James Ware Tattersfield (1787-1848) – Royal Navy & Merchant Seaman

JAMES WARE was the seventh and last child of JOHN Tattersfield and Anne Ware, who married on 29th April 1772 in St Sepulchre, Holborn, London. They are at the head of the London family tree, Chart 7. 

John and Anne had had a fifth child, also called JAMES WARE, who was baptised on 1st Jan 1783 and of whom no later record has been found, so presumably he died very young. The second JAMES WARE was baptised on 25th Nov 1787 at Deptford High Street Independent, formerly Butt Lane, Deptford, Kent. 

Nothing is known of his early life.  

The Brig Wizard, active 1805-1816. Painting by William Pocock (1783–1836) off Marretimo near Sicily sometime before 1814. National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. Public Domain.

Military Records 1715-1945 lists JAMES Tattersfield as a Prisoner of War in 1808. He was a Matelot from the Brig Wizard, which was engaged in fighting in the Napoleonic War at the time. A French hand-written list of prisoners (see highlighted row in image to left) includes four “matelots”, JAMES Tattersfield, Sam Perryman, Williams Randall and John Towry, all from the Brig Wizard, all captured on 9th Aug 1808, and all “Entered the Depot” on 27 Feb 1809. 

The Brig Wizard was built in 1805. It was a brig-sloop with 14 24-pounder carronades and two sixes. It weighed 283 tons, and had a complement of 95 men and boys. It is not known when JAMES Tattersfield joined the vessel. On 6th Mar 1808 the Wizard undertook an expedition against the Turks at Alexandria in Egypt. On 10-14 May 1808, in the Mediterranean, off the coast of Africa, it chased the French brig-corvette Requin for some 88 hours, but was unable to bring the chase to a satisfactory conclusion, as the French vessel found a haven in neutral waters. The Requin was, however, subsequently captured on 28 July 1808, this time after a chase of 9 hours by HMS Volage. 

On 1st Aug 1808, the ship’s boats, assisted by the Wizard itself, captured a number of vessels from a convoy abreast of the town of Noli. No record has been found of the Wizard being captured or damaged. The reason why JAMES and the other three were captured on 8th August is not known. Perhaps they were too adventurous in one of the marauding boats! 

JAMES is next recorded in the British Royal Navy Allotment Declarations 1795-1852, in 1812. He was described as “Able Seaman, Vessel Wizard, Pay Book number 86, Relationship Mother Ann, Prisoner, pay 7 pence per day, or 16sh 4 pence per month, paid by ‘Treasurer’, Allotted 2 Aug 1812, paid to 7 May 1814, Sum £18-15-8”. The meaning of the above is not entirely clear. It might mean that, in 1812 he was still held prisoner, and that his pay was still given until 7 May 1814.  

An index of documents shows two, one stating that JAMES was on the Wizard in 1812, and the other that he was on the Superb that year. Original documents seen support the former, but not the latter. 

The Wizard had other battles, presumably without JAMES on board. On 2 July 1813, with the Cephalus, it captured the French privateer Petit Chasseur. On 5-29 Oct 1813, it took part, with other ships, in actions in and off the Port of Trieste.  

On 19 July 1816, it was lying in Deptford, and on 18 Sept 1816 it was put up for sale at auction at £1,000, but bidding stopped at £740.  It was finally sold for £700 on 17 Oct 1816.

It is not known when JAMES left the Royal Navy, but perhaps this was on 7 May 1814, when payments to him appear to have stopped. The Napoleonic War did not end until 20 Nov 1815. 

JAMES’s actions then are not known, but he was in the Merchant Navy by 1819. There, he was to have problems of a different sort, as reported in The Military Register of 10 Sept 1820. What follows is a verbatim account, under the introduction “The following is another of the Cases, which, after being rejected at Tobago, came on before the Thames Police at London“. 

“On the 5th of November last (1819), Charles McGlashan, master of the brig Margaret, trading from London to the West Indies, appeared before the sitting Magistrates at this Office to answer to three summonses for wages due to James Tattersfield, Alexander Campbell, and Robert Craighead, mariners. 

