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A HISTORY
OF
THE BRITISH INDIA STEAM NAVIGATION COMPANY LIMITED
The founding father of the British India Steam Navigation Company was an enterprising Scot by the name of William Mackinnon. Born in 1823 in Campbeltown, Kintyre, William Mackinnon arrived in Calcutta in 1847 having elected not to pursue a promising partnership with a Portuguese East India merchant for whom he had worked in Glasgow. It is useful at this point to take a brief look at the history of the East India Company in order to set the scene for William Mackinnon’s arrival in India. The East India Company was founded for the purpose of trading with India and the East Indies, and it received its original charter from Queen Elizabeth in 1600. It soon had trading posts at Madras, Bombay and Calcutta, but, for more than a century, it was involved in long and bitter commercial struggles with European rivals, notably the French. The genius of Robert Clive changed all that when, in the mid-eighteenth century, he masterminded the downfall of the French and laid the foundations for the rule of the East India Company. A private trading company had, in effect, become the owner of an empire. Corruption and self interest among those responsible for running the East India Company led to the British Parliament gradually taking control of the business of governing India, and, after the Indian Mutiny in 1857, the India Act of 1858 transferred all the territories and powers of the East India Company to the Crown. From that moment, the government of India was directed by a Secretary of State in London, whilst the day-to-day administration became the responsibility of the Indian Civil Service. William Mackinnon thus arrived in India at a time when the trading monopoly of the East India Company was in terminal decline, and opportunities for private enterprise were beginning to develop. In December 1847, William Mackinnon entered into a partnership with Robert Mackenzie to run a business as general merchants. Robert Mackenzie had arrived in Calcutta in 1836, and, as well as making a success of his business as a general merchant, he became an agent for the India General Steam Navigation Company, which was one of the early steamship companies trading in the inland waters of eastern India.
The Mackinnon and Mackenzie partnership flourished, and, in 1849, they were joined by fellow Scots James Hall and Peter Mackinnon. The firm of Mackinnon, Mackenzie and Company then began to charter vessels to carry its merchandise on routes from Glasgow and Liverpool to Calcutta and from Calcutta to Australia and China. Sadly, in 1853, Robert Mackenzie lost his life in a shipwreck off the coast of New South Wales whilst returning to Calcutta from a trip to Australia to further the interests of Mackinnon, Mackenzie and Company. Despite this obvious setback, the Company’s shipping business continued to grow and prosper under the very able leadership of William Mackinnon, and, in 1853, he set up W Mackinnon and Company in Glasgow and Hall, Mackinnon and Company in Liverpool to handle the British end of the trade. The name of the latter company changed to Mackinnon, Frew and Company in 1858. In 1854, the East India Company, at that time still nominally in charge of Burmese affairs, invited tenders for a contract to operate a mail service between Calcutta, Rangoon and Moulmein, and William Mackinnon and his associates set about winning it. To do so, however, they would have to acquire modern, reliable and fast ships and to form a new company to own and operate them. 1856 was indeed a busy year for William Mackinnon. To start with, he paid £10,000 to acquire a one third partnership in the Australian agency of Law, Dodd and Company, and then, on the 24 th September, he registered the Calcutta and Burmah Steam Navigation Company Limited in Glasgow with an initial share capital of £35,000 in 700 shares of £50 each. Soon after its formation, this Company was awarded the contract to carry mail between Calcutta, Rangoon and Moulmein, and William Mackinnon wasted no time in acquiring two modern ships, the Baltic and the Cape of Good Hope , to enable it to operate this service. Details of the Baltic and Cape of Good Hope , and of all the other ships operated by the Calcutta and Burmah Steam Navigation Company and the British India Steam Navigation Company, are in Appendix 1. The Cape of Good Hope had the honour of introducing the Company’s fortnightly Calcutta-Rangoon-Moulmein service, and she commenced the inaugural voyage from Calcutta on 23rd^ March 1857. The service had hardly begun, when the Indian Mutiny occurred, and the Cape of Good Hope was requisitioned by the Bengal Government for the carriage of troops. She performed her role as a troop ship well with two important consequences: firstly, the Indian Government came to rely on the Company, and its successor the British India Steam Navigation Company, for the carriage of troops by sea, and, secondly, William Mackinnon and his associates were not slow to recognise the financial rewards of such contracts.
