Maritime Service
The East India Company Maritime Services could be divided into three main categories:
- EIC Mercantile Marine. The Mercantile Marine was the principal merchant shipping service supporting the company's trade with India and the Far East. It was in operation from 1600 to 1834.
- Bombay Marine. The Bombay Marine was the fighting navy of the EIC. In the later nineteenth century and twentieth century it was renamed several times, ultimately becoming the Royal Indian Navy in 1935.
- Bengal Pilot Service. The Bengal Pilot Service was responsible for guiding shipping between along the Hooghly River between Calcutta and the Bay of Bengal.
FIBIS Resources
Wrecked or Captured, the East India Company Ships that Failed to Arrive
A fascinating talk given by Andrea Cordani, writer and researcher on East India Company Ships, at FIBIS's Spring lecture meeting in May 2009, is available to download or listen to on the podcast page. The presentation that accompanied this talk and a book list for further reading can be found in the Members area of the FIBIS website at Members Area-Presentations.
An edited edition of this talk is available in FIBIS Journal, No 22 (Autumn 2009), page 15.
FIBIS Journal, No 22 also contains an article "The Loss of an East Indiaman in 1807 : account by Samuel Rolleston" on page 23.
- For details of how to access these articles, see FIBIS Journals.
Books
Also see Ships and sailing reading list
A biographical index of East India Company Maritime Service officers, 1600-1834, by Anthony Farrington London: British Library, 1999
A companion volume to the "Catalogue", see below, the biographical index provides summaries of the sea careers of some 12,000 individuals who made the voyage to Asia as commanders, mates, surgeons, or pursers in the service of the EIC. The information has been compiled from the surviving ships' journals, logs, paying-off books and associated sources in the Company's archives at the British Library.
Links
- There is a set of records called Ships' Journals IOR/L/MAR/A-B 1605-1856. Read about these records . The various ships are listed alphabetically, following the order in Catalogue of East India Company Ships' Journals and Logs 1600-1834 by Anthony J.Farrington (London, 1999).
Browse the ships names A-Dav, Daw-Han, Hap-Mas, Mat-Sat, Sc-Z plus extra ships names from 1834.
- There is a set of records called Ships' Journals IOR/L/MAR/A-B 1605-1856. Read about these records . The various ships are listed alphabetically, following the order in Catalogue of East India Company Ships' Journals and Logs 1600-1834 by Anthony J.Farrington (London, 1999).
- Andrea Cordani's EIC Ships website
- A Register of Ships, Employed in the Service of the Honorable the United East India Company 1716-1810 By Charles Hardy, Horatio Charles Hardy
- A Journal of a voyage to the Cape of good Hope and Bombay in the Ship Sesostris by James Smith, 1829-1831
- Len Barnett’s British Maritime History - Realistic genealogical guides to surviving records and more has sections on