In tracing the progress of steam navigation to the East the various tenders for the conveyance of the East India and Australian mails have been incidentally noticed. Among those which were lodged, in reply to an advertisement from the Admiralty issued on the recommendation of Lord Jocelyn’s Committee of 1851, there was one from a new undertaking—the Eastern Steam Navigation Company—offering to convey the mails from Plymouth to Sydney and to the East Indies, &c., monthly, viâ Alexandria, in vessels of from 1300 to 2100 tons, with engines of from 400 to 600 horse-power.[412] This company had been incorporated by royal charter with a nominal capital of 1,200,000l. in 20l. shares, having power to increase it to 2,000,000l. The projectors of the proposed undertaking were, in the highest degree, respectable, comprising some men of great wealth, and others of well-known scientific attainments. They were, in every way, competent to carry out the service they had tendered to perform. The general impression, at the time, seemed to be that they intended to act in concert with the Austrian Lloyd’s Steam Navigation Company, a well-known undertaking trading from Trieste to different ports in the Mediterranean and represented in London by the late Mr. Joseph Edlmann, a merchant of the highest standing, whose name appeared as one of the directors of the new undertaking. But, as the ships the company intended for the service to India and Australia were not mentioned, and more especially as the directors did not state in their tender the sum they required for the performance of the latter service, their offer was not accepted, though it may have been considered.
Detailed proposals of the directors.
After the directors had communicated to the shareholders the result of their tender, some of them, on the suggestion of Mr. I. K. Brunel, recommended the construction of a steam-ship of extraordinary dimensions to trade with India. On looking at the export and import trade of Great Britain they observed that the main line of commerce passed round the Cape of Good Hope towards India, China, and Australia, following nearly the same track as far as Ceylon. On the fact of this great pathway of commerce they grounded, and not without plausible reasons, their scheme for the profitable employment of various vessels of gigantic size between England and Ceylon, from which place smaller vessels were to diverge to the other parts of India, as well as to China, Japan, and Australia; the intention, however, being to despatch their first great vessel, when ready, direct either to Calcutta, Sydney, or Melbourne.
Having made the calculations (to their own satisfaction) that such ships would maintain a speed of fifteen knots per hour, there was in their judgment no doubt that they would “attract so large a portion of the traffic as to afford full cargoes at remunerative rates both outward and homeward.” The voyage from England would thus be accomplished in thirty days to Trincomalee, which had been selected for their central station, as it offered every facility for such a purpose. Thence they estimated that the voyage in ordinary steam-vessels could be accomplished to Madras in two days, Calcutta in four, Hong Kong in ten, and Sydney or Melbourne in fourteen respectively; the auxiliary steamers on these lines transferring the outward cargo from the leviathans, and bringing to them “the valuable products of all these countries as a back freight to England.”
“Should the great ships,” they said, “fulfil only the most moderate of the anticipations, in regard to speed, and be able to land goods in Calcutta within thirty-five days of their shipment in London, in Hong Kong within forty, or in Melbourne within forty-four, it is certain that they will take up at higher freights a large amount of goods now conveyed in ordinary vessels. Of the whole Eastern tonnage, all that portion which will bear a minimum freightage of 5l. per ton, may be fairly calculated on as cargo available for their ships. Of such are the silks and silk piece-goods of India and China averaging from 2000l. to 3000l. per ton in value; indigo from 500l. to 1000l. per ton; tea, coffee, spices, lacdye, shellac, &c., of the value of between 100l. to 300l. per ton. Among the export goods intrinsically valuable enough to pay the higher rates of freightage may be reckoned the principal manufactures of Birmingham, Manchester, Sheffield, and Leeds: woollens, silks, satins, velvets, millinery, haberdashery, oilmen’s stores, and hardware, besides the costly productions of France and Germany.”
Going into various calculations in detail, they arrived at the conclusion that out of the exports to India there would be 180,000 tons of goods able to afford the minimum freight, without considering the goods at that time transported by the overland route in the ships of the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, the greater portion of which the directors of the great ship company felt certain they would secure, while they were, further, convinced that their ships would “attract a considerable portion of the exports to Australia were a line of branch steamers to be laid on from Trincomalee to the Australian ports.”
The import trade, in the opinion of the directors, was even more valuable than the export, and could “well afford a higher freightage in return for speedy transport.” The Aberdeen clippers they said “obtain from 8l. to 12l. per ton for the carriage of fine teas from China, in which trade they will be utterly unable to compete with their great ships should they reduce the voyage from 80 to 40 days.” Estimating at least 50,000 tons of tea from China should the freight not exceed 6l. or 7l. per ton, and, without considering the large and rapidly increasing amount of that article imported from Assam and the Himalayas, the tea from China in itself would be, in the opinion of the directors, an enormous source of profit. Then, should they reduce the voyage from Australia to 45 or 50 days, they might calculate with certainty on obtaining “the conveyance of all the gold from that country.” In a word, they were of opinion that, after making the most ample allowance for working expenses, wear and tear, depreciation and insurance, “a surplus would remain equal to 40 per cent. per annum on the capital invested.”[413]
Capital subscribed to build the Great Eastern.
Nor were the vast and increasing number of passengers overlooked in their calculations as affording a larger source of profit than even gold or merchandise, while, in their opinion, “for the transport of troops the capabilities of their ships would be such as always to command a preference from Government over vessels of smaller burden.” Such were the views and calculations of the directors of the Eastern Steam Navigation Company.
Nevertheless, in spite of these glowing prospects, many of the shrewd and more cautious shareholders in the original undertaking, including nearly all the persons interested in the Austrian Lloyd’s Company, preferred receiving back the money they had deposited, on account of their shares, and declined to support the new company. Others, however, and among them many men of great capital and of high position in the world of science, consented, and, after considerable difficulty, sufficient capital was raised to construct the Leviathan, the largest ship ever known either in ancient or modern times, and the first, as well as the last, of the ships of this size they had contemplated building.