''Ceres'' was launched at Whitby in 1794. She made two voyages for the British

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...

(EIC). Thereafter she remained a London-based transport. She was last listed in 1816.

Career

''Ceres'' enters ''

Lloyd's Register Lloyd's Register Group Limited (LR) is a technical and professional services organisation and a maritime classification society, wholly owned by the Lloyd’s Register Foundation, a UK charity dedicated to research and education in science and ...

'' in 1795 with T. Hedley, master, Leighton, owner, and trade London—Botany Bay.''Lloyd's Register'' (1795), Seq.№540.
/ref> EIC voyage #1 (1795-1797): Captain Thomas Hedley sailed from Portsmouth on 9 August 1795, bound for New South Wales and China. ''Ceres'' reached Rio de Janeiro on 18 October and left on 22 October. On her way ''Ceres'' stopped at

Île Amsterdam Île Amsterdam (), also known as Amsterdam Island and New Amsterdam (''Nouvelle-Amsterdam''), is an island of the French Southern and Antarctic Lands in the southern Indian Ocean that together with neighbouring Île Saint-Paul to the south for ...

. There she rescued two English and two French sailors, (the leader being

Pierre François Péron French Captain Pierre François Péron, born in 1769 at Lambézellec, near Brest, was a French sailor and trading captain who sailed to many different locations in the late 18th century. He owned his ship until it was captured by the British, fo ...

), who had been marooned there three years earlier. The French brig ''Emélie'' had left them there to gather seal skins. (This was after the outbreak of war between Britain and France, something of which ''Emélie'' was unaware.) captured ''Emélie'' before she could retrieve them. Hedley rescued the men, but left the skins behind. ''Ceres'' arrived at Sydney Cove on 24 January 1796 with her cargo of provisions. On 24 January 1796, the American vessel , Captain Ebenezer Dorr, arrived from Île Amsterdam with a cargo of skins that he had found there. When Péron found out about this, he took Hadley with him as witness and met with Dorr to lay claim to the skins. Péron and Dorr came to an agreement that included Péron joining ''Otter'' as First Mate, and sailing with her until she would reach China. There they would sell the skins and divide the proceeds. ''Ceres'' left on 3 April, bound for China. ''Ceres'' arrived at

Whampoa Anchorage Pazhou is a subdistrict of Haizhu in southeastern Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, in China. , formerly Whampoa Island, has a total area of and is the site of Pazhou Pagoda. Its eastern bay was formerly the chief anchorage for ships parti ...

on 12 May. Homeward bound, she crossed the Second Bar, reached

St Helena Saint Helena () is a British overseas territory located in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is a remote volcanic tropical island west of the coast of south-western Africa, and east of Rio de Janeiro in South America. It is one of three constitu ...

on 20 November, and arrived at Long Reach on 14 February 1797.British Library: ''Ceres'' (3).
/ref> There is a report that on 21 November 1797 ''Ceres'' sighted the island of

Sonsorol Sonsorol is one of the sixteen states of Palau. The inhabitants speak Sonsorolese, a local Chuukic language, and Palauan. The islands of the state of Sonsorol, together with the islands of Hatohobei, form the Southwest Islands of Palau. His ...

while sailing from Port Jackson to China. Unfortunately, readily available online resources can provide no more information about what would represent Hedley and ''Ceres''s second voyage to the region. EIC voyage #2 (1801-1802): Captain Thomas Todd (or Toad) received a letter of marque on 3 December 1800. Thomas Hall tendered ''Ceres'' to the EIC to bring back rice from Bengal. She was one of 28 vessels that sailed on that mission between December 1800 and February 1801. Todd sailed from Falmouth on 10 January 1801, bound for Bengal. ''Ceres'' reached

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

on 16 June. Homeward bound, she was at Culpee on 21 August,

Saugor Sagar is a city, municipal corporation and administrative headquarter in Sagar district of the state of Madhya Pradesh in central India. Situated on a spur of the Vindhya Range, above sea-level. The city is around northeast of state capital ...

on 15 September, and St Helena on 31 December. She reached Deptford on 6 March 1802. On 30 March 1802 the Court of Directors of the United Company of Merchants trading with the East Indies (the EIC), announced that on 22 April they would offer for sale 37,000 bags of rice brought by the , , , ''Ceres'', and . The data in the table below comes from either ''

'' (''LR''), or the ''Register of Shipping'' (''RS''). Either source is only as accurate and complete as a vessel's owner choose to keep it. Thus gaps in coverage and contradictions occur in the data.

Citations and references

Citations References * * * * {{cite journal , last1=Richards , first1=Rhys , year=1986 , title=The Easternmost Route to China 1787-1792: Part II , journal=The Great Circle , volume=8 , issue=2 , pages=104–116 1794 ships Ships built in Whitby Ships of the British East India Company Age of Sail merchant ships Merchant ships of the United Kingdom