Beginning in February 1803, before a vessel could depart on a foreign voyage, the master (or Captain) had to  hand in a list of the crew to the customs collector at that port. In return, the master received a certified copy of the list and a Clearance Certificate he would have to show to the first boarding officer encountered upon his returning to a U.S. port and produce the persons named and described in the Crew List. 

     These crew lists were protection for the crew depending on the need as created by the current events in a country whose harbor they entered and, sadly, very necessary when entering any port in the Southern states of this country that many times, using the excuse of having a contagion, stories to tell about freedom that would spread like  virus affecting the slaves, could be "quarantined" away from the waterfront to spend the time the ship was in harbor working a field somewhere or some other position of servitude, possibly to be returned to the ship but, if, not, pursued by the captain most likely an abolitionist from New Bedford until returned.

     At the bottom of his Crew list the master would list any changes to the original list because of loss overboard, in pursuit of a whale, death at sea, or deserting crew at various ports, and an replacements for the lost crew members. Both the list on the way out and the one on the way in, had to be sworn to and signed.

     The latter brought many people from foreign countries to ports like New Bedford with the very provincial Quakers, who kept the lists, doing their best to record foreign names phonetically as many crew members were illiterate and could not spell their name and pronounced them with heavy accents, often being assigned a name as a result. Hence, Ignacios became the locally common name Enos. There is no way other than this to explain why there were so many Joseph Antones on many ships simultaneously.

     The lack of literacy also made including the names of places of origin a challenge, and it is clear when the makers of the lists became more familiar with foreign names as the spelling went from phonetic to official spelling and Howhyee became Hawai’i and Mowee became Maui.

     Quite often, even if the places of origin may not be listed for new crew members, depending on the name and the voyage’s route, these can be figured out.

     The master would note any loss or addition to the crew as a result of death aboard ship, loss at sea, killed by pursued whale, runaways at various ports of call, and/or those crew members added along the way to replace lost crew.

     This is the crew list of the Charles Phelps out of Stonington, CT, mastered by Palmer Hall, on a whaling voyage between 1842 and 1844.

     The first part is the crew list on the way out. The second section are the names of those who were picked up along the way and why it was needed. Among the added crew is the crewmember to whom William Smith offered money for sex.

     The log book may contain whale stamps and accounts of provisions used, whales taken, ships spoken, the insurance policy on the vessel, Whalemen's Shipping Papers for this voyage which contains the positions on the ship, and the wages earned by each and a lesson in learning Fractions, but in the summary to the log in the repository, there is no mention of anything related to Mr. Smith, although his actions as enumerated in the log would have made him a person of interest even without his attempted tryst.

                                  I have included pictures of those pages for those so interested.