It is well known that discrepancies between measured and predicted ship motions are significant in the range of low frequencies. In this paper, the vertical ship motions in regular longitudinal waves in a shallow water are briefly discussed. The investigation is focussed on the role of wave exciting forces and moments to the motion responses in these low frequencies. It is confirmed that diffraction forces are in general small in a shallow water as one may expect. Furthermore the wave exciting forces and moments on a displacement-type ship will be larger practicularly in low frequencies, when the contribution of the diffraction effect is neglected. As a result of this fact theoretically predicted responses for the pitch motion becomes closer to the experimental one. The discrepancies for the heave motion, however, are still apparent.