Religious Professionals in Emigrant Ships

This chapter looks at the religion of those emigrants, and others in emigrant ships, who earned their living from religion. These professionals were principally male clergy, but there were also some women who were nuns, deaconesses, or matrons supervising parties of single women. Among these religious professionals studied in the chapter are Anglicans emigrant chaplains, but also Nonconformists who acted unofficially as emigrant chaplains, and Catholic priests ministering to their own constituents. The chapter finds that Anglican chaplains particularly were taken seriously by emigrants and emigration officials, though some of them took advantage of the general hegemony of Anglican worship in British-flagged vessels. The chapter also looks at comparisons between the earlier and later nineteenth century, and finds that religious professionals in the latter period were remarkably cooperative with each other, notwithstanding the usual religious divisions held to by some.