The complainants stated, they had entered into a contract with the said master to go on a voyage from the Port of London to the Island of Tobago, and back again. That the said master, on the night of the 25th of May last, assaulted one of them, by stabbing him with a cutlass, and by violently beating them whilst the said brig was lying at anchor in Queen’s bay, Tobago. That the complainants, on the 26th went on shore and proceeded to Scarborough, a distance of 25 miles, for the purpose of obtaining a warrant. The Magistrates granted a warrant on the 28th of May, and on the Monday following McGlashan was brought up before the Magistrates, who would not allow the complainants to enter into the charges which they intended to make; that they would not hold McGlashan to bail, commit him to prison, or discharge the warrant. The constable gave McGlashan his liberty. The seamen waited till the Friday following, June 4, in hope of obtaining a hearing on that day, when the Magistrates sat again, but they would not then interfere as McGlashan was not then before them; they then proceeded to Queen’s-bay to join the Margaret, and to leave the case to stand over till the vessel’s arrival in England, but the master would not allow them to go on board, unless they signed a paper confessing that they had been mutinous, and that the accusations which they had made were false and malicious. This they would not do, and returned  again to Scarborough, to ask the advice of the Attorney-General, Mr. Capper, who applied in their behalf to the Magistrates, on Monday, June 7th— notwithstanding, the Magistrates still declined to enter into investigations. The master of the Governor Halkett, (Thomas Justus), humanely gave them a passage home, and kindly made them presents to procure covering, their clothes having been detained. The seamen produced a piece of the cutlass, which had been broken on the arm of Campbell, and they likewise produced a warrant which had been granted at Tobago. They swore that justice had been denied them at Tobago, in consequence of which denial they had been forced to sleep 15 nights on the beach, were nearly starved to death at Tobago, and that since their return to England had experienced the greatest distress for want of the necessities of life. Mr Capper, who is now in England, attended on behalf of the claimants, and corroborated their statements. 

The defence set up by the master of the brig was, that the seamen were not entitled to their wages, as they had broken the contract by desertion in going on shore. 

Mr. Longley, Captain Richbell, and Mr. Kinnaird, were unanimously of opinion, that the case of the seamen was completely made out, and that the men had done perfectly right in seeking redress for their grievances, and that the absence from the vessel for that purpose did not amount to desertion. The master was adjudged to pay the men wages from the Port of London to Tobago, and back again (amounting to £10 each) together with costs. 

This was paid, and so were the costs of three actions into the bargain. 

We shall look further into the merits of this subject, and produce the facts as they arrive at our hands. The conduct of Mr. Attorney-General Capper, appears, as far as we have seen, in a very exalted point of view.”

The ending of the report in The Military Register of 10 Sept 1820, as quoted above,  is puzzling, as a great deal had happened by that date, and at very senior level.  

On 15 July, the Attorney-General Mr Benjamin Capper, who had tried to obtain justice for the three seamen, and whose action was praised by The Military Register, attended a major dinner for senior men in the island. The Governor of the colony, Major General Sir F. P. Robinson K.C.B. and the Chief Justice, were not present. During the evening, Mr Capper, who had been on the island for about 3 months, in a loud voice, and possibly influenced by alcohol, denounced aspects of the governance of the Colony. He declared that “the governor, the chief justice, and all the gentlemen of property in the island, were a set of jugglers, and in league against public justice, that he would write to the Privy Council at home to have the governor and the chief justice removed, and that, if Lord Bathurst did not comply with this suggestion, that he (Lord Bathurst) would be as great a rascal as either of them.” (Lord Bathurst was Secretary of State for the Colonies). 

He was immediately prevailed upon to apologise, which he did, and again the following day, giving assurance he had intended no insult to anyone personally. However, the damage was done. The Privy Council of the island met four times in the next three weeks to record the incident with corroborative statements from a number who were present. On 2 Aug 1819 Mr Capper wrote a letter of resignation of his office. The Governor accepted it the same day, and Mr Capper soon returned to England. He was thus able to support the three seamen in the court case in London at which they were awarded their full wages and costs. 

Mr Capper wrote to Lord Bathurst from London on 18 Oct 1819. He explained that, no sooner had he arrived in Tobago, he was warned “to fall in with the ideas and views of the leading men in the Island, in which case he would receive a salary.” He also explained that “during the short space of three months, I saw the laws of God and man trampled on and defied. No one dares to interfere; a few wealthy merchants hold sway.” 

He set out in detail six cases to support his complaint. Of these. No2, “Seamen’s case” described the experience, by name, of James Tattersfield, Alexander Campbell and Robert Craighead, from the Brig Margaret. 

The Governor and senior officials decided they must present their case to Lord Bathurst. This was done by a letter from the governor, Sir F. P. Robinson, dated 26 Aug 1819. Together with enclosures this ran to 10 pages of close typing.  

