Yrjö Kaukiainen Sailing Into Twilight Societas Historica Finlandiae Suomen Historiallinen Seura Finska Historiska Samfundet
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Yrjö Kaukiainen Sailing into Twilight Societas Historica Finlandiae Suomen Historiallinen Seura Finska Historiska Samfundet Studia Historica 39 Yrjö Kaukiainen Sailing into Twilight Finnish Shipping in an Age of Transport Revolution, 1860-1914 SHS / Helsinki / 1991 Cover: Yrjö Kaukiainen Photograph: Unidentified vessels at Port Blakely Mill Co., Port Blakely, WA. Photo by Wilhelm Hester, ca 1893-1905. Photo courtesy: San Francisco Maritime National Park, Historical Document collections. ISSN 0081-6493 ISBN 951-8915-41-5 Tekstinvalmistus: Magneettisesta tekstistä Painaminen ja sidonta: Gummerus Kirjapaino Oy Jyväskylä 1991 Preface This study is the result of a long-held interest in the history of Finnish shipping and, in particular, the great transformation which took place within it during the latter half of the 19th century. It is also partly a result of an equally long frustration with pre-1918 Finnish shipping statistics. Their inadequacy caused many problems in investigating the history of shipping, which could only be solved by going rather deeply into primary source material — if such existed. For a number of years, I had been aware that the register-books of the old Finnish mutual marine insurance association contained detailed data on the voyages of several hundred Finnish ships, data which might considerably compensate the shortcomings of the official statistics. I also knew that there were a number of shipping accounts from the late 19th century still in existence — as was demonstrated in the dissertation of Jan-Erik Börman (1979) which I had the pleasure of supervising — but whether they were representative enough of all national shipping was uncertain. It was only in spring 1986 that I had the opportunity to devote some time to these sources, when the Finnish Academy granted money for a pilot study on Finnish shipping and seamen (1870-1930). My first contacts with the registers of the Finnish marine insurance association were so encouraging — fascinating might be a better description — that I immediately started to plan a system for collecting this data, and then used the summer and early autumn of 1986 to do the work. When the Finnish Academy granted me a scholarship for the academic year 1987-88, I was able to continue by going to the provincial archives and collecting data from shipping accounts. It was clear from the beginning that the time I could afford for 5 the work would be limited. This meant that the ratio of results to total effort had to be kept reasonably high. Thus, I had to concentrate on the main trends of national development and leave all the interesting details and local specialities unstudied. I also had to rely mainly on periodical samples instead of complete year- to-year observations. This, of course, means that the picture I am able to paint is in some respects summary, it may be even sketchy, and there is no doubt that other studies will be able to add many details. Now that the work is complete — at least technically, for no serious scientific work is ever "complete" — I have the pleasant duty of thanking people and institutions who have helped me to do it. Not infrequently, scholars regard their studies as examples of original and innovative thinking. More often than not, however, they depend heavily on ideas drawn from previous studies and discussions with other colleagues, even though the author himself is no longer able to trace all such influences. Of fellow maritime historians, Professor Lewis R. (Skip) Fischer not only provoked many ideas and much inspiration with his numerous articles and through many private discussions, but he also read parts of the manuscript and gave valuable comments and suggestions. I am also in debt to several other members of the so-called Maritime Economic History Group for comments and inspiring discussion when I presented part of this study at a conference in Bergen in August, 1989. The Finnish Academy furnished me with the necessary financial help without which I would probably still be in the planning stages. While I was collecting the material, I was greatly aided by the staff of many archives, and John Hackman and Kim Montin from Åbo Akademi deserve special thanks. I would like to thank the Finnish Historical Society for accepting my study in their series, and Professors Viljo Rasila and Markku Kuisma, who read the manuscript, for suggesting that the Society do so. Last but not least, I wish to thank Joan Nordlund M.A. for a considerate, skillful and thorough language revision. Helsinki, October 1990 Yrjö Kaukiainen 6 Contents Preface I. Introduction: World trade and Finnish shipping in the latter half of the 19th century 17 The growth of international maritime transport 17 Finnish shipping in an international setting 20 Shipping and