A branch of the family came to Bristol to build railway locomotives (later to become the Avonside Engine Company).

During 1874, she was purchased (along with Hadley's four other tugs; the initial three had been joined by Myrtle and Hazel[5]) by the Canal Company, which had by then renamed itself the Sharpness New Docks & Gloucester & Birmingham Navigation Co.. She was fitted with a new boiler and a condenser in 1876,[6] and converted into a tandem compound in 1888 by adding a new high pressure cylinder and piston above the existing one.

[7] By the late 1890s she was the most seaworthy tug in the fleet, and she was altered to make her suitable for work in the Bristol Channel.

[8] In 1909 Mayflower was again altered when the funnel was arranged to hinge down (counterbalanced with large weights which can still be seen) to enable her to pass under the fixed bridges on this stretch of water.

In 1948 the British Waterways Board took over the canal and made efforts to modernise the tug fleet.

She was given the job of 'mudding tug' – towing the mud hopper barges filled by the canal dredger to the discharge point.

[11] Morgan was the managing director of Nordman Construction, who were demolishing the nearby Severn Railway Bridge at the time.

[14] On 4th April 1981 she was auctioned,[14] and purchased for £3600 by curator Paul Elkin of Bristol Museums & Art Gallery.

[8] Mayflower regularly steams during the summer months carrying visitors on trips in Bristol Harbour.