Steam Navigation and Its Relation to the Commerce of Canada and the United States

by James Croil

The Dominion Line.

This line began in 1870 when a number of merchants, engaged in the New Orleans and Liverpool trade, formed what they styled the “Mississippi and Dominion Steamship Company, Limited,” under the management of Messrs. Flinn, Main and Montgomery, of Liverpool, the agents in Montreal being Messrs. D. Torrance & Co., of which Mr. John Torrance has been for a number of years the senior partner. Their boats were to run to New Orleans in the winter and to Montreal in summer. Their first ships were the St. Louis, Vicksburg and Memphis. In 1871 they added the Mississippi and Texas of 2,822 tons. The Orleans route was soon abandoned and the Dominion Line, then so called, confined its trade to Canada, having Portland for its terminal winter port. Gradually increasing the size and speed of their steamers they entered into a lively competition for a share of the passenger traffic, and soon became formidable rivals of the Allan Line, and for a number of years shared with them in the Government allowance for carrying the Royal mails.

In 1874 they had built for them at Dumbarton the Dominion and Ontario, each 3,000 tons; in 1879 the Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa, of still larger dimensions, were added. They next bought the City of Dublin and City of Brooklyn from the Inman Line, and renamed them the Quebec and Brooklyn. In 1882 and 1883 they built the Sarnia and the Oregon, fine boats of about 3,700 tons each, with increased power and midship saloons. In 1884 Messrs. Connal & Co., Glasgow, built for them the Vancouver, a very fine ship of 5,149 tons, having a speed of fourteen knots and excellent accommodation for passengers. Although she has had several minor accidents she has been, on the whole, a successful and popular ship. The most serious misfortune that befell her was in November, 1890, on her voyage to Quebec, when she encountered a furious hurricane in mid-ocean. Captain Lindall, who had been constantly on the bridge for a long time, went to his chart-room to snatch a few minutes rest, leaving the first officer on the bridge. All of a sudden the ship was thrown on her beam ends by a tremendous wave which completely wrecked the bridge and swept the chart-room, with the captain in it, into the sea. The quarter-master at the wheel was also washed overboard, and both he and Captain Lindall were drowned. The first officer, Mr. Walsh, who had a miraculous escape, took charge of the battered ship and brought her to Quebec, where deep regret was expressed for the sad death of Lindall, who was a general favourite and as good a sailor as ever stood on the bridge.

CAPTAIN LINDALL.

The Labrador, 4,737 tons, launched from the famous shipyard of Harland & Wolff, Belfast, in 1891, has also been a successful and popular ship. She combines in her construction a number of the latest improvements, and has attained a high rate of speed, with large cargo capacity and a moderate consumption of fuel. Until the arrival of the Canada, in October, 1896, the Labrador held the record for the fastest voyage from Moville to Rimouski—6 days, 8 hours. In August, 1895, she made the voyage from land to land in 4 days, 16 hours. In May, 1894, she averaged 365 knots a day, equal to fifteen knots an hour, her best day’s run being 375 knots, which was regarded as great work considering the small amount of fuel consumed. In December of that year she made the run from Moville to Halifax in 6 days, 12 hours.

Up to this point, however, the business ability and enterprise of the Dominion Company had not been rewarded with financial success. For years they had to contend with the general depression of trade, the keen competition of other lines, and ruinous rates of freight. In the autumn of 1894 the managers resigned, and the entire fleet of vessels was sold to Messrs. Richards, Mills & Co., of Liverpool, at a great sacrifice. The Montreal agency remains as heretofore with Messrs. D. Torrance & Co., and under the new management the line seems to have entered upon a career of prosperity.

