USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Professional and industrial history of Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Volume II > Part 14
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The Columbia came out for the first time in January, 1841; the //2- bernia in May, 1843; and the Cambria in January, 1845. The average length of the twenty-nine passages from Liverpool to Boston, inchid- ing the detention at Halifax, from July, 1840, to December, 1841, was fourteen days, twenty-three hours. In 1842 the February and March packets came only to Halifax, and the passengers and mails were brought to and taken from Boston in the Unicorn.
When the Britannia left Boston, July, 1842, she carried with her a silver vase for presentation to Mr. Cunard. It had been made by Jones, Lows & Ball, and it was described as "the greatest triumph in the silver worker's art as yet achieved in Boston." In an address to Mr. Cunard which accompanied it, it was said: "To the public spirit and enterprise of yourself and your honorable associates, we are in- debted for a frequent, rapid and thus far unfailing mode of intercourse, unsurpassed for comfort and safety, and for an additional bond of union between two great commercial nations, united by every tie of descent, common language and mutual interests, never as we trust to be weaken-
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ed or severed." The signers of the address, in behalf of the citizens of Boston, were Martin Brimmer, Isaae P. Davis, James Read, Thomas Lamb, William T. Andrews and E. Hasket Derby.
The Columbia was wrecked on Seal Island, in the Bay of Fundy, July ยป, 1843, but without loss of life. The people of New York had been unable to look with entire complacency upon the superior facilities which Boston now enjoyed for communication with Europe. The Lon. don line to their port had been broken up by the loss of the President and the sale of the British Queen; and although the Great Western was making ber trips from Bristol or Liverpool with regularity, and was regarded as a successful competitor of the Hibernia, whose size was about the same as her own, New York was mainly dependent upon the Boston steamers for its passenger and mail service. The loss of the Columbia suggested a text to the newspapers of that city, which they were ready enough to make use of, and they preached fluently and continuously concerning the extraordinary dangers of the Boston route, which they described as "four hundred and fifty miles of rock, ledge, shoal, fog, and narrow intricate channels." An unexpected event, the next winter, made it doubtful for the moment whether a fatal mistake had not been made in bringing the transatlantic steamers to Boston. After the arrival of the Britannia in January, 1814, the har- bor was frozen over, and it looked as though she would be seriously delayed in starting on her return trip. But the merchants were equal to the emergency. A meeting, was held on the Exchange, with the mayor, Mr. Martin Brimmer, in the chair, and it was decided that the steamer should be cut out withont expense to her owners, and sent to sea as near the advertised time of her departure as possible. A com- mittee to collect the requisite money was chosen, consisting of Benja- min Rich, Caleb Curtis, Ozias Goodwin, Thomas C. Smith, Samuel Quincy, Thomas Gray, Charles Brown, Thomas B. Curtis, and Ammi ( Lombard A contract was made with Gage, Hittinger & Company and John Hill, for cutting two canals in the ice, one from the East Boston ferry to the open sea, and the other from the ferry to India Wharf, into which other channels could be opened as might be desired For this work the contractors were to receive fifteen hundred dollars. Mr. Richard Henry Dana says in his diary: "I went down to see the work in company with hundreds, or rather thousands, of others. The scene was peculiar and exciting in the extreme. The whole harbor was one field of ice, frozen on a perfect level, though somewhat roughly
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in parts, and strong enough to bear heavy loads of merchandise drawn by cattle. Two gangs of men were at work, one beginning at the wharves and cutting down, the other beginning at the clear water and cutting up. Each gang numbered over a hundred. Perhaps there were four hundred workmen in all. There were booths erected for the sale of refreshments at different parts of the track, and from the end of Long Wharf to the place where the lower gang was at work, a distance of five miles, there was a well-marked footway, and travel- ers upon it were as frequent as on the great highway to a city on a festival day." It was an impressive scene when the Britannia, on the afternoon of February 3, slowly steamed through the passage which had been cut for her, cheered by thousands of spectators. This evi- dence of the enterprise of the Boston merchants made a most favorable impression in England, and if there had been any misgivings there, in reference to sending the mail steamers to this port, they were speedily dispelled. Only once since has it been necessary to do a similar work. In January, 1854, a canal was cut in the ice through which the America passed out to sea one afternoon, and the Arabia came up to her dock on the next day.
