William Boultbee Whall (1846 – 1917) was a master mariner, who compiled one of the first collections of English sea songs and shanties in 1910.
His father, born in Lincoln in 1807, went to Emmanuel College Cambridge and remained as rector of Thurning for over 40 years (1833 till his death in 1874).
He became a Master mariner in 1878 and by 1901 was a nautical surveyor with the Board of Trade based at Wallasey on the River Mersey.
[3] By the 1911 census Whall, aged 64, was a Principal Officer at the Board of Trade in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales, supervising sea vessels in the Bristol Channel.
[7] Collections of French shanties were made by Captain Armand Hayet in 1927[8] and American songs by Joanna Carver Colcord in 1924.
[9] Many modern scholars, however, still reference Capt Whall's book in their investigations into sea songs and shanties.