I strongly suspect that this message is a huge waste of your time but it seemed worth a try!! I hope you don’t mind?! I am interested in where the name ‘Starbuck’ came from for your character. It may be as simple as a love of modern coffee varieties – although I suspect not … For some years I have sporadically been exploring the history of the house I now live in. Exploring censuses and local records we have put together what is a highly speculative theory about the house. In brief; we don’t know when the house (originally 4 farm cottages) was built but it seems to be in the 1850s. Later documents state that they were built by Joseph Starbuck although he never seems to have lived in them. He appears in local censuses of the period and his extended family tend to appear as labourers or paupers. There is no evidence to support his ability to build 4 cottages except that he appears in 1851 listed as a sailor. It gets complicated but there appears to be evidence that he went to sea, made his money (as was possible in those days!) returned home, built the cottages as a kind of pension. Unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to have worked because he ended up as cottager and then later a labourer. The ages on the census are consistent with this being the same man and although the village is on a canal there is a clear distinction made between a boatman & a sailor. It is extremely (!!!!!) unlikely, but maybe you came across a sailor/adventurer in the mid-1800s that may have prompted your characterisation? Just a hopeful thought, I’m sure, but worth a try! My apologies if I have wasted your time, Jane Fraser. (Mill Lane Cottages, Hickling, nr Melton Mowbray, Leics.)