The increasing commerce of Boston called for various public im- provements; one of these was the new custom-house, begun in 1838 and completed in 1845; another was the Merchants' Exchange in State street. The Exchange was built by a company of which Robert G Shaw was president, and Samuel Dana secretary. Isaiah Rogers was the architect, and the building committee consisted of Andrew E. Bel- knap, Samuel Henshaw, Isaac Livermore, Thaddeus Nichols, jr., and Thomas Lamb. The corner stone was laid August 2, 1841, by the ven- erable Colonel Perkins, who made an interesting address giving his reminiscences of "sixty years ago." A leaden box was placed under the stone, containing a silver plate, suitably inscribed, together with one or more of each of the American coins then in use, a pine-tree shil- ling contributed by Isaac P. Davis, a Boston Directory, and copies of the newspapers of the day. When the building was taken down in 1889, this box was deposited with the Bostonian Society, and at the monthly meeting, October S, it was formally opened and its contents were examined with much interest by the members of the society and others present.
Early in the summer of 1844 Mr. Enoch Train, who had been en- graged in the leather trade, and in connection with this in the trade
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with South America, started his celebrated line of Liverpool sail- ing packets. It may seem strange to us now, that a sagacious mer- chant should undertake to establish such a line from Boston, side by side with the Cunard steamers; but it should be remembered that the paddlewheel vessels then in use could accommodate only a small quan- tity of cargo, and that this was subject to a high rate of freight. In- stead of interfering with the transportation on the ocean of ordinary merchandise, these mail steamers stimulated the foreign trade of the port by the facilities they offered for the transmission of orders and for the speedy conveyance of business men to and from Europe. So far as exports were concerned, it may be said that they took away next to nothing, and the goods they brought from England were of the most valuable kind. It was twelve or fifteen years after the first arrival of the Britannia in Boston harbor before the importance of the iron serew steamship in the Atlantic trade began to be understood.
The first ships advertised by Enoch Train & Company were the Dorchester, 500 tons; the Cairo, 600 tons; the Governor Davis, 800 tons; and the St. Petersburg, 800 tons, "all first-class. Medford-built, copper-fastened, coppered, and fast sailing ships." The Dorchester, Captain Callwell, sailed for Liverpool May 27, and was followed by the Ellen June 10, and the Cairo July 8. The first ship built expressly for the line was the Joshua Bates, and this was followed in rapid succession by the Anglo-Saxon, the Anglo-American, the Washington Irving, the Ocean Monarch, the Parliament, the Daniel Webster, the Star of Em- pire, the Chariot of Fame, the Staffordshire, the Cathedral, and the John Eliot Thayer. These were all fine vessels; some of them were very large for those days and very beautiful vessels. Through Mr. Train, Donald McKay was first brought into prominence as a ship- builder. Among the captains in this service, all men of ability and high character, were Caldwell, Murdock, Thayer, Brown, Howard, Richardson and Knowles. For a few years the business of the line in Liverpool was managed by Baring, Brothers & Company. Mr. Train then sent over his young partner, Mr. Frederick W. Thayer, and estab- lished a house there, to which the present house of Warren & Company is the successor.
The impulse given to the general trade and prosperity of Boston by the Cunard and Train lines, and by other facilities for transportation both by water and by land, was very great. The population of the city increased sixty-two per cent. from 1810 to 1850, and for the second time
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in its history, its taxable valuation doubled, advancing from $94, 580,- 600 in 1840, to $180,000,500 in 1850. The imports increased during the same period from about $14,000,000 to $28,659,733. At no time since have there been so many importing and jobbing houses, although a few houses now probably do a larger business than all of them did then. The coastwise shipping trade was also very large. The supplies of cot- ton for the mills of New England came by sea, and the products of the Southwest, such as provisions, lard, lead, ete. In return we shipped to the Southern ports domestic dry goods, boots and shoes, furniture and wooden ware, in large quantities. There were several fine lines of ships and barques to New Orleans and Mobile, lines of brigs to Savannah, Alexandria, Baltimore and Philadelphia, and lines of schooners to New York.
In 1851 the railways leading to the Canadas and the northern lakes were completed, and so high an estimate was placed upon the commer- cial value of this connection, that the State and the City joined with the business men of Boston in a celebration such as had never been wit- nessed before, and perhaps such as has not been seen since. In an official report published by the City it was said: " However extensive and brilliant may have been the public pageants on other occasions, not one, it is believed, has on this continent surpassed, if any have equaled, that of September 17, 18, and 19." The president of the United States, Millard Fillmore, with members of his cabinet, arrived on the morning of the first day. He was followed by Lord Elgin, governor-general of Canada, with his suite. All the large towns of British America were represented by their mayors and other officials, and the British army was represented by several distinguished officers then stationed in Canada. The publie festivities consisted of a military review on the Common, an excursion down the harbor, a military ball, and, on the third day, which was a general holiday, a procession, and a dinner on the Common, at which three thousand six hundred persons sat down, with fireworks in the evening.
