William Hoodless land surveyor (1776-1855) had four sons. Three of those sons chose to take up the high risk occupation of merchant seaman and travelled the world, sailing the high seas, shipping a variety of cargo from ports around the world. No doubt they were raised to be ambitious, improve their prospects and go out into the world to seize their fortune. They all achieved the status of Master Mariner captaining their own vessels. Here is a review of how things worked out for one of them.
William, the oldest son, was born in 1804 and baptised at St Michaels Workington on 18th Nov 1809. By the age of 25 he was master of the Irt, a 215 ton sailing ship registered out of Whitehaven originally and then Liverpool. The shipping news below shows him bringing in wine and iron flasks containing quicksilver (mercury) from Cadiz in Spain.
In the years he was master of the Irt until at least late 1836, William regularly sailed between Liverpool and Calcutta, and also sailed to Rio de Janeiro. His last voyage on the Irt was recorded as departing Manilla on 31st March and arriving back in Liverpool, via St Helena in the South Atlantic Ascension Islands, on 30th August 1836. Below is an extract from the Merchant Seamen’s Register for 1843-1844, his entries are coded 62 for the port of Liverpool. William is 37 years old, master of the Patriot Queen and the The Princess Royal. In these ships he sailed to Singapore, Bengal and St Helena. His brother John is shown below his entry, as a 27 year old master of the Oberon.
The news report below dated 7th June 1839 details William arriving from Canton, China with a valuable cargo of china tea, bundles of mats and blinds, boxes of lamps and lacquerware and sundry other exotic items. This is the height of the British fascination with Chinese decorative pieces and the beginning of their obsession with tea. Interestingly, one of the people named as an importer is one W Hoodless, which may have been his father. He is importing the largest share of the goods with 4799 chests and 702 half chests of china tea. Unless this was William himself and he had a side business importing as a wholesaler. Maybe this is how he amassed his fortune – which will be discussed further on.
Below is an extract from the Merchant Seaman’s Register for the years 1845 to 1848. Everything was written in code numbers in this one for the registered port, ship, departure port, the date and month etc.
Here William was 40 years old in 1845 sailing out of Liverpool on the British Tar on 14th March and returning on 8th December that year. He then undertakes a voyage on the Robert, a sloop built in 1831, departing from Liverpool on 9th July 1846 and not returning until 10th April 1847. A month later the Robert sails again on 15th June and does not return to Liverpool until 23 February 1847.
William married Jane Scott in Workington on 22 June 1848, they were both in their forties when they we and never had any children.
Here they are in the 1851 Census for Workington living on Brow Top, Workington. His wife’s sister, Margaret Scott, is also living at the residence along with a house servant. The houses along this road are of a good quality and the couple lived here until their death in 1876. William’s will states his residence as 29 Brow Top and the value of his estate is £6000 when he dies 6th Feb 1876. As a master mariner in the merchant navy, William had amassed a fortune which implies he may have been trading and importing as well. By 1861 he has retired to live a comfortable life in a stylish home – 29 Brow Top is on an elevated site and would have had a view out over fields towards the River Derwent. The road was a terrace of elegant Georgian houses and was a thoroughfare from the town centre leading down to the sea and the Port of Workington.
Upon his death in February 1876, William’s will was proved at Carlisle High Court – Jane his wife and Henry his brother executors. William set apart a sum of £3250 to be invested and his wife to live off the interest of the investment. After her death (which was only 8 months later) £50 of that sum went to Henry as a fee for acting as executor. In the event of Jane’s death the remaining £3200 was to be divided into four equal parts of £800. These were bequeathed to:
- Ann Jackson nee Hoodless, his older sister, a widow.
- Mary Scott nee Hoodless, his youngest sister, a widow.
- Henry Hoodless, his brother, a bookseller and stationer of Wigton.
- William’s two great nieces (yet to be identified) – the daughters of his late nephew Robert Hoodless.
The balance of his personal and real estate outside of this, as a separate sum, was to be distributed equally between his wife Jane and his brother Henry Hoodless. I think its great that he looked after his two widowed sisters in this way, even if it was dependent on the death of his wife.
Captain William Hoodless was without doubt a go-getter and must have been an intelligent man. He mastered the art of sailing around the world in an era when there was no weather reports, no satellite GPS systems or radio communication. He would have sailed with a compass and sextant and taken calculations from the sun, moon and stars to plot a course on a basic chart. A risky profession, the dangers were high but commerce and trade around the world relied on the merchant navy – ships foundered, sank, wrecked and disappeared by the dozens every month. In June 1839 alone when William was bringing his cargo back from Canton there were approximately 76 ships reported wrecked.
William was lucky and prospered. His two younger brother’s Robert and John were not so fortunate. Their story is next.