Tracing an old boat / captain

[sighmoon]

The thread about sailing forefathers has got me thinking about mine. Details handed through the family history are scanty, and perhaps engrandeured, but maybe somebody knows where I can find out more:

My great great grandfather was Captain Evan Pierce Bennet, who owned and captained a coaster called the Pride of Wales, out of Saundersfoot, Wales.

I don't know anything about his father, but had he been a nautical man himself, I wonder if he had encountered Captain Eben Pierce, who gave Joshua Slocum the Spray - the names sound awfully similar, although they lived on opposite side of the Atlantic.

Before captaining his own boat, my great great grandfather used to do the cape horn runs though I'm not sure what his role was.

During WW I he was captain of the liberty boat at Porthcawl.

After the war he skippered the Duke of Monmouth's racing yacht and taught his (Duke of Monmouth's) son to sail.

Can anybody point me in the right direction to find out more?

 

[Wunja]

There is a lot of useful information in this link

 

[armchairsailor]

You could do worse than contact the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich - they'd be able to point you in the right direction, I imagine.

 

[sarabande]

Exmoor and Somerset used to import a lot of coal from S Wales for the lime kilns.

Bridgwater has a museum, as does the Exmoor National Park. A long shot, but they might have records of the coasters delivering across the Brissel Channel ?

 

[Mark-1]

Can't really help in any concrete way but for what it's worth:

Saundersfoot was all about Coal.

There's a historian called Roscoe Howells who has written prolifically about Saundersfoot and the surrounding area so finding out general information about the place your ancestor was familiar with should be a doddle. Saundersfoot Tourist Information Centre is excellent and will be able to set you up with all kinds of literature. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find they they could put you onto harbour records of some kind, or at least point you at someone who could.

Can't really help with tracing ships and voyages except there seems to be infinate scope for doing so online, I was easily able to confirm a huge number of my G-Grandfather's trips. (Admittedly I have the log books so I was just checking stuff I already knew.)

These sites helped me:
http://www.plimsoll.org/
http://portcities.hartlepool.gov.uk/server.php?show=conMediaFile.951
http://www.findmypast.com/passengerListBrowseByShipStart.action?shipInitial=A