Martin & Company
Martin & Company
Initially an engineering company, established in 1892 by Thomas Aquin Martin (previously Manager of Walsh, Lovatt & Company), Harold Martin, Rajendranath Mookerjee and C W Walsh; located at Jackson House, Calcutta. The company is in some records named the London based T A Martin & Co. [1].
The business developed rapidly as a Managing Agent and had interests in light railways, collieries, steel works, docks, engineering works, manganese mines, tea, timber, electric supply companies, cement and allied undertakings. The company built jute mills and had further large contracts for water and drainage works. The building department was responsible for the design and construction of many important commercial and public buildings and private residences [1].
The company also had a large business in supplying light railway materials and by 1897 were regularly advertising in trade journals which stated they could supply portable and permanent railways for agriculture, industrial and contractors purposes and had a large stock of light rails, sleepers and attachments, steel double-sided tipping trucks, platform wagons, bogie goods wagons, special wagons for timber, plantation and tea garden wagons, special cask wagons, conservancy wagons for municipalities, steel coal tubs and mining wagons and barrows. They also acted as sole Indian agents for a number of locomotive builders and railway equipment companies:- British Thomson Housten (1899); Hunslett Engine Co (1904); Arthur Koppel & Co (1904); Robert Hudson & Co (1907) [1].
By 1926 they also had offices in Bombay, Karachi and Dhanbad and a works at Kidderpore. In 1940 they were shown in trade directories as merchants; building contractors and Agents for railways, tea and engineering companies with offices at 12 Mission Row, Calcutta and in Lahore and New Delhi.
In 1946 Martin & Company merged with Burn & Co Ltd to form Martin, Burn & Company [1].
Some significant Martin & Co. undertakings
Calcutta Storm Water Construction Railway Between 1898 and 1905 the remodelling of the storm water outfall for Calcutta's Sewer System was undertaken by Messrs Martin & Company[1].
Martin's Light Railways (MLR), owned by Messrs Martin & Company, from 1897 onwards operated several disparate Narrow Gauge(NG) light railways in the Gangetic plain, from Calcutta in the east to Delhi in the west. See page Martin's Light Railways for details.
External Links
- Grace’s Guide "Martin and Co (of Calcutta)"
- Wikipedia "Martin, Burn & Company"