Catalogue description Navy Board: Office of the Comptroller of the Navy: Ships' Pay Books

Pay books recording the names of all officers and men on board each ship. They can be used to supplement the musters where these are defective.

Between 1715 and 1830 at least three sets of pay books were maintained for every ship in commission. These were kept at the Pay Office of the Treasurer of the Navy, at the Office of the Comptroller of the Navy, and at the Ticket Office. The Treasurer's set, which occasionally contains entries (not found in other sets) of payments to executors or administrators of deceased seamen, has been preserved as the nucleus to 1832, when it was discontinued; gaps in the series are filled from the Ticket Office set, which continues to 1856.

Navy Board, Office of the Comptroller of the Navy, 1546-1832