec.
(Lucille H. Campey (2002), "'Fast Sailing and Copper-Bottomed': Aberdeen Sailing Ships and the Emigrant Scots they carried to Canada 1774-1855" (Natural Heritage Books, Toronto), p. 24)

21/03/1827:
NOTICE TO PASSENGERS FOR QUEBEC
THOSE Passengers who have engaged their Passage the first-class fast-sailing Brig ROB ROY, WILLIAM KENN, Commander, Are requested to be in Belfast and board on SATURDAY, the 31st inst. Shippers will please have their Goods on board on WEDNESDAY, the 28th. A few Passengers can still be comtartably accomodated on immediate application to DAVID GRAINGER
Belfast, 19th March, 1827.
(Belfast Commercial Chronicle)

08/06/1827:
(From the New York Gazette May, 16)
FRIGHTFUL SHIPWRECK.-The brig ROB ROY, from Belfast for Quebec, was wrecked in a violent gale on the night of the 30th ult., [April] on the shoals of L'lslet. The number of passengers was 151; of these were drowned, 19 children, 3 women, and 2 men. The WATERLOO brought away 27 men, 16 women, and 27 children—in all 70 persons, the rest had proceeded to Quebec by land. The survivors were loud in their praise of the inhabitants of the country near where they were wrecked, who treated them with the utmost kindness, slaughtering their cattle to give them provisions. The cargo of the ROB ROY is valued at 30,000l. which is almost all lost or damaged. One man lost his wife and three children; another, out of four children, lost three; the survivor is deaf and dumb. A Mrs. Lamb lost her husband, one child, and money and property to the amount of 700l., and is now with six children, left destitute. The vessel is a total wreck.
(Sun (London))