Great Central Rly. Co.
Farther along the east coast, the Great Central Railway Company maintains a service between Grimsby and several of the Continental ports. The company in 1864 secured parliamentary powers to run steamers to Hamburg, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Flushing, Lubeck, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Revel, Cronstadt, St. Petersburg, and Königsberg. Subsequently they purchased the Anglo-French Company’s fleet and began to run steamers to Hamburg in July 1865. In April 1866, the railway company initiated a new service of steamers between Grimsby and Rotterdam, and in the August of the following year the service was extended to Antwerp. On December 1, 1885, the sailings between Grimsby and Hamburg were increased from two to four per week; and on July 1, 1891, a daily service was established. The sailings between Grimsby and Rotterdam were increased in September 1906 from two to three per week, and early in 1907 two new 18-knot turbine steamers Marylebone and Immingham were placed on this service.
In essential particulars these are sister ships, though differing somewhat in their internal arrangements. The Immingham has a length over all of 282 feet, beam 41 feet, and depth moulded 21 feet 6 inches. Accommodation is provided for seventy first and twenty-four second-class passengers, and three hundred in the third class, besides one thousand tons of cargo. She is driven by three Parsons turbines actuating three shafts. These two steamers marked a new era in the Continental service from the Humber, being far in advance in accommodation and speed of anything hitherto employed.