Hazard

Wreck

What is recorded here

Hazard was a wooden sailing vessel under a master named Kitchingham, travelling from Lisbon to Liverpool when it was lost in Caernarfon Bay before Lloyd's List reported the event on 8 February 1791. The saved point is a broad named bay location, not a found wreck. Cargo, exact loss day, cause and the fate of the…

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The vessel and voyage

Hazard was a wooden sailing vessel making the long commercial passage from Lisbon to Liverpool. Lloyd's List named its master as Kitchingham. The checked public record does not give its rig, tonnage, owner or cargo, so wine, salt, fruit or any other typical Portuguese trade should not be added. It is one of several unrelated vessels called Hazard around Wales.

How it was lost

Lloyd's List reported on 8 February 1791 that Hazard had been lost in Caernarfon Bay. That fixes the event before the report but not the exact day. No storm, rock, collision or navigation mistake is stated in the accessible summary. The broad bay assignment is deliberate and may move if a later newspaper or harbour report supplies a more exact shore or shoal.

Deaths and survival

The available record gives no death total, survivors or names beyond master Kitchingham. The word 'lost' tells us the vessel did not complete its voyage, but it does not reveal whether the company reached boats or shore. Human outcome must remain unknown. It would be especially unsafe to borrow casualties from another ship called Hazard, a common name in wreck records.

What remains

No archaeological remains are confirmed. The Royal Commission explicitly assigns the documentary casualty to the named maritime area pending better location evidence. The map pin therefore does not mark a surveyed pile of timber. After more than two centuries, any remains might be buried, scattered or elsewhere in the bay, but none of those possibilities is a recorded observation.

Why it mattered

Hazard records the international trade passing the north Welsh coast between Portugal and Liverpool at the end of the eighteenth century. It also illustrates the value and limit of Lloyd's List: one short notice can preserve ship, master, route and broad loss area while leaving cause and people unanswered. Keeping those gaps open makes the record ready for genuine new evidence.