Find your ancestors in Lancashire, Barrow-In-Furness Shipbuilding & Engineering Employees

What can these records tell me?

These records, compiled by staff and volunteers from staff registers and records held by Barrow Archive and Cumbria Archive Service, include the names of men and women employed or were apprenticed at the Barrow in Furness shipyard in Lancashire 1872-1965 and the women who were employed to work at Vickers during the First World War. Information found could include:

• First names(s)
• Last name
• Date of birth
• Department employed in
• Job role
• Address
• Age
• Date they entered service
• Date they left service

Female workers employed at Vickers during World War One

During the First World War, women were employed at the Vickers shipyard. Over 1240 women were employed in industrials roles, the majority of whom were teenagers. This database, compiled from the staff registers held by the Barrow Archives, includes information in their names, ages, addresses, dates of birth, department, role, and the date in which they entered service. Some abbreviations, denoting department, are included here:

A=Airships, Buc Dk=Buccleuch Dock, C Dk=Cavendish Dock, E=Engineering, O=Ordnance, Rams Dk=Ramsden Dock, S=Shipbuilding

A further 98 women were employed in non-industrial roles at Vickers (typists, clerks, telephonists).

In 1916, an arbitration session was held between Vickers and the women workers over pay (men got 28 shillings, women around 18). This failed as the arbitrator was won around by the argument that the wages were in line with everywhere else and there's a war on.