THE WAY THEY HAD IN THE COMPANY’S SERVICE
In order that the East Indiamen might be able to make themselves known
on the high seas to the British men-of-war, a special code of signals
was accustomed to be arranged by the Admiralty for the former. This was
for use during war-time, so that the Company’s vessels on meeting with
other craft might know at a distance whether these were the friends who
would convoy them or the enemy who would assail them. Some time during
the autumn, during these eighteenth-century wars when England always
seemed to be engaged in hostilities, the custom was for the Admiralty
to appoint a fresh code so that the naval and the Company’s ships might
know each other. This code was then sent sealed to the Secret Committee
of the East India Company, and handed over to the latter’s commanding
officers. Similarly special signals were arranged so that when calling
at St Helena the Governor of that island might be able to recognise the
homeward-bound East Indiamen.
The following document, dated 5th November 1733, from the Admiralty
will give some idea of the nature of these signals:—
“Signals to be observed by the East India Company’s ships in their
next homeward-bound passage upon their meeting with any ships near
the Channell or else where which they may supose to be the King’s
Ships, the better to know.
“The Company’s ships whether to Windward or to Leeward, shall make
a Signal by hailing up their Foresail, and lowering down the Main
Top Sail, and spreading an English Ensign, the Cross down-ward,
from the main Top Mast head down the Shrouds; and They shall be
answered by the King’s ships by lowering down their Fore top sail,
and spreading an Ensign, in the same manner, from their Fore
topmast head downward, hailing up their Main Sail, and hoysting
their Mizen top sail, with the Clue lines hail’d up.
“In the case of Blowing weather that the Top Sails are in, the
other Signals will be sufficient.
“Signals by Night.
“The Company’s Ships shall make a Signal by hoysting three Lights
one over another on the Ensign Staff, and One at the Bolt sprit end.
“The King’s ships will answer by shewing three Lights of equal
height, One of ‘em in the Fore, One in the Main, and One in the
Mizen shrouds.”
And in order to know any of his Majesty’s ships when encountered in
the East Indian waters the signal was to be as follows:—The ship to
windward was to hoist an English Jack at the fore t’gallant masthead,
and the ship to leeward was to answer by furling the mizen topsail and
hoisting a French Jack at the mizen topmasthead.
The Company had their own agent at Deal, and considering the number of
days that were spent by the East Indiamen in the Downs, both outward
and homeward bound, his presence was very necessary. The ships were
taken down the Thames by the Company’s own pilots, and this corporation
owned its own pilot-cutter, which was a 60-ton craft with a master and
six men, her cruising ground being between Gravesend and the Downs.
However, even then, the Company’s ships were by no means immune from
getting ashore, although it ought to be mentioned that by the middle
of the eighteenth century a really good chart of the Thames estuary
did not exist, and the exact nature of some of the numerous shoals was
unknown. It is not surprising, therefore, to find casualties occurring
as these big ships went up and down the London river. For instance,
in March 1734 the East Indiaman _Derby_, outward bound in charge of a
“Pylot,” ran aground “on the Mouse Sand below the Nore.” (This shoal is
a few miles to the east of Southend pier.) She sustained so much damage
that she had to put into Sheerness for dry-docking and repairs.
So also, a few days before Christmas in the year 1736, the East
Indiaman _Lyell_ “by the Unskilfulness of the Pilote has been Onshore
on the Spaniard Sand,[D] in going down for the Downs.” So she also had
to use Sheerness dock for repairs. Captain John Acton, the commander
of the _Lyell_, in his report stated that the “Pylots” pretended not
to have seen the “Buoy of the Spill,” and “borrowing too near on the
Kentish Shore, he run us aground on the Spaniard at High Water, the
wind blowing fresh N.W.” The “Spill,” or, as it is now called, the
“Spile” buoy, marks the western end of the Spile Sand. The pilots had
clearly got out of their course, for these East Indiamen, drawing as
they did 20 feet of water, would never have taken the inner passage
along the Kentish shore known as the Four Fathoms Channel. They should
have left the Spile buoy to starboard and not to port, as clearly was
the case in the present instance among the shoals. The north-west was
a fair wind from the Thames to the Downs all the way, so that no one
except by accident would have chosen to take such a ship so far out of
the main, deep-water channel.
The ship was hard and fast on the Spaniard, and the conditions could
scarcely have been worse—a fresh onshore wind, and the accident
occurring at top of high water. All night the ship lay on the shoal
bumping and injuring herself so that there were soon seven feet of
water in the hold, and the pumps could not cope with it. But on the
morning of Christmas Eve by a great piece of luck the ship was got
off, for the wind veered to the north and sent in a bigger tide, as of
course it would, and a local fisherman—doubtless from Whitstable or the
East Swale—came and assisted with his local knowledge so that “thank
God the ship floated and we got her off here.” Making a fair wind of it
the _Lyell_ then ran into the East Swale and anchored off Faversham.