Britannia backed by a lion, both facing left, and with the lion’s front right paw resting on a globe. For the house flag, he chose a white burgee surmounted by a red diagonal cross, and in 1863 he imposed a strict uniform code for officers. Immediately upon its formation, B.I. contracted with the Indian Government for the provision of mail services on several new routes. Throughout its history, B.I. would receive many more Government contracts for the carriage of both mails and military personnel and equipment, and there is no doubt that these contracts were vital to the success of the Company. This solid commercial relationship between the Indian Government and B.I., based upon mutual trust and respect, enabled William Mackinnon and his associates to build up an extraordinarily large fleet of ships capable of transporting passengers and merchandise on a vast and intricate web of routes. With the Calcutta-Rangoon-Moulmein service already firmly established, B.I. added the following 6 services in 1862. Those under Indian Government mail contract are in bold type: Calcutta-Akyab via Chittagong. Moulmein-Singapore. Calcutta-Bombay via coastal ports (monthly). Madras-Rangoon. Bombay-Karachi (fortnightly). Bombay-Persian Gulf (six-weekly). It is interesting to note that, in the early days of coastal trading, B.I. ships that were not operating to a strict mail service timetable would sail close inshore, literally on the lookout for trade. Merchants would use crude signalling devices, such as flags on tall poles, to indicate that they had goods to transport.
B.I. first entered the trooping business in a serious way with the purchase of the Australian and the Sydney in 1863. These 2 vessels had been acquired by the East India Company in 1857 for use as troop ships, but, with the demise of the East India Company, the Indian Government no longer wished to own and operate ships for tasks which could be performed as, or even more, efficiently by private shipping companies. Quick to take advantage of such a business opportunity, William Mackinnon wasted no time in acquiring the Australian and the Sydney and, within a few months, B.I. was contracted by the Indian Government to supply these vessels to carry troops to take part in the New Zealand Land Wars. Also in 1863, B.I. was contracted by the Indian Government to provide a monthly Moulmein-Singapore mail service. In 1864, as required by revisions to its contracts with the Indian Government, B.I. increased the frequency of the Bombay- Persian Gulf mail service to monthly and the Calcutta-Bombay via coastal ports mail service to fortnightly. Also in 1864, under a new contract with the Indian Government, B.I. introduced a monthly Madras-Rangoon mail service. At the suggestion of William Mackinnon, his nephew, Archibald Gray, and Edwyn Sandys Dawes joined forces to establish a shipping agency called Gray, Dawes and Company in London in 1865. Both had been ships’ officers, and William Mackinnon’s faith in their potential as businessmen was borne out by the fact that Gray, Dawes and Company became a successful and important agent for B.I. It is interesting to note that Edwyn Sandys Dawes acquired the controlling interest of the New Zealand Shipping Company in 1889, which was another company to play a significant role in the training of deck and engineering cadets. The Netherlands Indies Steam Navigation Company was formed as a Dutch flagged subsidiary of B.I. in 1866 to take advantage of Dutch Government contracts for mail services in the East Indies. In order to meet Dutch Government requirements, the ships belonging to this British company were registered at and managed from Batavia. In 1868, nine ships from B.I. were employed to transport troops and supplies for the Abyssinian campaign. Three of these ships played an unusual role in that, due to a severe water shortage during the campaign, they were anchored off the African coast, and their condensing systems were used to supply the troops and their animals with 30,000 gallons of fresh water a day from sea water. In the same year, B.I. increased the frequency of its Bombay-Persian Gulf mail service to fortnightly as required by a revision to its contract with the Indian Government. The Suez Canal was opened in 1869, and, in that same year, B.I. secured the contract for trooping from Britain to India, which up until then had been held by P & O. This success was no doubt due to William Mackinnon’s foresight in purchasing