Lord Bathurst replied briefly on 29 Oct 1819. He enclosed Mr Capper’s letter of 18th Oct, and asked for detailed explanations of the points in it. 

Sir Frederick Philipse RobinsonGCB (September 1763 – 1 January 1852), governor and commander-in-chief of Tobago from 1816-1828, following a very illustrious military career in the West Indies. Painting by George Theodore Berthon (1806-1892) – This image is available from the Archives of Ontario under the item reference code 693128, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3492917

The governor sent a detailed explanation of each of the six cases, in a letter dated 23rd Dec 1819, totalling 27 typed pages. In the Seamen’s case, this relied mostly on the declaration of the honourable John Robley and other affidavits. The gist was that the three sailors had behaved with “insolence and insubordination” to Captain McGlashan, and had been “in a state of mutiny during the night”, after which they went to Scarborough to complain about the captain. Reasons were given as to why the sailors had to return to England on another ship. 

The letters, minutes of meetings and affidavits very briefly summarised above, were all ordered to be printed by The House of Commons on 17 July 1820. They do not lead through to any conclusion as to the outcome as it affected the main participants. 

We know, from the report of The Military Register of 10 Sept 1820 that James Tattersfield and his two co-seamen obtained justice, in the form of full wages and costs, in London. 

Nothing has been found as to what Mr Capper did after leaving Tobago, or what other kind of employment he went on to have.   

As to the governor, Sir F. P. Robinson, he remained governor until about 1826, when he was recalled to London by Lord Bathurst, apparently in response to complaints. He was subsequently told that he would not return to his post in Tobago. The relevant documents run to many pages. 

Robinson did not give up. In 1830, in Paris, he produced a paper entitled “A Statement of Charges made by The House of Assembly of Tobago against Sir F. P. Robinson, and his replies thereto, with some of the correspondence connected with these charges.” It covers 160 pages of close typing, and includes two sets of charges made against him, totalling 54 charges in all, together with his reply to each. None of the 54 charges referred to Mr Capper, or the six complaints he made. Clearly there was no shortage of complaints about Sir F. P. Robinson. 

Within the document is the deciding letter from Lord Bathurst, which includes the following:- “Although it is with great satisfaction I find myself able to state, that the most rigid scrutiny into every part of your official conduct has failed to establish any one charge injurious to your honour or integrity; I am compelled to observe, that the unfortunate demonstrations of temper into which you have been betrayed in your communications with the Legislature, and the frequent instances that have occurred of your having failed to make a distinction between your political and judicial duties, appear to have occasioned such general and rooted hostility to your government that it is hardly possible to suppose but that the public service must suffer from your return to Tobago. 

                                                                               (Signed)             Bathurst” 

Between his Royal Navy and Merchant Navy careers, JAMES WARE Tattersfield, Bachelor, married Mary Judith Sawors, Spinster, on 1 Jan 1816 in the Parish of St Anne, Limehouse, London. Both were of the Parish, and  were married by Banns “with consent of parents.” (the need for consent is not clear as they were not minors). Both signed, JAMES in an educated hand. They had 11 children between 1817 and 1835. 

JAMES’s Marriage Certificate does not state his occupation. However, in later years he was described as Fishmonger or Fish Dealer on the marriage certificates of his children. There was one exception in 1849, after his death, when he was described as a “Mariner”. All four sons who survived to adulthood became Fishmongers, and one had the nickname “King of Billingsgate”.  

JAMES was recorded in the 1841 Census, as a fishmonger, age 53, at Spencer Street, Tower Hamlets, with wife Mary, and children Mary, Henry, Elizabeth, Samuel, John and Eliza. 

Tax was levied on JAMES, from 1797-1825, for a property in New Court, Wapping. This same tax for the property had been levied on his father, JOHN, from 1780-1795. It seems some or all the family continued to live in the same house. 

JAMES died of phthisis on 27 Sept 1848, age 60, described as a Fishmonger, address Spencer Street. He was buried at St George in the East.  

Header Image: A stylized rendition of the printed text of the UK parliamentary Hansard for the House of Commons Chamber on Wednesday, June 6, 1821. Hansard reports that Lord Nugent "rose to move for a committee to inquire into certain abuses in the Administration of Justice in the island of Tobago." Here, Nugent refers to the case of the three seamen, one of whom was James Ware Tattersfield - the only reference to a Tattersfield so far found in UK parliamentary records!