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<font size=3>Some citations. I searched EAN for 1730 to 1739.
There are 168 hits for "galley". Some may have other
meanings or be OCR artifacts, but I think there are few of these (only 2
in the first 20, my sample). These are not small Thames
rowboats.<br><br>
* Custom-House, New-York. ... <i>Cleared for Departure</i>. ...
Sloop Black ey'd Susan, Lewis Thebau to Jamaica ... Ship Smith Galley, J.
Tate to Virginia. <i>American Weekly Mercury</i>, 1729 [? /1730]
Jan 6, 4. [The form "Ship Smith Galley" is unusual for
customs reports; generally the type of ship precedes the name of the
ship. And this is complicated by the fact that "ship" in
customs reports seems often to identify a specific type of vessel
(presumably OED sense 1.a: a vessel having a bowsprit and three masts);
others are listed as sloops, brigs, schooners, etc.]<br><br>
* [Datelined London] Money was sent down ... to Plymouth, to
pay off His Majesty's Ship the Mary Valley, lately arrived at that
Port. <i>Boston Gazette, 1730 March 30, 2.<br><br>
</i>* [Datelined Leghorn; re rebellion on Corsica] ... he had
resolved to make Use of Force, and for that purpose had a Galley ready to
put to Sea for Calzi, with 1500 Muskets to be distributed ...
<i>New England Weekly Journal</i>, 1730 Aug. 17, 3.<br><br>
* [Datelined London] The Birch Galley, Capt. Joseph Turner,
is arrived at Bristol from Jamaica, but in her passage ... she was taken
by a Spanish Guard de Coast, belonging to the Havanna, which carried her
to one of the Florida Keys ... plundered the Ship of all her Stores, and
her Cargo ... <i>Boston Gazette</i>, 1730 Sept. 14, 4. [Thus
a commercial vessel, not a warship.]<br><br>
* For Bristol directly. The Diamond Galley, Burthen 150 Tons,
<i>William Donalson</i> Commander, is ready to take in Goods, and will
sail with all convenient Speed: Any Gentlemen that hath a mind to Freight
or Passage, may agree with ... <i>American Mercury</i>, 1731 April
29, 4. [How large a ship was one with 150 tons displacement?
But in any case, this ship was going from Philadelphia to
Bristol.]<br><br>
* [Datelined Cadiz] ... several vessels in distress, and among 'em a fine
long English Galley, with a Teer of Guns ... <i>American Weekly
Mercury</i>, 1731 June 24. [Would this warship have had
rowers?]<br><br>
* [Datelined Naples] There has been discovered a conspiracy, formed
by some Galley Slaves, who had resolved to poison the Crews of the
Galleys designed to cruize along the Coasts, during the journey that the
Viceroy is shortly to take by land to Amalfi and Salerno ... <i>Boston
News-Letter</i>, 1731 Aug. 26, 2. [So there were still galleys
rowed by slaves (OED sense 1.a) in the Mediterranean in 1731.]<br><br>
My comment about the 18th century was slightly facetious -- the OED has
been criticized for slighting it.<br><br>
Joel<br><br>
At 10/26/2011 11:25 PM, Dave Wilton wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">>And was the 18th century,
where I see "galley", overlooked in the<br>
>19th century?<br><br>
There are a lot more sources looked at today than in the past.
Updated<br>
entries frequently have older senses that previous editions
missed.<br><br>
And you're right, Americans or British would not have employed
ocean-going<br>
galleys in the eighteenth century.<br><br>
But there is this, from Smyth's 1867 "Sailor's Word-Book" in
the entry for<br>
galley (from which the OED also copied the opening sentence for its<br>
definition of "galley"):<br><br>
"Also an open boat rowing six or eight oars, and used on the river
Thames by<br>
custom-house officers and formerly by press-gangs; hence the names<br>
'custom-house galley,' 'press-galley,' &c."<br><br>
This sense corresponds with the OED's definition 3. Could these craft
be<br>
what your custom-house records refer to? (Without seeing the citations
it's<br>
kind of hard to figure out what these "galleys" refer
to.)<br><br>
There is also "gallias," which is another type of ship
altogether.<br><br>
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