Royal Navy database.

This database of 3,300 men includes over 600 Welshmen thus far having been identified as being active at the Battle of Trafalgar. It will be deficient in Welsh born officers and some marines as their birthplaces are not usually shown on ship musters or pay books of ships at the battle. Further Welshmen may be also be found by using The National Archives' Trafalgar ancestors database at http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/aboutapps/trafalgarancestors which includes extensive details on many aspects of the battle.

We have worked on the fate of the men at Trafalgar by tracing their subsequent seafaring careers in the navy. However many men left the navy in 1815 it has been hard to link these men in subsequent non-naval sources. We would be very interested in including any details onto the website of their fate and of course information on any Welsh born or Wales resident man in the Royal Navy during this period. Contact Reg Davies at

The Naval scribes were probably unfamiliar with the Welsh language so place names would probably have been written as heard. Therefore, in several instances, conflicting places of birth are found for the same man, as he was transferred from one ship to another. Birthplaces such as Pembroke, Carmarthen, Caernarfon etc may either refer to the county or to the town of that name.

Other Welshmen found in Admiralty documents have been included in the database but the index cannot in anyway be considered to be a comprehensive listing of Welshmen in the Navy at this period.

I (Reg Davies) have published a series of articles on the Trafalgar men as follows:

Dyfed Family History Journal, 1995, Vol 5, no 4, p 198-200.
Dyfed Family History Journal, 1996, Vol 5, no 6, p 264-266.
Gwreiddiau Gwynedd Roots, 1993, no 25, p 7-9.
Glamorgan Family History Society Journal 1996, no 43, p 25-26.
Powys Family History Society's Journal Cronicl, 1995 no 36, p 41-42.

Search the Royal Navy database