Services that did not. In this case, the service was between London and the Persian Gulf. On leaving London, this service called at Algiers, Port Said, Suez, Yanbu, Jeddah, Hodeida, Aden, Karachi, Bunder Abbas, Bushire and Basra. However, it was, initially, bedevilled by delays caused ostensibly by Arab officialdom, although the underlying reason may well have been the self interest of those wealthy Arabs involved in such things as the slave trade. Also in 1874, B.I. started a service between Zanzibar, the Comoros Islands and Nosy Bé (Madagascar). In 1875, as required by a revision to its contract with the Indian Government, B.I. increased the frequency of its Bombay-Persian Gulf mail service to weekly. In the same year, B.I. started an Aden-Karachi service, and another Home Line service, this time operated by B.I.A.S., was introduced on a four-weekly basis between London and Calcutta. Also in 1875, B.I. took delivery of its first paddle steamer, the Rangoon , for use on the increasingly popular Rangoon-Moulmein service. The frequency of the London-Calcutta service, operated by B.I.A.S., was increased to fortnightly in 1876. In the same year, B.I., under a contract with the Portuguese Government, extended the Aden-Zanzibar service to Mozambique, and, also in 1876, four B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Malaya – the Perak Campaign. The firm of Smith, Mackenzie and Company was formally established in Zanzibar in 1877, and its prime role was to act as agent for B.I. in East Africa. In 1878, four B.I. ships were employed to transport troops to Malta for the war between Turkey and Russia. In 1879, under a contract between B.I. and the Portuguese Government, Home Line ships started to make a monthly call at Lisbon so as to create links between Portugal, India and Mozambique. This was an interesting development in the light of the long standing contractual relationship between the Portuguese Government and P & O. In that same year, one B.I. ship was employed to support military activity in the Zulu War. Taking into account the sheer size of the geographical area serviced by B.I., it is not surprising that there would be changes and developments in trading patterns, and that these would result in corresponding changes to B.I. services. For example, in 1881, B.I. started the following 5 new services: Madras-Negapatam-Penang-Singapore.
Rangoon-Straits Coast. Bombay-Lourenço Marques. London-Calcutta. (Formerly operated by B.I.A.S. from 1876) London-Queensland. (Under a mail contract with the Queensland Government and operated by B.I.A.S.) Whilst in the same year: the Calcutta-Port Blair-Singapore service was extended to Rangoon; the Calcutta-Akyab-Kyaukpyu- Sandoway service was extended to Bassein; the Aden-Zanzibar-Mozambique service was withdrawn; and the Zanzibar- Comoros Islands-Nosy Bé service was also withdrawn. Also in 1881, one B.I. ship was employed to support military activity in the Transvaal War. It is, therefore, worth pausing at this point to review the astonishing progress that had been made by B.I. since it took over from the Calcutta and Burmah Steam Navigation Company Limited. After just 20 years of operation, one major service between Calcutta, Rangoon and Moulmein had been transformed into a whole range of services extending from Singapore to Britain and encompassing a great many ports on the coasts of Malaya, Burma, India, East Africa and the Persian Gulf, and a B.I.A.S. service had just begun to Australia. Whilst accepting that Government mail and trooping contracts played a major role in this development, it is extremely important to appreciate the size of the commercial trade that B.I. now serviced. The B.I. fleet had grown from 10 to 60 ships, and a glance at Appendix I shows that many of them were capable of carrying an astonishingly large number of deck passengers. India was, in effect, an exporter of labour on a massive scale. With work at home a scarce commodity, thousands of Indian labourers made regular voyages as deck passengers on B.I. ships to countries where work was plentiful. For example the rice fields and rubber plantations of Burma were a ready source of work. B.I. ships also carried huge quantities of cargo in the form of a wide variety of goods such as, for example, jute from India, rice and teak from Burma, and dates from Basra. Military activity in Egypt in 1882 had a significant impact on B.I., as 19 of its ships were employed as military transports. Also in that year, B.I. began a service between Rangoon and Mergui.
observance of the Sabbath. What he did not say was “as a working day””. It would appear that this note had been written by a long serving Master of B.I.!! Duncan Mackinnon, a nephew of William Mackinnon, was appointed Chairman in 1894. In the same year, the following new services were introduced: Madras-Negapatam-Penang-Singapore (Operated intermittently since 1881). Calcutta-Australia (Operated intermittently since 1885). Calcutta-Ceylon-Malabar Coast Ports-Bombay. Bombay-Lourenço Marques. Tuticorin-Colombo. Rangoon-Chittagong. Kyaukpyu-Ramree-Cheduba (Arakan Coast). Mergui-Madras-Negapatam-Straits Ports. Also in 1894, the mail contract with the Queensland Government for the London-Queensland service expired, but B.I. continued to operate the service. The following 3 new services were introduced by B.I. in 1896: Bombay-East Africa. Calcutta-New Zealand.
