Grace's Guide To British Industrial History

Registered UK Charity (No. 115342)

Grace's Guide is the leading source of historical information on industry and manufacturing in Britain. This web publication contains 162,260 pages of information and 244,501 images on early companies, their products and the people who designed and built them.

Grace's Guide is the leading source of historical information on industry and manufacturing in Britain. This web publication contains 147,919 pages of information and 233,587 images on early companies, their products and the people who designed and built them.

C. T. Bowring and Co

From Graces Guide

of 20 Castle Street, Liverpool

of Pyewipe Mills, Grimsby, Lincolnshire (1959)

1813 The original Bowring enterprise was that of Bowring Brothers, which was started in St. John's, Newfoundland by Benjamin Bowring.

1820s Benjamin Bowring, who was involved in the seal trade, founded the company at St. John's Newfoundland

By 1823 Owned a fleet of small sailing vessels to trade across the Atlantic.

The New York house was established as Bowring & Archibald by William B. Bowring (afterward Sir William B. Bowring, Bart.) and Brenton Archibald, son of Sir Edward Archibald, who was at that time British Consul-General at New York.

The firm was established to do business with the Newfoundland house, and for a considerable time confined its attention exclusively to the importing of Newfoundland products. Later, however, the firm went into the petroleum business, in which Bowring and Archibald were pioneers, and the firm was one of the first shippers of a full cargo of barreled oil to England, and among the earliest developers of tank steamers especially built for petroleum shipments.

1830 C. T. Bowring & Co. was founded in Liverpool.

By the 1840s, his son, Charles Tricks Bowring, was the functional head of the company which had expanded to Liverpool.

1860s routes opened to India and New Zealand, Australia and the West Coast of America.

1870 Bowring's London house was established and later another at Cardiff, about 1880.

From 1880 the company built up a fleet of ocean going steamships

1888 A new company, English and American Shipping Co was formed to operate passenger and cargo services, mostly between Liverpool, St. John's and New York.

1886 the Red Cross Line was started by the Bowring interests and has since been engaged in regular traffic between New York, Halifax, Nova Scotia, and St. John's, Newfoundland.

From early 1880s, operated the Red Cross Line (New York, Newfoundland and Halifax SS Co.), a passenger and freight service along the Atlantic Seaboard.

1899 The company was registered on 18 March, to take over the business of the firm of the same name, steamship owners, ship and insurance brokers and merchants. [1], C. T. Bowring & Company, a private limited company

1902 the New York house of Bowring & Company was incorporated under the laws of the State of New York; the Newfoundland house became a limited corporation under the name of Bowring Brothers, Limited.

The petroleum business of the Bowrings developed into the Bowring Petroleum Co of London, a subsidiary organization.

WWI Heavy ship losses were encountered

1919 The English and American Shipping Co was liquidated; a new company the Bowring Steamship Co was formed. The passenger trade was dropped about this time and Bowrings concentrated on the oil tanker, iron ore and freight business.

1929 the Red Cross Line was sold and their ships transferred to Furness, Withy and Co's Bermuda and West Indies Steamship Co.


1959 C. T. Bowring and Co (Fish Oils), Limited. Supplier of fish meal, cod oil, veterinary cod liver oil, and vitamised fish oils.




See Also

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Sources of Information

  1. The Stock Exchange Year Book 1908
  • Bowring [1]
  • Bowring and Co [2]