Casgliadau Arlein

Manuscript memorandum notebook of a maritime average aduster who worked in Cardiff. Notebook belonged to George Henry Vodden (1886-1965) of Cardiff who spent his professional working life in the city working as an average adjuster for one of the four or so specialist firms located in the Mount Stuart Square area in the heart of Cardiff’s professional maritime community. His home address is inscribed on the rear end paper.

Average adjusters are employed to impartially resolve legal martime disputes without the parties having expensive and potentially time-consuming recourse to law. They require a very detailed knowledge of all aspects of contract and maritime law. The disputes that reached the courts and were legally recorded were only the more complex or intractable disputes. A much larger number were settled by average adjusters and left virtually no endurting written records.

The notebook appears to have been commenced in the inter-war period and has updates and entries down to 1957 (Letter N, p.1). It comprises specialist maritime law definitions and notes of legal precedents and relevant case law, covering myriad aspects of contract law, damage, repairs, disputes, negligence, and maritime law definitions. The diversity of subjects noted emphasise the enormous breadth of disputes that average adjusters worked to resolve and to apportion compensation or damages.