Rangoon-Bombay. In the same year, the Kyaukpyu-Ramree-Cheduba (Arakan Coast) service and the Mergui-Madras-Negapatam-Straits Ports service were withdrawn. Also in 1896, ten B.I. ships were employed for military support in Sudan. B.I. introduced a Negapatam-Colombo-Calcutta-Rangoon service in 1897, and, also in that year, 2 B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Uganda. In 1898, one B.I. ship was employed to support military activity in the Sudan, and 3 B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Crete. The Boer War started in October 1899, and, in all, 39 B.I. ships were employed to support the British military involvement in this war. Attempts by the Chinese “Boxers” in 1900 to eliminate foreigners living in China led to their suppression by an international military force. Thirty-nine B.I. ships were employed to support the British military element of this force. In the same year, one B.I. ship was employed to support British military activity in the Second Ashanti War in West Africa (Gold Coast). Also in 1900, the Calcutta-Mauritius service was extended to the Seychelles and to Aden. In 1901, five B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Somalia. The following new services were introduced by B.I. in 1902: Madras-Japan. Lourenço Marques-Mozambique. Calcutta-New Zealand (Operated intermittently since 1896). Zanzibar-Lourenço Marques (But withdrawn the following year).
B.I. started to recruit apprentice deck officers in 1906, although another 10 years would elapse before the concept of formal cadet ship based training was introduced. As a consequence, the quality of the training over those first 10 years was far from uniform. A new service between Calcutta and Japan was introduced by B.I. in 1907. In 1908: a new Aden-Mombasa-Zanzibar service was introduced; the Moulmein-Yeh-Tavoy-Palauk-Mergui-Bokpyin service was extended to Victoria Point and Penang; and the Bombay-Lourenço Marques service was withdrawn. The Rangoon-based, and locally owned, Bengal Steam Navigation Company competed for several years with B.I. in the Bay of Bengal trades, but, by 1910, it had succumbed to a fierce freight rate cutting war and become insolvent. B.I. acquired the 2 ships that it had used in this trade and renamed them Zaida and Zira. In 1911, two B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Persia. Apcar and Company was a Calcutta-based business that was owned and managed by an Armenian family, and it comprised workshops, mines and a fleet of 5 ships that traded mostly between Calcutta, Singapore, Hong Kong, Amoy (Xiamen) and Japan. This business was purchased by B.I. in 1912, but the Apcar name was retained to enable the ships to continue to trade under Conference rules. In 1912, the Calcutta-Japan service, which had operated intermittently from 1907, became a regular service. In 1913, B.I. acquired the Currie Line, a Melbourne-based firm that owned 5 ships that primarily traded between Australia and India. In particular, the Currie Line had built its early success on the carriage of horses from Australia. However, changes to Australian manning regulations and other misfortunes had brought the Currie Line to the market, and, as always, the B.I. management were quick to snap up a competitor. In the same year, B.I. removed the last vestige of competition on the Australia-India trade by buying the Cooeyanna from McIlwraith, McEacharn and Company of Melbourne.
