Further details about the life of Andrew Watson, the first black international footballer, have come to light with the digitisation of shipping manifests on the genealogy website ancestry.
It was already known that he qualified as a First Class Engineer in May 1893, and these fascinating new records reveal the work he was able to obtain over the next few years while he had his home in Liverpool. Not only do they show his address (he seems to have moved several times) and his pay, they are all personally signed by him.
The first was an 18 day journey on the Louisianan in October 1893, and he went on to make five voyages on the same ship over the next year as Second Engineer, paid at the rate of £11 per month. There is then a gap before his first voyage on a ship called, appropriately enough, the West Indian in January 1896; however, the register for the first voyage says his most recent ship had been the Waesland. He had 13 voyages on the West Indian, travelling four or five times a year, and during this period was promoted to Chief Engineer, with a pay rise to £15 per month.
The only other surviving shipping record is an intriguing one from 1901 which shows Andrew Watson, together with his wife Eliza and their two children Henry and Phyllis, sailing from Liverpool to Philadelphia. They were on their way to visit a friend called JD Caswell in New Orleans, presumably for a family holiday. The ship they travelled on was the Waesland, which was one of his former employers.
Although these are an incomplete record of Watson's maritime career (most of the manifests do not even reveal the ships' destinations), they do help to fill in some gaps in the life of one of football's most important early characters.
It was already known that he qualified as a First Class Engineer in May 1893, and these fascinating new records reveal the work he was able to obtain over the next few years while he had his home in Liverpool. Not only do they show his address (he seems to have moved several times) and his pay, they are all personally signed by him.
The first was an 18 day journey on the Louisianan in October 1893, and he went on to make five voyages on the same ship over the next year as Second Engineer, paid at the rate of £11 per month. There is then a gap before his first voyage on a ship called, appropriately enough, the West Indian in January 1896; however, the register for the first voyage says his most recent ship had been the Waesland. He had 13 voyages on the West Indian, travelling four or five times a year, and during this period was promoted to Chief Engineer, with a pay rise to £15 per month.
The only other surviving shipping record is an intriguing one from 1901 which shows Andrew Watson, together with his wife Eliza and their two children Henry and Phyllis, sailing from Liverpool to Philadelphia. They were on their way to visit a friend called JD Caswell in New Orleans, presumably for a family holiday. The ship they travelled on was the Waesland, which was one of his former employers.
Although these are an incomplete record of Watson's maritime career (most of the manifests do not even reveal the ships' destinations), they do help to fill in some gaps in the life of one of football's most important early characters.
Detail from one of Andrew Watson's shipping manifests
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