the Finnish economy 25 The problem of backwardness 29 The organization of this study 33 II. Factors of production 36 1. The development of tonnage 36 Problems with the data 37 The calculation of tonnage — methods and definitions 44 The development of total tonnage 49 Structural changes in the fleet 52 — The period of growth (the 1860s and 1870s) 53 — The period of stagnation (the 1880s and early 1890s) 60 — The period of fluctuations (the mid-1890s to World War I) 66 2. Investment cycles and capital formation 73 Prices of new ships 73 Second-hand prices 78 Investment cycles 83 Capital "outflows" 91 The real value of the fleet and capital accumulation 99 3. Labour 102 Sources of labour and wage information 102 7 Crew size 104 Total labour development 109 The price of labour 111 Indirect labour costs: food provisions 117 Finnish labour costs compared 119 4. Capital, labour and know-how 123 III. Production 129 1. General problems of data and methods 129 The data 129 How to measure sailing and production 139 2. The development of trade 148 Sailing ship trades 150 — Different ships for different trades 150 — The changing structure of transports 155 — The development of cross-trade 159 — Finnish exports and imports: North Sea and Baltic trades 170 — Coastal trade 178 Steamer trade 181 — From coastal passenger/cargo vessels to specialized steamships 181 — Coastal trade 187 — Steamers in North Sea and Baltic trade 192 — Cross-trade 197 3. Total production and productivity 201 Total production of shipping services: growth and change 201 Technical transition and productivity 206 Finnish shipping and the transport demands of the Finnish foreign trade 214 IV. Income and profitability 220 1. Problems of data 220 Shipping accounts 221 Methods of calculation 229 2. The development of gross income 236 Sailing vessels 236 Sailing ship income and freight rates 242 Steamships 246 Steamships and general freight development 253 3. The development of net result and profitability 257 8 Sailing vessels 257 Steamships 262 Return on capital 267 4. The macro view 278 Total gross revenue 279 Value-added or net value of production 284 Shipping income and shipping investments 288 V. Summary and conclusions 294 Structural change and profitability 294 Finnish shipping and the international economy 301 Finnish shipping and the Finnish economy 307 From golden days to twilight years 316 Sources 319 List of tables Table 1:1. Tonnage per population in certain countries, 1870. 21 Table 1:2. Steam-tonnage percentage share of total merchant tonnage, 1892 and 1913. 24 Table 1:3. Cargo space required by the most important Finnish export items. 26 Table 2:1. Merchant tonnage of the Finnish sea-coasts from different sources. 47 Table 2:2. Sailing ships in the larger size-classes, 1913. 48 Table 2:3. Finnish merchant marine, 1865-1913. 51 Table 2:4. Merchant sailing fleets in towns of different parts of Finland, 1865 and 1875. 56 Table 2:5. The merchant fleet of the coastal parishes in 1865 and 1875. 58 Table 2:6. Some structural features of selected merchant fleets, 1875. 59 Table 2:7. Steamships in different parts of Finland in 1885 and 1895. 61 Table 2:8. Merchant sailing fleets in different parts of Finland in 1885 and 1895. 63 Table 2:9. Steamships in different parts of Finland in 1905 and 1913. 67 9 Table 2:10. Sailing ships in different parts of Finland in 1905 and 1913. 69 Table 2:11. The geographic distribution of larger (700 tons and over) sailing ships, 1895-1913. 70 Table 2:12. The geographic distribution of the coastal sailing fleet (vessels under 100 net tons), 1895-1913. 70 Table 2:13. Average size of steamships in selected merchant fleets, 1913 71 Table 2:14. Cost of building new sailing-ships in the 1860s and 1870s. 75 Table 2:15. Purchase prices of second-hand sailing vessels, 500 net tons and over, 1880-1913. 79 Table 2:16. Values of sailing vessels imported to Finland 1895-1913. 80 Table 2:17. Average prices of steamships imported to Finland and Norway, 1896-1913. 82 Table 2:18. Estimate of new sailing tonnage in Finland 1861-1880. 85 Table 2:19. Estimate of urban and rural investments in sailing tonnage, 1861-1885. 86 Table 2:20. Estimated Finnish steamship investments, 1861-1885. 87 Table 2:21. Tonnage aqcuisitions from different sources, 1895-1913. 89 Table 2:22. Finnish shipping investments 1896-1913. 90 Table 2:23. Rates of depreciation, sailing ships, 1860-1913. 97 Table 2:24. Estimated current value of Finnish merchant tonnage, 1865-1913. 101 Table 2:25. Man-ton ratios in the Finnish merchant marine, 1865-1913. 106 Table 2:26. Estimated numbers of crew and officers in the Finnish merchant marine, 1865-1913. 110 Table 2:27. Typical monthly wages for officers and sailors on foreign-going ships in Finland 1860s-1913 112 Table 2:28. Averages of monthly wages of crew members (masters excluded, officers included) and of total earnings per month of masters in samples of Finnish foreign-going ships 1860-1913.