From the middle of the 19th century Royal Navy warships, especially the larger vessels, often had bands aboard. These were generally brass, with occasional woodwind instruments and/or fiddles. Their ongoing upkeep was usually the responsibility of the individual ship’s officers with a modicum of support from the Admiralty. This paper lists some of the known ships’ bands and their activities, although information about them is even more sparse than that for civilian, land-based bands of the same period.