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The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies, and later with East Asia. The company gained control of large parts of the Indian subcontinent and Hong Kong. At its peak, the company was the largest corporation in the world by various measures and had its own armed forces in the form of the company's three presidency armies, totalling about 260,000 soldiers, twice the size of the British Army at certain times.
Company rule in India refers to regions of the Indian subcontinent under the control of the British East India Company (EIC). The EIC, founded in 1600, established their first trading post in India in 1612, and gradually expanded their presence in the region over the following decades. During the Seven Years' War, the East India Company began a process of rapid expansion in India which resulted in most of the subcontinent falling under their rule by 1857, when the Indian Rebellion of 1857 broke out. After the rebellion was suppressed, the Government of India Act 1858 resulted in the EIC's territories in India being administered by the Crown instead. The India Office managed the EIC's former territories, which became known as the British Raj.
The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal, later the Bengal State, was the largest of all three presidencies of British India during Company rule and later a State of British India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and Southeast Asia. Bengal proper covered the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal. Calcutta, the city which grew around Fort William, was the capital of the Bengal Presidency. For many years, the governor of Bengal was concurrently the governor-general of India and Calcutta was the capital of India until 1911.
The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which provided for the gradual abolition of slavery in most parts of the British Empire. Passed by Earl Grey's reforming administration, it expanded the jurisdiction of the Slave Trade Act 1807 and made the purchase or ownership of slaves illegal within the British Empire, with the exception of "the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company", Ceylon, and Saint Helena. The Act came into force on 1 August 1834, and was repealed in 1998 as a part of wider rationalisation of English statute law; however, later anti-slavery legislation remains in force.
The Early History of slavery in the Indian subcontinent is contested because it depends on the translations of terms such as dasa and dasyu. Greek writer Megasthenes, in his 4th century BCE work Indika or Indica, states that slavery was banned within the Maurya Empire, while the multilingual, mid 3rd Century BCE, Edicts of Ashoka independently identify obligations to slaves and hired workers, within the same Empire.
George Donisthorpe Thompson was a British anti-slavery orator and activist who toured giving lectures and worked for legislation while serving as a Member of Parliament. He was arguably one of the most important abolitionists and human rights lecturers in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Abolitionism in the United Kingdom was the movement in the late 18th and early 19th centuries to end the practice of slavery, whether formal or informal, in the United Kingdom, the British Empire and the world, including ending the Atlantic slave trade. It was part of a wider abolitionism movement in Western Europe and the Americas.
Cornwallis was built probably at Surat around 1789, or possibly Demaun in 1790. Her name was originally Britannia, but it was changed to Cornwallis shortly before her completion. She served for some years in India as a country ship, before transferring her registry to Britain in 1797. She then served in private trade between Britain and India until 1809 or so when she transferred her registry back to Bombay. Thereafter she served as a country ship, though in both 1810 and again in 1817 she performed a voyage to Britain for the British East India Company. Thereafter she apparently continued to serve as a country ship with homeport of Bombay. She burnt there in June 1841 as she was about to take a cargo of cotton to China.
Indian Trader was launched in 1791. She made one voyage for the British East India Company (EIC). She was on her second voyage when a French privateer captured her. The British recaptured her and she returned to merchant service, sailing to the Americas. She was lost c. 1830.
Lucy Maria or Lucy and Maria was launched at Calcutta in 1801. She made one voyage to England carrying rice from Bengal on behalf of the British East India Company (EIC). She was seized at Amboyna in 1804 and then sailed as the Dutch ship Victoria. The British recaptured her in 1806 and new owners renamed her Troubridge and later renamed her Lucy Maria. As Troubridge she served as a transport for two invasions, that of Mauritius in 1810 and Java in 1811. She was broken up in 1821.
Orient was launched in 1814 at Calcutta. She sailed to England and from then on was based there. She traded with India into the 1830s. She participated in a naval punitive expedition in 1819, and performed four voyages for the British East India Company. From the 1840s she continued to sail widely until she was condemned in 1865 and sold for breaking up.
Barrosa was launched in 1811 at Cossipore. She sailed to England and then made six voyages for the British East India Company (EIC); during this period she also made one voyage carrying immigrants to South Africa. After the EIC gave up its maritime activities in 1833-1834, Barossa became a transport. She made three voyages transporting convicts to Australia. She was lost in 1847, without loss of life, while transporting contract labourers from Madras to Jamaica.
Duckenfield was launched in 1814 at Great Yarmouth. She spent most of her career as a West Indiaman. Between 1831 and 1833 she sailed to Australia and Bengal. She then started sailing across the North Atlantic. She became waterlogged; her surviving crew were rescued on 1 December 1835. They left her in a sinking state.
Lord Forbes was launched at Chester in 1803 as a West Indiaman. She soon became an "armed defense ship", but by 1805 had returned to being a West Indiaman. She made two voyages as an "extra" ship for the British East India Company (EIC). She continued trading with India until 1817 when she sustained damage on her way to Bengal. There she was surveyed, condemned and sold.
Gabriel Boughton was an East India Company (EIC) ship surgeon who travelled to India in the first half of the seventeenth century and became highly regarded by Mughal royalty.
Calcutta was launched at Chester in 1817. She was a general trader and in her early years traded with India, sailing under a license from the British East India Company (EIC). She suffered a maritime mishap in 1833, but then traded for another 20+ years; she was last listed in 1857 with stale data.
Indian Oak was launched at Cochin, probably in 1813. She then traded between India and Britain. From circa 1824 she operated as a "country ship" trading primarily in the Indian Ocean. Notable events included arson by the crew, a dispute between her master and the government of Mauritius, transport of 200 labourers from Bengal to Mauritius, and mutiny that resulted in the cutting and maiming of her master. She was wrecked in August 1840 after having delivered troops to Chusan for the First Opium War.
Several sailing vessels have been named Indus, after the Indus River, or the constellation Indus:
The Government Savings Bank (1833) was an Indian bank founded in 1833 in British India and operated until it was liquidated in 1843. The bank was the fifteenth oldest bank in India.
General Morden Carthew CB was an officer in the service of the East India Company (E.I.C.) Indian Army in the Madras Presidency, India and South East Asia during the mid 19th century.
References
- ↑ S. R. Mehrotra, "The British India Society and its Bengal Branch, 1839-46", The Indian Economic & Social History Review 1967;4(2):131-154. doi:10.1177/001946466700400203
- ↑ "Peaceful, Bloodless and Anti-Slavery Commerce? The British India Society and the Ethics of East India Trade, 1833-1857". ahc.leeds.ac.uk.
- ↑ "British India Society 1839-43 - GKToday". www.gktoday.in.