The year 1913 also saw the retirement of Duncan Mackinnon, who was replaced as Chairman by Lord Inchcape. James Lyle Mackay had joined B.I. as an assistant with Mackinnon, Mackenzie and Company in Calcutta in 1874, and, when he was created a Baron in 1911, he took the title Lord Inchcape. In 1914, the Penang-Singapore (Fast) service was withdrawn. At the start of the First World War, B.I. owned 126 ships. No less than 109 ships of the B.I. fleet were involved in supporting military activity during that war, and, of these, 25 were lost in action as indicated in Appendix 1. Right from the start, B.I. was involved in large-scale operations, and that pattern was to continue throughout the war. For example, in 1914, B.I. provided a convoy of 24 ships carrying 30,000 troops from Bombay to support the war effort. Horses played a major role throughout the First World War, and it is interesting to note that B.I. ships helped to carry more than 84,000 horses from Australia to India during the war years. “Merchant Adventurers 1914-1918” by F A Hook provides a historical record of the B.I. fleet’s involvement in the First World War. Details of this book, which has a forward by Lord Inchcape, are at Appendix 2. On the 1st^ October 1914, B.I. was taken over by P & O. There is no doubt that Lord Inchcape had been interested in an amalgamation of these two great concerns for many years, and that there were senior figures in both camps who shared his views. Nevertheless, it would appear that both Duncan Mackinnon, whilst Chairman of B.I., and Sir Thomas Sutherland, the then Chairman of P & O, were less than enthusiastic about brokering such a momentous deal. Lord Inchcape, who has been described as “a man with a mind as sharp-edged as a battle axe in large affairs”, was undoubtedly the driving force behind the take over, and it is interesting to note that, with the retirement of Sir Thomas Sutherland soon after the take over, he became Chairman of P & O. The Joint Board, of which Lord Inchcape was Chairman, had 12 P & O and 8 B.I. Directors. Nevertheless, from a day-to-day operational standpoint, the 2 companies continued to appear to maintain separate identities. In April 1915, P & O and B.I. jointly formed the Mazagon Dock Company in Bombay. Shipbuilding, repair and maintenance had been a way of life at Mazagon long before the arrival of P & O and B.I., albeit on a much smaller scale. However, from 1915, the site, which had the great advantage of being close to the open sea, was expanded and developed into a major shipbuilding, repair and maintenance facility. Also in 1915, B.I. introduced a Singapore-Bangkok service. With the development of the Mazagon facility underway, B.I. turned its attention to the development of a similar facility on the East coast of the Indian sub-continent, and, in August 1916, the Garden Reach Workshops, Calcutta, was formed by B.I. in
Ship Period Cadets Chantala 1950 to 1954 1954 to 1959 1959 to 1966 1966 to 1971
Cadets serving in these ships took over the role of the deck crew whilst, at the same time, receiving a structured programme of training, which included classroom work under the guidance of a dedicated instructional officer. With the exception of the period that encompassed the Second World War and the years following it up to the arrival of the brand new Chindwara on the 24th January 1950, there were usually 2 cadet training ships in service at any one time, and, up until 1966, cadets could normally expect to spend their entire apprenticeship on a cadet training ship. Changes in training policy, designed to focus more on the development of management and leadership skills, then dictated that cadets would spend only a part of their apprenticeship on cadet training ships, and finally, in 1971, the principle of designated cadet training ships was abolished altogether. Why the Company should chose to operate its first cadet training ship in the middle of the First World War remains a mystery, but the decision certainly turned out to have tragic consequences, as, on 25 th March 1917, while on her way from Bombay to Marseille, the Berbera was torpedoed, and she sank with the loss of 3 cadets. Somewhat surprisingly, the Company then decided to operate 2 cadet training ships, and, in the same year as the loss of the Berbera , the Waipara and the Carpentaria were refitted to carry 32 and 28 cadets respectively. One cadet was killed when the Waipara was torpedoed and abandoned on 4 th^ August 1918. In October 1917, B.I. and P & O each purchased 50% of the shares of The Hain Steamship Company. Also in 1917, the London-Queensland service was suspended. In 1919, B.I. started a London-Bombay service in conjunction with P & O, and, in the same year, B.I. resumed its London- Queensland service. The number of ships in the B.I. fleet reached its peak of 161 in 1920, and, also in that year, B.I. extended its London-Zanzibar service to Beira.
