UK Colonial Registers and Royal Navy Logbooks (CORRAL)

Long before official records were kept of weather conditions, the captains of naval vessels were recording changes in climate via their official ship’s log - this project holds information on the climates of past centuries via the digitised ship’s logs of 200-year-old voyages. Archives from lighthouses in the Caribbean further enhance the meteorological information available, alongside links to other international climate statistics databases.

The voyages covered were all commissioned with goals linked to further exploration of the North Pole region and the search for the North West Passage. As such, they serve as invaluable early 19th century sources of climactic data for the Arctic region.

How can this collection be used in teaching, studying and research?

The collection’s primary function is as a source of climactic data for those studying weather changes in the Arctic region, as well as those studying, teaching or researching naval history in general and the history of naval expeditions in the Arctic in particular.