And a very handsome sight she must have looked lying to her hempen
cable in that winding river.
One bleak day in January 1737 the East Indiaman _Nassau_ had the
misfortune to run on the south end of the Galloper in a “hard gale at
SW,” as her captain reported. The Galloper is a treacherous bank in
the North Sea off Harwich, and many a ship used to get picked up here
in the olden days. The _Nassau_ was now in a critical position, and
every moment those on board expected her to go to pieces: “but,” wrote
her skipper, “by the Providence of the Almighty in about an Hours time
we forc’d her off again with her head sails, but had the misfortune
at the same time of losing our Rudder, Main and Mizen Top Mast which
obliged us soon after to come to an anchor.” But here again, just as
had been the case with the _Lyell_, local assistance came to them.
For after a time the Harwich packet passed them bound for Holland,
and her captain, seeing the _Nassau_, hailed her skipper and advised
her to stand in for Orfordness, and even sent on board his mate, as
he knew every inch of that coast. However, the wind now veered to the
north-north-west, which made it fair for running down the North Sea,
so the _Nassau_ sailed down towards the North Foreland and anchored in
Margate Roads, whence her captain was able to send information to the
East India Company, where also he would wait for orders.
Another peril which these East Indiamen had to remember was the
presence of pirates. These consisted not merely of local Eastern
craft, but of such people as Captains Avery and Kidd, two of the most
notorious men in the whole history of piracy. In the early part of the
eighteenth century the latter were found in many parts of the Indian
Ocean. Madagascar was a favourite base for these rovers, but they
would be found off Mauritius, or at the mouth of the Red Sea awaiting
the East Indiamen returning from Mocha and Jeddah. Not content with
this, these European pirates would hang about off the Malabar coast,
and the East India Company’s ships suffered considerably, and feared
a repetition of these attacks. And yet, when we consider the matter
dispassionately, were Avery, Kidd and his fellow-pirates very much
worse than some of those captains who first took the English ships out
to the Orient, who thought it no wrong but a mere matter of business
to stop a Portuguese ship and relieve her of her cargo just as these
eighteenth-century pirates would assail the ships of the present
monopolists of the Eastern trade? The only difference that seems
obvious is that Lancaster and those other early captains were acting on
behalf of a powerful corporation having a charter from the sovereign:
whereas Avery, Kidd and the like were acting on their own and were
outlaws. And even this cannot be pushed too far, seeing that at one
time of his career Kidd received a commission from William III. to go
forth and, as “a private man-of-war,” capture other notorious “pirates,
free-booters and sea-rovers,” on the old principle of setting a thief
to catch a thief.
Sometimes these East Indiamen were taken for the enemy even by English
men-of-war. You will remember the famous voyage of Lord Anson round
the world in the years 1740-1744. One day whilst they were in the
South Atlantic they saw a sail to the north-west, and the squadron
began to exchange signals with each other and to give chase “and half
an hour after we let out our reefs and chased with the squadron ...
but at seven in the evening, finding we did not near the chace ...
we shortened sail, and made a signal for the cruisers to join the
squadron. The next day but one we again discovered a sail, which on
nearer approach we judged to be the same vessel. We chased her the
whole day, and though we rather gained upon her, yet night came on
before we could overtake her, which obliged us to give over the chace,
to collect our scattered squadron. We were much chagrined at the escape
of this vessel, as we then apprehended her to be an advice-boat sent
from Old Spain to Buenos Ayres with notice of our expedition. But we
have since learnt that we were deceived in this conjecture, and that
it was our East India Company’s packet bound to St Helena.” This is
certainly a fair proof of the sailing qualities of the Company’s ships,
seeing that not even the English cruisers could overhaul the merchant
ship.
At this time the chief cargoes which these East Indiamen took out to
the East still included those woollen goods which had been sent ever
since the foundation of the first Company, and they continued to bring
back saltpetre, but now tea was becoming a much more important cargo.
But in addition to that tea which came home in the Company’s ships and
paid custom duty, there was a vast amount brought in by smugglers. And
one argument used to be that this had to be, because the East Indiamen
brought back chiefly the better, higher priced kind, compelling the
dealers to send to Holland for the cheaper variety.