Two enterprises were initiated in connection with "the railroad jubilee " as it was called; neither, unfortunately, brought anything but embarrassment to the public-spirited men who started them, but one of them exists as an integral and essential part of our railroad system to- day. The Grand Junction Railroad Company, chartered in 1847 with a capital of $1,200,000, formally opened its line, six and six-tenths iniles in length, which joined the Eastern, Boston and Maine, Fitch-
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burg, and Lowell Railroads, with the steamship wharves at East Bos- ton. No such facilities then existed at any other port. The directors of the company, whose names deserve to be perpetuated, were Samuel S. Lewis, David Henshaw, John W. Fenno, Charles Paine, of Vermont, and Ichabod Goodwin, of New Hampshire. Mr. Lewis was the Boston agent of the Cunard line from 1840 to 1854. Lewis street in East Boston and Lewis wharf were named for him.
The Ocean Steamship Company of New England was the other en- terprise to be ushered into publie notice amid the festivities of which we have spoken. Its purpose was to build four steamships, to be called after well-known Boston merchants, and its first and only vessel, the S. S. Lewis, Captain Cole, a propeller of 1, 101 tons register, built in Phil- adelphia, arrived in the harbor on the 14th of September, after a run of forty-seven hours from Delaware breakwater. She had a large party on board, including two or three members of the Vander- bilt family, and resolutions were adopted speaking in terms of praise of her accommodations and performances. She sailed for Liver- pool October 4, with forty-five cabin and twenty steerage passengers, but, we believe, she never made a second voyage in this service. The projectors of the undertaking, Harnden & Company, the pioneers in the express business in the United States, were brought to bankruptcy during the autumn.
The serew propeller, as adapted to the requirements of the Atlantic trade, had not yet passed beyond the experimental stage. Captain Forbes built the MMassachusetts in 1845, a propeller of about seven hundred and seventy tons, and, in the autumn of that year, with his relative, Colonel Perkins, took passage in her from New York to Liverpool; but she was only what was called an "auxiliary " steamship, as on her out- ward passage she sailed under canvas six or seven days out of the sev- enteen. ller engines were designed by Ericsson. Mr. William Inman, of Liverpool, was the first, not only to foresee the possibilities of the iron serew steamer, but also to realize them in actual service; and when the S. S. Lewis was building, he was taking the initial steps towards the establishment of the steamship line which in a few years held such a leading position in the transatlantic trade. A year or two later the Cunard Company built the Alps, the Andes, the Jura and the Etna, iron propellers varying from eighteen hundred to twenty-two hundred tons, which brought large cargoes to Boston. It was not until 1862 that the company brought out its first serew steamer for the mail and pas-
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senger service,-the China, a fine ship of about twenty-six hundred tons register. Her first trips were made to New York, but later she was placed on the Boston route.
Boston participated largely in the commercial activity created by the discovery of gold in California and Australia while it lasted. The clear- ances at this port for those countries were: In 1852, 98; in 1853, 149; in 1854, 59; in 1855, 16; in 1856, 54; in 1857, 42. Forty-four vessels were built in and about Boston in the year 1855, with a tonnage amount- ing to 45,988; and twenty-two more, of 24,842 tons, were on the stocks at the close of the year. The tonnage owned in Boston in 1855 was larger than ever before or since-541, 644 tons.
In 1854 the merchants of Boston organized again for the purpose of considering, and, by concerted action, promoting measures for the ben- fit of the city. This time they formed a Board of Trade; its objects and methods were similar to those of the Chamber of Commerce of 1836, but it was much more active and aggressive, and it made its influence felt far and near. It issued a series of annual reports which contain much information relating to the trade and commerce both of Boston and of the country at large. The first president was Samuel Lawrence, and he was succeeded by James M. Beebe, George B. Upton, Edward S. Tobey, James C. Converse, George C. Richardson, and others. Its secretaries from 1854 to 1843 were Isaac Chapman Bates, Lorenzo Sabine, and the writer of these pages. After this the Board merged itself in the Merchants' Exchange and a few years afterward ceased to exist. The rooms on the corner of Bedford and Chauncey streets, occu- pied by the Board from 1865 to 1843, are now occupied by the Mer- chants' Association, which, in many of its functions, may be regarded as having succeeded to the work of the Board.
