ALEXANDER

Date1813

Object NameSHIP

MediumWOOD

ClassificationsShip

DimensionsLength 90.1' x Breadth 26' x Depth (not recorded - height between decks 5.7')
Gross tonnage: 252 or 275 tons (see notes)

Object numberABDSHIP002889

Keywords

Aberdeen Built Ships

About MeYard: unknown

Fate: unknown, last in Lloyd's shipowners 1833 (A446).

Propulsion: Sail
Description: Ship rigged (see note), 3 masts, 2 decks, standing bowsprit, square stern, carvel built, no figurehead.

Owners:
1815-25: Ritchie & Co. (Lloyd's underwriters)
1822-33: Thompson (Lloyd's shipowners)
1824: Registered at Aberdeen for subscribing owners;
Alexander Bannerman, 32 shares; Thomas Bannerman, 32 shares.
(Source: Aberdeen Register of Shipping (Aberdeen City Archives)

Masters:
1815-18: Master J. Pirie
1818-25: Master J. Ellice (Lloyd's shipowners gives J. Allison fitting with "John Allison, Greenland master" in Barrow's account extracts of which below, however as a ship hired by the nay the commissioned officer, Lt. Parry, commanded, not the master, who navigated.)
1822-28: Master J. Booth (Lloyd's shipowners)
1830-33: Master Robinson
1824: Master Joseph Pecket (Aberdeen Register)

Voyages (Lloyd's underwriters):
1815-17: Plymouth Transport (i.e. contracted to the Transport board)
1818-21: London Discovery
1822-24: Dysart - New Brunswick (Lloyd's shipowners)
1826-33: Leith - America (Lloyd's shipowners)

General History:
Having been already in the service of the Transport Board ALEXANDER was hired in 1818 to join an expedition to be led from the ISABELLA by Commander John Ross RN. Its purpose was to explore the coast of Baffin Island and search for the North West Passage.
ALEXANDER's crew for this endeavour was:
Lt. W. E. Parry RN (commanding)
Lt. H. H. Hooper RN
W. H. Hooper, purser
Alexander Fisher, assistant surgeon
Ph. Bisson, midshipman
John Nias, midshipman
John Allison, Greenland master
Joseph Phillips, Greenland mate
James Halse, clerk
3 petty officers (a carpenter, cook, and sailmaker)
3 leading seamen
17 able seamen
5 marines
(Sir John Barrow (1846), "Voyages of discovery and research within the Arctic regions, from the year 1818 to the present time: under the command of the several naval officers employed by sea and land in search of a North-west passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific" (John Murray, London), p. 19)
"Lieutenant Parry, who commanded the ALEXANDER, served several years on the coast of North America, where he was distinguished as an excellent navigator, theoretical as well as practical." (ibid., p. 22)
Sir John Barrow's account is clear that he viewed this expedition as a disappointment. (ibid., p. 24)
"On the 18th of April the ships left the river Thames, arrived at Lerwick on the 30th, and on the 1st of June were somewhere on the eastern side of Davis's Strait; proceeded slowly between the ice and the western shore of Greenland" [in mid June] (ibid., pp. 25-6)
Barrow castigates Captain Ross for leading the expedition up the west side of Baffin Island "where there could be no passage into the Polar sea" (ibid., p. 29)
By 19 August they had reached the Carey Islands at the north-western corner of Greenland (ibid., p.36) Ross did not then try to penetrate Smith's sound between Greenland and Canada's northernmost island, Ellesmere Island. (ibid., pp. 37-8). He did, however, enter the Lancaster Sound, between Baffin Island and Devon Island to the north of it. (ibid., pp. 41-2)
Barrow notes that "In Lieutenant Parry's [commander of ALEXANDER] private journal it is said 'The swell comes from the north-west, compass' (that is, south-south- west true,) and continues just as it does in the ocean. It is impossible to remark this circumstance without feeling a hope that it may be caused by this inlet being a passage into a sea to the westward ot it.' A happy and rational hope that, within twelve months Parry had the good fortune to realise." (ibid., p. 44). Ross however, seeing mountains ahead and so described the sound as an inlet - presumably the mountains were icebergs - turned the ships about, and headed back east. (ibid., pp. 45-7) They then proceeded homeward, having only proceeded slightly farther than William Baffin some two centuries earlier. Parry would return to the area several times but not in the ALEXANDER.

Note: In Lloyd's underwriters ALEXANDER is 275 tons but in most other information she is given as 252 tons, Barrow, Lloyd's shipowners, and the Aberdeen register all give this figure. However, while the Aberdeen Register and Lloyd's shipowners agree on tonnage they disagree on date built, as the Aberdeen register puts it as 1810 rather than 1813 which is in both sets of Lloyd's. Both Lloyd's also agree on ship rig rather than barque as in the Aberdeen register.