Her (late) Majesty’s Steam-Packets, for the conveyance of mails and passengers between Liverpool and Kingstown, commenced sailing on the 29th August, 1826. Captain John Emerson, R.N. (late Commander of the St. George steam-packet), was appointed Captain of one of these Royal Mail Steamers, of which there were four, all built at Liverpool, and each of 300 tons burthen.
The City of Dublin Steam-Packet Company commenced a regular steamship passenger service between England, Ireland and France in June, 1827. The route was from Belfast to Dublin, thence to Bordeaux. Passengers from the North of England were carried by the Company’s steamers between Liverpool and Dublin, connecting at the latter port with the steamer to France. The pioneer steamer of the service was the Leeds, which sailed on her first voyage from Belfast on Sunday, 17th June, and from Dublin on the following Wednesday, continuing to sail at fortnightly intervals during the season. The venture was so successful that the Directors of the Company, the following April, added the steamers Sheffield and Nottingham to the service, and increased the sailings to the 1st, 10th and 20th of each month.
FOOTNOTES:
[12] For a special account of this Firm, see Part II. of this Volume.
Chapter IX.
Steamship Routes to India and the East.—Lieut. Johnston.—Enterprize purchased by Indian Government.—Renders important service during Burmese War.—Thomas Waghorn.—Regular steamship service established between Bombay and Suez.—Peninsular Steam Navigation Co. (1834).—Altered to Peninsular and Oriental S. N. Co. (1837).—First P. and O. steamer to India, 1842.—Services extended to Ceylon, Penang, Singapore, and Hong Kong, 1844.—And to Australia, 1852.—P. and O. steamships engaged as troopships during Crimean War.—S.S. Mooltan (1861) and other later steamers fitted with compound engines.—Suez Canal opened, 1869.—Mails transferred to Canal route, 1888.—Calcutta and Burmah S. N. Co. (1855).—Steamers engaged as transports during Indian Mutiny.—Title changed to British India Steam Navigation Co., Ltd. (1862).—Bibby Line.
Soon after steam navigation began to attract attention in Great Britain, a public meeting was held in London (1822), for the purpose of forming a steamship company to trade between England and India. It was the intention of the promoters of the meeting that the packets should proceed to India by way of the Cape of Good Hope, the route by which the bulk of the trade of Europe with the East had been carried since the time of Vasco da Gama. At this meeting it was decided that Lieut. (afterwards Captain) Johnston should proceed to Calcutta, with a view to interesting the East India merchants in the proposed undertaking.
Lieut. Johnston proceeded to India via Egypt, and although he was commissioned to advocate the Cape route, he was convinced on this journey of the greater advantages of the route by Suez, and afterwards became one of its most ardent supporters. Several meetings were held in Calcutta after his arrival there, at one of which, held on the 17th December, 1823, it was announced that the Governor, Lord Amherst, cordially approved of the proposal to establish steamship communication between England and India, and that he was prepared to recommend his Council to grant as a premium[13] “a gift of 20,000 rupees to whoever, whether individuals or a company, being British subjects, should permanently, before the end of 1826, establish a steam communication between England and India, either by the Cape of Good Hope or the Red Sea, and make two voyages out and two voyages home, occupying not more than seventy days on each passage.”
Colombo carrying Xmas gifts to the troops in the Crimea.