The Boston Corn Exchange was formed in 1855 for the purpose of regulating and promoting dealings in breadstuffs. Its first president was Alpheus Hardy, a merchant in the Mediterranean trade, and a large exporter of flour. In 1871, for the purpose of broadening its sphere and of bringing to its membership other branches of business, partien- larly the provision, fish, and salt interests, the organization changed its name to the Boston Commercial Exchange. In 1885 it consolidated with the Boston Produce Exchange (incorporated in 1827) under the name of the Boston Chamber of Commerce, and, as such, it now repre- sents the general commercial interests of the city. On the 21st of Jan- mary, 1892, the Chamber dedicated a beautiful building for its uses, erected by the enterprise and liberality of the membership.
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In the spring of 1855 the Legislature of Massachusetts incorporated Donald MeKay, George B. Upton, Enoch Train, Andrew T. Hall, and James M. Beche, under the name of the Boston and European Steam- ship Company, with a capital of $500,000, " for the purpose of navigat- ing the ocean by steam." The plan was to build "a splendid line of Atlantic steamers rivaling in every respect the Collins line of New York," and Milford Haven was thought of as the terminal port in Great Britain. It was felt that there should be an American line of steamers at this port, under full control here. The Cunard steamers had been temporarily withdrawn from the New York service, the company hav- ing chartered several of its ships to the British Government for its use in connection with the Crimean War; and there was a rumor that the Boston steamers were to be withdrawn also, but this was contradicted by the agent, Mr. Lewis, in a note to the newspapers dated May 15. A public meeting was held on the Exchange, in the interest of the pro- posed line, July 12. Mr. George B. Upton presided, Robert B. Forbes, James M. Beebe, Charles G. Greene and Edward S. Tobey were chosen vice-presidents, and Vernon Brown and Henry N. Hooper, secretaries. Stirring speeches were made by George R. Sampson, Elias II. Derby, Enoch Train, and others. Mr. Sampson referred to the Canadian tran- sit trade, of which we shall speak presently, which, he said, had grown from $24,000 in 1849 to $5, 424,000 in 1854, and which, at certain sea- sons of the year, furnished half the lading of the Cunard steamers on their passage to the westward. Mr. Train said: "It had been thought that he would oppose the line as antagonistic to his own. He should do no such thing. There is a vast difference between steam and sail- ing vessels, and steam would not interfere with his regular business- the transportation of coarse and weighty commodities and passengers who could not afford the luxury of a steam passage. He would, in- stead of opposing the proposed line, lend it the strength of his right arm. Boston, though the principal commercial city of New England, had never yet owned a proper, hard-weather, sea-going steamship. Our capitalists have done much in building up manufacturing towns. flere was another enterprise that demanded their consideration. "
Mr. Derby, in addressing the meeting, predicted that steam would at no distant day supersede canvas in the commerce of the world. Mr Mckay exhibited a model of the pioneer steamer of the proposed line: it was to be called the Cradle of Liberty, and was to cross the Atlantic in six days. A series of resolutions was adopted, and, on the nomina-
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tion of a committee of three, a large committee to solicit subscriptions was chosen, consisting of the following business men : Robert B. Forbes, George B. Upton, Enoch Train, George Baty Blake, Samuel Hooper, William H. Bordman, William Perkins, Isaac Rich, Andrew T. Hall, James M. Beebe, Francis Skinner, William F. Weld, James Lawrence, James Sturgis, J. Bowdoin Bradles, George R. Sampson, Nathaniel 11. Emmons, William B. Bacon, William Amory, G. Howland Shaw, John H. Pearson, William T. Glidden, William B. Reynolds, Hamilton A. Hill, Charles Bockus, Adam W. Thaxter, jr., Ammi C. Lombard, Don- ald MeKay, Frederic W. Thayer, William Bramhall, Edward S. Tobey, Ezra H. Baker, Israel Whitney, Edward D) Brigham, William S. Bul- lard, Vernon Brown. The following were afterward added to the committee, the first three being presidents of insurance companies : Thomas C. Smith, Joseph H. Adams, Charles W. Cartwright, David Snow, Thomas Nickerson, Isaac Taylor. Here the matter ended, and we can now see that it was well that it went no further. Great changes in ocean steam navigation were imminent; and the Col- lins line, on which the new line was to be modeled, was even then seri- ously embarrassed, and went into bankruptcy a year later. Mr. Train also, not long after this, became seriously involved, and a new firm. Thayer & Warren, undertook to build upon the foundations which he had laid with so much ability and foresight.