The East Indiamen’s captains were not above engaging in the smuggling
industry, at any rate as aiders and abettors. One of the methods was
to wait until the ship arrived in the Downs. Men would come out from
the Deal beach in their luggers and then take ashore quantities of
tea secreted about their person. This was the reason why the Revenue
cruisers were told to keep an especial watch on the Company’s ships
when homeward bound, because of “the illicit practices that are
continually attempted to be committed by them.” So notorious indeed and
so ingenious were the methods to land goods without previously paying
duty, that the Revenue cutters were ordered to follow these bigger
ships all the way up Channel, keeping as close to them as possible
as long as they were under sail, and when the East Indiaman came to
anchor, the cutter was to bring up as near as possible to her. This
was to prevent goods (such as silk and tea) being dropped through the
ship’s ports into a friendly boat that had come out from the beach, a
practice that was by no means unknown on board these merchant craft
home from the Orient.
Just as there was serious friction sometimes between the Revenue
cutters and the ships of his Majesty’s navy concerning the wearing of
pendants, so these incidents were not unknown to happen to the ships
of the Honourable East India Company. As an instance, Captain Balchen,
R.N., during the year 1726 wrote to the latter complaining that one of
their ships had hoisted a broad red pendant at the main topmast head.
There was certainly no possible defence, and the Company were compelled
to reply that they were “entire strangers” to the complaint, and
would give directions to prevent this occurring again. But otherwise
these East Indiamen were treated with far more respect than any other
merchant ships. No finer ships other than men-of-war sailed the seas.
On arriving at their port in India they were always saluted, and their
captains ranked as Members of Council, being saluted with thirteen
guns when they landed, and the guard turning out when they entered
or left the fort. No one, in fact, other than officers of the Royal
Navy received such respect. Under the captain were from four to eight
officers in the bigger ships, who all wore uniforms, the duties on
board being carried on with just the same discipline as in a man-of-war.
Some of the Company’s servants were making handsome profits even when
the Company itself was doing badly. Eastwick mentions the name of a
purser who had such nice little perquisites out of his office that he
left the service and became owner of a ship which traded between London
and Calcutta. She was a ship of no mean size, for she carried thirty
cabin passengers and 300 lascars, together with a large mixed cargo
of the value of £13,000. And you may judge of the profits from the
passenger source alone when it is stated that one of these cabins cost
four hundred guineas for the voyage. The affairs of the Company had
for some years been in a rather bad way. Instead of being able to pay
to the Government the stipulated sum of £400,000 a year, the directors
were actually compelled to ask the Government for a loan of £1,000,000.
This was in the year 1772. The affairs of the Company were brought
before Parliament, and a Committee exposed a series of intrigues and
crime. It was to remedy this rotten condition of things that in June of
1773 two Bills were introduced, of which one authorised the loan just
mentioned, and the other, celebrated as the India Act, effected most
important changes in the Company’s constitution and its relations to
India. A Governor-General was appointed to reside in Bengal, to which
the other presidencies were to be made subordinate. A supreme court
of judicature was inaugurated at Calcutta. The salary of the Governor
was to be £25,000 a year, and that of the Council members at £10,000
each, the chief judge receiving £8000 a year. From this time forth the
Company’s affairs were brought under the control of the Crown, all the
departments were reorganised, and all the territorial correspondence
had to be laid before the British Ministry.
It was certainly high time that the Company’s affairs were taken in
hand. Our present inquiry is concerned only with its merchant shipping,
so we may confine ourselves strictly thereto. Had it not been for the
wonderfully popular taste which the United Kingdom had now shown for
tea, the Company’s ships would have been compelled to cease trading
with the East. When, in 1773, the Company’s charter was once more
renewed, a grant was made of a monopoly also to China. From about the
middle of the eighteenth century, however, the Company had become more
of a military than a trading concern, yet the latter was anything but
insignificant. Enormous tracts of land had been obtained in India. The
governments of the native princes were corrupt, and the East India
Company was strong. The British Government was some thousands of miles
across the sea, so gradually but surely, without much interference, the
Company had obtained a strong grip on the natives. From that followed
extortion, and when the Company’s servants returned home they came with
fortunes, even though the Company itself was doing badly.
In the year 1772 the East India Company were employing fifty-five ships
abroad, aggregating 39,836 tons. At home they owned, and there were
being built for its service thirty ships of an aggregate of 22,000
tons. In 1784 the number of its ships at home and abroad was sixty-six.
The chief object of the inquiry into the Company’s trade with the East
by the Committee just alluded to was apparently to see if the ships
could be built and run more cheaply than under the present method of
chartering. It was seen from the evidence of Sir Richard Hotham that
the existing method of freighting the Company’s ships could be improved
upon to effect greater economy, for whereas the Company were paying in
the year 1772 as much as £32 a ton for the carriage of fine goods, this
expert witness expressed himself as willing to bring goods from any
part of the East at £21 a ton.