The total gross tonnage of the B.I. fleet reached its peak of 831,533 gross tons in 1922. In 1923, B.I. started 2 new services from Mombasa: one to Mikindini and the other to Lourenço Marques. B.I. withdrew its London-Queensland service in 1924. In the same year, 3 new ships, the Tairea , Takliwa and Talamba , joined the B.I. fleet. This was the only time that a group of sister ships were given 3 funnels, although one was a dummy. Interestingly, these were the first B.I. ships to be registered in London as opposed to Glasgow. In 1927, six B.I. ships were employed to support military activity in Shanghai. The Arakan Flotilla Company operated launches, some sizeable, along the rivers and waterways of the Arakan coast. The services provided by these launches complemented those provided by B.I. along the Arakan coast, and so it is not surprising that B.I. took an opportunity to purchase the Arakan Flotilla Company from its Ellerman owners in 1928. The launches and associated infrastructure, such as maintenance facilities, were then absorbed into and became part of the B.I. organization. Lord Inchcape died on 23 rd May 1932. He was undoubtedly the driving force behind the success of B.I. and, latterly, P & O, and it is not surprising that he has been described as a forceful man of vast ambition, who possessed commercial genius in a phenomenal degree. He was replaced, as Chairman of P & O and B.I., by the Honourable Alexander Shaw, who, in 1937, became Lord Craigmyle. The Neuralia had been operating as a permanent troop ship since 1925, and this had meant that she had been laid up each summer in Southampton Water. However, in 1932, B.I. used her during this “off-season” to operate schoolship cruises to the Baltic and Norwegian Fjords. These summer cruises became immensely popular, and they continued for many years after the Second World War. P & O had acquired The Nourse Line in November 1917, but, in 1932, the majority of the shares in it were transferred from P & O to B.I. In 1934, B.I. acquired a controlling shareholding in the Asiatic Steam Navigation Company.
The deck passenger had played a major role in the development of B.I. business, but, by the early 1950s, deck passenger numbers were in decline. For example, on the Apcar Line routes from Calcutta to Chinese and Japanese ports, a combination of political unrest and the advent of air travel lead to the virtual elimination of the deck and cabin passenger business. In this example, Gurkha troops on passage between Calcutta, Malaya and Hong Kong then became the mainstay of the “passenger” traffic for the Apcar Line ships. B.I. introduced a service between the Persian Gulf and Japan in 1951. In 1953, the Arakan Flotilla Company, which had been reformed within the B.I. Group in 1940, was nationalised by the Burmese Government. B.I. shareholdings in both The Nourse Line and The Hain Steamship Company were sold to P & O in 1955. B.I. celebrated its centenary in 1956. By then, Indian Government regulations designed to create conditions favourable to its own shipping industry were taking effect to the extent that the days when B.I. had a virtual monopoly of Indian coastal services were gone forever. Thus by the middle of the twentieth century, B.I. services were more directed towards the longer intercontinental routes. Also in 1956, one B.I. ship was employed to support military activity during the Suez crisis. The P & O and B.I. Boards were separated in 1957, but Sir William Currie remained Chairman of both. Mackinnon, Mackenzie and Company ceased to be Managing Agents for B.I. on 30th^ September 1959, after acting in that role for nearly a century. On the 1 st April 1960, Sir Donald Anderson became Chairman of the P & O Group, and Mr E J Pakes became Chairman of B.I. In the same year, both the Mazagon Dock Company and the Garden Reach Workshops were sold. The London-Zanzibar-Beira service was extended to Durban in 1962, and, on the 1 st April of that year, Mr K M Campbell became Chairman of B.I. The end of National Service in 1962, changes in Britain’s defence and foreign policy and developments in aviation all conspired to bring about the demise of the troopship and, with it, another significant element of B.I. business.
Reorganisation of the roles of the companies within the P & O Group in the latter part of the 1960s resulted in what could be euphemistically called the inter-Group transfer of ships. The container revolution was underway, and the B.I. fleet became the repository for general cargo ships that were no longer needed by other companies within the Group. On a more positive note, B.I. experienced a growth in trade in the late 1960s on the Japan-Persian Gulf route, which resulted in the Company placing an order for 2 ships of a completely new design to transport the large and heavy materials required by the oil industry. The largest general cargo vessels in the B.I. fleet at the time, the Amra and Aska were each capable of handling loads of up to 300 tons. However, both were to pass into P & O ownership in 1973. B.I. had a very brief flirtation with containerisation. The Manora , Merkara , Morvada and Mulbera were designed to carry up to 340 containers, but all 4 ships were transferred into P & O ownership in 1973, and, in any event, developments in containership technology soon left them obsolescent. On 1st^ October 1971, B.I. was absorbed into the P & O Group, and, over the next few years, all but a very few B.I. ships passed formally into P & O ownership. On 23 rd May 1982, the last remaining ship to be still owned by B.I. – the Dwarka – was delivered to the breaker’s yard, and a once great British shipping company faded into history. No single event caused the downfall of B.I., but there is no doubt that political developments in its major trading areas were of great significance as were the effects of air travel and containerisation.