In connection with the tariff of 1846 Mr. Robert J. Walker, secretary of the treasury, established the present warehouse system, copied in most of its details from that which had proved so beneficial to the for- eign commerce of Great Britain and France. Under this system mer- chandise might be carried under bond and scal in transitu through the territory of the United States between Great Britain and the Canadas; and on the completion of the Northern New England Railroads Boston became the most eligible port for this transit trade. In the year 1851 the invoice cost of the merchandise arriving here from Europe for Can- ada was about six hundred thousand dollars; in 1852, two millions; and in the years 1853 to 1856, about five millions annually. After 1852 this trade was largely diverted to Portland under an arrangement by which the Allan Steamship Company and the Grand Trunk Railway Company issued through bills of lading from Liverpool to all parts of British North America. The commercial relations of Boston with its provin- cial neighbors were most intimate and satisfactory at this time, under the operation of the Reciprocity Treaty of 1854, the product of the
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labors after long years of negotiation of such statesmen as Mr. Webster and Mr. Marey, Sir Henry Bulwer and Lord Elgin. The following estimate of this treaty is from the pen of Mr. Sabine, who was one of the best authorities of that day on all questions bearing upon our trade with the Canadas and the fisheries:
"At the dismemberment of the British Empire, in 1983, it was proposed to allow the United States to participate in the trade of the remaining colonies in this hemisphere, on terms of equality with the mother country ; but the English merchants, who enjoyed that trade in monopoly, were alarmed, and defeated the measure. Two years after, our first minister at the Court of St. James was instructed to renew the proposition, and was curtly answered that it could not be admitted even as a subject of negotiation. A third effort was made in 1989, with no better success; and, from that period down to the year 1822, the colonial ports were fast closed against our flag save under certain de- fined restrictions. Retaliation on our part followed from time to time, and, in the end, the legislation both of Parliament and Congress became utterly barbarous. If wiser counsels occasionally prevailed, or were about to prevail, the controversies which arose between the two govern- ments as to the intent of the laws passed by the one er the other, in the spirit of concession, became so bitter, finally, as to produce re- straints greater than ever before. Nor was it until the ' MeLane Ar- rangement,' so called, in 1830, that any change of moment occurred, or that a direct and free intercourse was permanently allowed. In the twenty-four years that followed the ' Arrangement,' the increase of the colonies in commerce, navigation, wealth, and happiness, was very considerable The Reciprocity Treaty is the crowning measure of the wise and humane policy adopted in 1830. Ilow marked the change ! In place of alienation and hatred, of ports barred and bolted, the people of the colonies and the United States, joined in bonds of amity deal with one another at will; exchange without customs even, 'the wealth of the seas,' and the principal raw staples of the soil; mingle, as if of the same nation, on all the sea fishing grounds; and, as if of the same na- tion too, use the St. Lawrence, and the canals which connect it with the most distant of the great lakes."
To the great damage of New England, this treaty was abrogated in 1 865 by the action of the government of the United States, for political reasons chiefly.
The Calcutta trade of Boston reached the point of its greatest devel- opment in the years 1856 to 1859 inclusive. We have seen that in the
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year 1800 twelve vessels were loaded at Calcutta in one season for the United States, with cargoes valued altogether at about $2,400, 000. These cargoes consisted chiefly of cotton and silk manufactures. In 1840 twenty-one vessels arrived with Calcutta cargoes, amounting in quantity to seventeen thousand tons, and in value (first cost and freight money, ) to $1,250,000. The tonnage had increased but the value had been reduced by one-half, owing to the change in the character of the goods imported. The trade steadily increased until, in 1857, one hun- dred and twenty-two ships were loaded at Calcutta for the United States, carrying 189,267 tons, valued at $17,000,000. Of this tonnage more than seventy-five per cent. came to Boston, and the freight money earned on it was estimated at two million dollars. The arrivals in Bos- ton for the four years mentioned above were: 1856, 48 ships, 110,113 tons; 1852, 96 ships, 147, 131 tons; 1858, 59 ships, 86,013 tons; 1859, 81 ships, 141, 825 tons. From and after 1859 New York began to gain upon Boston; but it was not until 1867 that the tons imported at the former city actually exceeded the importation here.
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