User:Geoff3Cae/sandbox

Formation
The Lamport & Holt Line was a British cargo shipping company formed in 1845, and in operation until 1936, after which it was sold to, and became a subsidiary of, Blue Star Line.

The company was established as a partnership between William James Lamport from Workington, England, and George Holt, son of George Holt, Sr. and brother of Alfred Holt.

Initially the partnership owned wooden sailing vessels trading with North and South America, South Africa and India, the first of which was the 335-ton barque Christabel. Later, in 1861-62, two 1,300-GRT tramp steamers were acquired.

The company initially traded to India, South Africa, and the West Coast of South America in particular the River Plate.

Trade
Lamport & Holt carried mail for the British and Belgian governments, operated a coastal passenger service for the Brazilian Government and carried frozen meat and coffee. The firm became a public company in 1911, but Sir Owen Crosby Philipps was negotiating to acquire the company. In 1910, Philipps had taken over Elder Dempster Lines to add to his existing control of Royal Mail Steam Packet Company. The Lamport and Holt families accepted shares in these two companies in exchange for their shares in Lamport & Holt Ltd. The company moved first to Drury Building, in Water Street, Liverpool, and later to the Royal Liver Building in 1912.

In 1857 the company acquired their very first steamship and at that time the Liverpool, Brazil and River Plate Steam Navigation Company was formed in 1865 to operate services to the East coast of South America.

However, by the early 1900s Lamport and Holt and the newly formed Liverpool, Brazil and River Plate Steam Navigation Company concentrated greatly on the South America service out of New York. They became known as being one of the pioneers in the transporting of frozen meat, but also operating in the coffee trade to New York.

In 1902 a New York to South America passenger service was started with two second-hand ships and proved so successful that large new luxury liners were ordered. In 1910, three further vessels (of over 10,000 tons) built to a similar standard, were ordered for the Liverpool route. This stimulated its largest rival (Royal Mail) to take it over in 1911.

Liverpool, Brazil and River Plate Steam Navigation Co., Ltd
It was successfully started in 1865 to run cargo, mail and passenger services from Liverpool, London, Antwerp and Glasgow. In 1869 it pioneered the Brazil - New York coffee trade. In 1874 no less than 12 new ships had been delivered or were under construction; the firm became a limited company and a Belgian subsidiary was created.

In the late 1860s they took over the Irish shipping company Malcomson Line acquiring the following vessels in the process, Galileo, Herschel, Newton, Ptolemy, Tycho Brahe, Hipparchus.

On the death of Mr. Lamport in 1874 Mr. Holt was joined in the business by Mr. Walter Holland and Mr. Charles W. Jones, the former being a fellow-apprentice of Mr. Holt, whilst the latter served his apprenticeship with Lamport & Holt. Later these two Partners were joined by Mr. George H. Melly a nephew of Mr. Holt, Mr. Arthur Cook, and later by Mr. C. Sydney Jones, a son of Mr. Charles W Jones. Mr. Holt died in 1896.

Sailings were extended to Valparaíso, Chile in the 1880s, but then later abandoned in 1896, frozen meat was transported from the River Plate region in 1886 and in 1898 five large (5,555 ton) purpose-built ships were ordered.

In 1902 they began their first genuine passenger and cargo services from New York to Brazil and the River Plate ports. In order to operate this service, L+H had obtained a fine pair of 3,909 GRT (Gross Registered Tons) clipper-bowed ships that were built for Furness Withy.

The Tennyson was built by Alexander Stevens & Sons Ltd, Glasgow for Furness, Withy & Co. Ltd in 1900 as the Evangeline and the Byron followed in 1901 as the Loyalist. These ships were due to operate on the Liverpool to Halifax, St. John and New Brunswick service, however, Withy & Co found that these ships were simply too large for their intended service, as well as occupying too much passenger space. Thus they were sold to Lamport & Holt who would use them for their New York to Brazil and River Plate services.

This operation proved to be extremely successful, so much so that it was soon decided to lay down new plans for three larger ships of around 7,500 GRT, these ships would soon become known as the three famed V-Class Passenger-Cargo Liners.

However, the SS Tennyson and SS Byron continued to sail on, as well as both ships having been taken over in 1914 (HMS Tennyson), and 1915 (HMS Byron) by the Admiralty to be operated as a Convoy Commodore Ship during World War I.

After the war they returned to their regular duties, but both were sold in 1922 to ''Soc. Anon Braun & Blanchard of Chile and the Tennyson was renamed, Valparaiso'' and she was broken up ten years later in Italy in 1932. The Byron was also sold to the same company at the same time and she was renamed Santiago and was also broken up in Italy in 1932.

Société de Nav. Royale Belge Sud-Americaine
Formed in 1877 the Belgian flagged subsidiary company was started to operate the Belgian Mail contract to South America.

Argentine Steam Lighter Co
Formed in 1884, the company was based in Buenos Aires to run a fleet of feeder ships in the River Plate.

First World War
At the start of WW1 the fleet stood at 36 vessels of 199,000 grt. During the war 10 ships were lost, but 8 were delivered. Following the war, it reverted to cargo (especially frozen meat) as its staple trade except for the New York passenger trade. A major post-war expansion programme was undertaken and the fleet reached a peak of 50 ships of 322,857 in 1923, including two new passenger liners.

Company Collapse
Sir Owen Philipps became Lord Kylsant and continued to recklessly expand the Royal Mail group, raising larger and larger loans, until he was borrowing money against fictitious profits to pay the interest and instalments due on existing loans. In these parlous days Lamport & Holt suffered the tragedy of the loss of its liner Vestris. She is the only large passenger liner (over 10,000 grt) to ever founder in heavy seas. She went down on 12 November 1928, two days out of New York, with the loss of 112 lives. This caused uproar in the American press and the passenger service was suspended.

In 1929 Royal Mail Line defaulted, for the second time, on payment of an instalment due on a large Government loan and the Treasury set up an inquiry to investigate the affairs of the giant shipping and shipbuilding group. In 1930 Trustees were appointed to untangle those companies that could be saved from the collapse. Lord Kylsant was charged with fraud and imprisoned in 1931.

Lamport & Holt was placed in the hands of a Receiver who set about the task of stabilising the company’s finances. Ships were laid up on a rota basis, while the 41 vessel fleet was reduced to a more practical size. Shares in an Argentinean shipping company and 7 ships were sold in 1930; 3 in 1931; 4 in 1932; 4 in 1933 and finally 2 in 1934. In 1934 the restructured company was sold to new investors as Lamport & Holt Line Ltd.

At the start of WW2 the fleet stood at 21 ships of 141,003, with a further two fitting out.

After many losses due to enemy action during the WW2, the company was taken over by the Vestey Group in 1944, which included Blue Star Line, Frederick Leyland & Co. At the end of the war the fleet was down to 9 ships. In 1946, Vestey also bought Booth Line

The post war integration of the operations of these two shipping companies with Vestey’s Blue Star Line, led to considerable number of fleet changes. In 1959 Lamport & Holt owned 19 ships, but from that point the fleet numbers steadily reduced.

From 1947 many inter-company transfers of ships and temporary renamings took place, plus the formations of several groupings of companies. It survived as a separate company until 1974. In 1991 the last Lamport & Holt ship, MV Churchill transferred to Blue Star and became the Argentina Star, and the name of Lamport & Holt disappeared.

Merseyside Maritime Museum
The museum holds models of Titan (1902), Verdi (1907), Vauban (1912) and Delius (1937).