The casualties on the St. Lawrence route to steamers of this line have been numerous, but with a comparatively small loss of life. The foundering of the Vicksburg, from collision with ice, in 1875, was the most disastrous, involving the loss of forty-seven lives of passengers and crew—including the captain—and a large number of cattle. The Ottawa went ashore about fifty miles below Quebec in 1889 and became a total wreck. The Idaho was wrecked on Anticosti in 1890; the Montreal, on the island of Belle Isle in 1889. The Texas went ashore on Cape Race in a fog and became a total wreck. In September, 1895, the Mariposa, a beautiful twin-screw chartered steamer of 5,000 tons, was stranded at Point Amour in the Straits of Belle Isle and became a total wreck, but the passengers and crew were all saved.

DOMINION LINE SS. “CANADA.”

It very soon became apparent that the new management of the Dominion Line was bent on a new departure. They lost no time in discarding the smaller boats and replacing them with large and powerful freight steamers having also limited accommodation for passengers. Of this type were the Angloman[34] and the Scotsman. The latter is a fine twin-screw ship of colossal strength, 6,040 tons register, with a carrying capacity of from 9,000 to 10,000 tons of cargo, and an average speed at sea of twelve to thirteen knots. In September, 1895, in addition to a large general cargo, the Scotsman left Montreal with the largest shipment of live stock that ever left this port, consisting of 1,050 head of cattle, 2,000 sheep, and 47 horses, all of which were landed safely in Liverpool. But the latest addition to the fleet is in advance of the Scotsman. The Canada, which sailed on her first voyage from Liverpool on October 1st, 1896, is a type of ocean steamer new to the St. Lawrence, and is designed to meet present requirements by combining in one vessel the essential features of a first-class passenger ship with so large a freight-carrying capacity as to make her practically independent of subsidies. The Canada is a twin-screw steamer 515 feet long, 58 feet beam, and 35 feet 6 inches moulded depth. Her gross tonnage is about 9,000 tons. Her triple expansion engines are calculated to develop 7,000 horse-power with a steam boiler pressure of 175 pounds. Her staterooms are perhaps the finest feature of the ship—equal to any on the ocean ferry. Her maiden voyage was a stormy one, but it easily surpassed all previous records from Liverpool to Quebec. On her second trip she left Liverpool at 5 p. m. on October 29th, and reached Rimouski on November 4th, at 11.40 p. m., thus making the voyage in 6 days, 11 hours and 40 minutes, and to Quebec in 6 days, 23 hours, 30 minutes. Her average speed on this voyage was about 16 knots an hour, and her best day’s run, 416 knots, equal to 17⅓ knots an hour.

CAPTAIN MACAULAY, OF SS. “CANADA.”

At a luncheon given on board the Canada to leading members of the Dominion Government, Mr. Torrance said that the Dominion Line had been sold out to a company composed of men of tremendous energy and enterprise, with any amount of money at their backs, and, after looking at the matter in all its bearings, they decided that the time had come for a forward movement. They determined to build the largest steamer they could for the St. Lawrence trade. The Canada was contracted for by Messrs. Harland and Wolff, Belfast, as a sixteen-knot ship, and on her trial trip made seventeen and a half knots. He believed that she would average sixteen knots at sea, that she would reach Rimouski in six and a half days from Liverpool, and deliver her mails at the Montreal post-office within seven days. If that expectation comes to be realized, as it is most likely to be, the arguments in favour of a fast mail service between Canada and Britain will be materially strengthened. Mr. Torrance added that the Canada was built to carry 7,000 tons of cargo, that if she had a speed of seventeen knots she would only carry 4,000 tons of cargo; if eighteen knots, she would carry but 3,000 tons, and that with a speed of twenty knots it would not be safe to calculate on her capacity for more than 1,000 tons of freight: “in short, that the twenty-knot ship must be, virtually, a passenger ship, and well subsidized.” The Canadian Government has not been slow to back up private enterprise of this nature in the past, and will doubtless continue to do so in the future. For reasons not made public the Canada was withdrawn from the St. Lawrence service and placed on the route from Boston and Liverpool, where she has been so successful that another vessel of the same class is being built for that route. In the meantime other large vessels have been put on the St. Lawrence route, the latest addition to the fleet being the New England, having a tonnage of nearly 11,600 tons, fine accommodation for a large number of passengers, and room for an enormous cargo.