The result of this inquiry was that important changes had to be made.
The Company began to put its shipping business into proper condition.
The Company decided to build for its own use a number of bigger ships
than they had been wont to use, and thus those wonderful East Indiamen,
for which the eighteenth century will ever be famous, came into being.
They were of 1200 to 1400 nominal tons, though their real measurement
was greater than this. Such ships began to be built about the year
1781, though in earlier days, as the reader is aware, the ships had
recently averaged between 400 and 500 tons, not exceeding the latter
figure. The new type, of course, did not entirely drive the smaller
ones straight off the sea, but the two classes existed side by side.
We alluded just now to the terrible national evil of smuggling. This
vice had reached amazing limits during the eighteenth century, and the
country was in such a state of alarm, and honest traders complained
so bitterly of the disastrous effects on their prosperity, that in
the year 1745 a beginning was made of an inquiry by a Parliamentary
Committee into the causes of smuggling and the most effectual methods
to stop it. We have seen that tea, because of its recent popularity,
was especially an article beloved by these smugglers. We need not enter
further into this inquiry, but evidence showed that one of the best
means of ending this illicit trade would be to reduce the duties, thus
not making it worth while for the illicit trader to carry on his work.
Now when Pitt did reduce the duties on various Indian productions, but
especially on tea, it was found that a complete change was made in the
demand for this commodity. Many thousand more pounds’ weight were now
required, the sales were trebled, and thus there was a much greater
shipping business. The export trade to China now began to be most
important also, and the Company was prospering.
But before we proceed any further we must just see the conditions which
were in existence up to 1773 in regard to the method of chartering
ships by the Company from the owners. It was agreed that these hired
ships were to be surveyed by the Company whenever the latter desired,
and it is typical of the times that the proviso had to be inserted that
the Company’s surveyors “are to be civilly treated.” In order that the
ship might be efficiently armed, the commander and owners were liable
to a fine of £40 for each gun that was wanting. If any of the guns
were sold, the owners and commander were to be fined £100 for each gun,
and the commander to be dismissed the Company’s service. The commander
was also to obey the Company’s orders during the voyage, as well as
their agents and factors. In order to encourage the seamen, the Company
agreed to reward them when the ship returned to the Thames from the
East Indies at the end of the voyage—that is to say, if they had been
able to prevent any wilful damage to the Company’s property, or save
them from being lost, a reward suitable for the benefit was to be made.
If a seaman were to lose his life in defending the ship, his next of
kin was to receive £30. If he lost a limb, he himself was to have the
same sum. If he received minor wounds he was to be given some smaller
monetary reward and to be “cured of his wounds” at the Company’s
expense.
The Company expressly forbade these hired ships from calling at places
other than those which it ordered, or to take any foreign coin or
bullion, goods or provisions at any place short of her consigned port.
The cargo was to be disposed in the best manner to prevent damage, and
so that the working of the ship and her efficient defence would not be
interfered with. Pepper was not to be shot loose between decks or the
freight would not be paid for. If the ship should touch at St Helena
or the island of Ascension she was not to sail without the permission
of the Governor and Council. Nor was she to touch at Barbadoes, or any
American port, or any of the western islands, or even Plymouth, without
orders or some unavoidable danger of the sea, under a penalty of £500.
The commander, chief and second mates were to keep journals of the
ship’s daily proceedings, from the time when she first took in cargo
in the River Thames to the time of her return and discharge of her
cargo in England. Wind, weather, and all the remarkable transactions,
accidents and occurrences during the voyage were to be noted in these
journals, as also of everything received into the ship. These journals
were to be delivered up to the Company afterwards, on oath, if required.
No unlicensed goods were to be carried in the ship nor any passengers
to be taken without permission. The ship was to have her full
complement of men during the voyage, and none of these crews was
to be furnished by the master or officers with money, liquor, or
provisions beyond the value of one-third of what the wages of such
seamen should amount to at that particular time. The paymaster (who was
appointed by the Company and owners jointly) was to pay the seamen’s
wives one month’s wages in six. The commander was to have the use of
the ship’s great cabin, unless it were required for the Company’s
servants voyaging out or home. It was the duty of the part-owners
or the master to send in the ship always the sum of £500 in foreign
coins or bullion for use in the case of extraordinary expenses during
the voyage. The commander was also to be supplied with £200 a month
for paying wages and provisions while in India or China. And whenever
lascars were hired, the Company were to pay for their hire. We shall
refer to the subject of these lascars again presently, but we may now
go on to witness the development of the Company’s shipping after the
inauguration of those reforms at which we hinted just now.
FOOTNOTE:
[D] The Spaniard is a treacherous patch off the north-east corner of
the Isle of Sheppey.