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Pollok, Gilmour, and Company was a Glasgow-based timber-importing firm established in 1804 by Allan Gilmour, Sr and the brothers John Pollok and Arthur Pollok. The company soon became the leading British firm in the North American timber trade.
The Miramichi operations, established by Alexander Rankin, had originally been conceived by Allan Gilmour as a means of beating Napoleon's Continental System, which prohibited lumber exports to Britain from the Baltic countries. Robert Rankin, Alexander's brother, established another branch of the firm, Robert Rankin and Company, in Saint John, New Brunswick. The Saint John branch soon became the most successful operation in Pollok, Gilmour, and Company's empire.
Pollok, Gilmour, and Company was a vast North Atlantic concern which by 1838 operated 130 vessels in the timber trade – making it the largest British shipowning firm at the time – and employed no fewer than 15,000 men in its sawmills, on its wharves, and in the forests; it owned as well 2,000 horses and oxen for draught purposes. In the early 1830s the firm shipped out annually over 300 cargoes of timber.
A dispute among the founding partners erupted in 1837, and in 1838 Robert Rankin returned to Glasgow to settle the dispute. Robert maintained the helm of the firm throughout his remaining years, renaming it as Rankin, Gilmour and Company, and moving the headquarters to Liverpool, England. [1]
In order to employ its large fleet fully in the winter months, branch houses were opened in New Orleans, and Mobile, Alabama, where the company entered the rapidly expanding cotton trade. The diversification into cotton brought great profits, and by 1851 Rankin was a member of the Dock Committee of Liverpool.
The Aroostook War was a military and civilian-involved confrontation in 1838–1839 between the United States and the United Kingdom over the international boundary between the British colony of New Brunswick and the U.S. state of Maine. The Webster–Ashburton Treaty of 1842 settled the border along the line it still holds today. The term "war" was rhetorical; local militia units were called out but never engaged in actual combat. The event is best described as an international incident.
Events from the year 1788 in Canada.
Richard Hutchison was a New Brunswick businessman and political figure. He represented Northumberland in the House of Commons of Canada as a Liberal member from 1868 to 1872.
Sir William Brown, 1st Baronet DL was a British merchant and banker, founder of the banking-house of Brown, Shipley & Co. and a Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1846 to 1859.
Sir James Rankin, 1st Baronet was a Conservative Party politician in the United Kingdom. He was Member of Parliament for Leominster from 1880 to 1885, and from 1886 until the general election of 1906, losing the seat by only 28 votes to the Liberal candidate. He regained the seat in January 1910 and resigned in March 1912. He was made a Baronet on 20 June 1898, of Bryngwyn, Herefordshire. He was a senior partner of the family timber and shipbuilding company, Pollok, Gilmour and Company. The Rankin Constitutional Club, in Corn Square, Leominster, is named after him.
William Pagan was a Scottish-born merchant and political figure in New Brunswick. He represented Saint John County in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick from 1786 to 1816.
Alexander Rankin was a Scottish-born merchant and political figure in New Brunswick. He represented Northumberland County in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick from 1827 to 1852.
Joseph Cunard was a merchant, shipbuilder and political figure in New Brunswick. He represented Northumberland County in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick from 1828 to 1833.
John Ferguson was a timber merchant and political figure in New Brunswick, Canada. He was a member of the Legislative Council of New Brunswick from 1864 to 1867. Ferguson was called to the Senate of Canada for the Bathurst, New Brunswick division in 1867 and served until his death in 1888.
James Gilmour was a prominent Scottish-born entrepreneur, farmer, school trustee, justice of the peace, militia officer, and co-founder of both Douglastown, New Brunswick, and Gilmour, Rankin & Co.
Robert Rankin, the son of James Rankin and Helen Ferguson, and brother to Alexander Rankin, was a Scottish timber merchant and shipowner. His uncles, John Pollok and Arthur Pollok, were co-founders of Pollok, Gilmour and Company.
Allan Gilmour was a businessman in the shipping and timber industries and worked for the family firm in Britain and Canada. He worked for a firm established by his uncle Allan Gilmour Sr.
Allan Gilmour Sr. was a prominent Scottish-born lumber merchant and shipowner.
The Ottawa River timber trade, also known as the Ottawa Valley timber trade or Ottawa River lumber trade, was the nineteenth century production of wood products by Canada on areas of the Ottawa River and the regions of the Ottawa Valley and Western Quebec destined for British and American markets. It was the major industry of the historical colonies of Upper Canada and Lower Canada and it created an entrepreneur known as a lumber baron. The trade in squared timber and later sawed lumber led to population growth and prosperity to communities in the Ottawa Valley, especially the city of Bytown. The product was chiefly red and white pine.The Ottawa River being conveniently located with access via the St. Lawrence River, was a valuable region due to its great pine forests surpassing any others nearby. The industry lasted until around 1900 as both markets and supplies decreased, it was then reoriented to the production of wood pulp which continued until the late 1990's/early 2000's.
Sir Robert Rankin, 1st Baronet was a Liverpool shipbuilder, and British Conservative politician, who was elected a Member of Parliament for Liverpool Kirkdale in 1931 until 1945.
Captain Alexander "Sandy" Allan, was the Scottish sea captain and businessman who founded the Allan Shipping Line in 1819. Rising from shoemaker to shipping magnate in little more than thirty years, Allan retired in 1839 having made a fortune and created a transatlantic dynasty. He is recognised as one of the major contributors to Scotland's commercial interests in the early 19th century, and to the establishment of the Firth of Clyde as an international centre of shipping. During the Napoleonic Wars his brig Jean – so named for his wife – held the record for the fastest crossing between the Firth of Clyde and Quebec City. Under his five sons, the Allan Line became the world's largest privately owned shipping empire.
Charles McArthur was a British average adjuster from Liverpool. He became a Liberal Unionist politician who sat in the House of Commons in two periods between 1897 and 1910.
The Gilmour Lumber Company was one of the giants of the Canadian timber industry. Their involvement in lumbering began modestly in the 1790s in the area of Glasgow, Scotland where Allan Gilmour Sr. started a small timber merchandising business. In 1804 he entered into a partnership with his cousins John and Arthur and formed Pollock, Gilmour and Company. Pollock, Gilmour and Company became ship owners and imported products in Europe and the Baltic region.
Alexander Dennistoun was a Scottish merchant, bank director, property developer and, for a two years, from 1835 to 1837, Member of Parliament for Dunbartonshire. He was responsible for establishing the Glasgow residential area Dennistoun, named after him.
James Finlay & Co was formed in 1750 and under the leadership of Kirkman Finlay became one of Scotland’s leading cotton manufacturers and merchants. In the 1860s the firm came under the control of John Muir and diversified into Indian tea plantations. The cotton business was eventually closed and, after an unsuccessful period of diversification, Finlay concentrated on its core interests of tea and other agricultural produce. In 2000, the firm was acquired by John Swire & Son.
University of New Brunswick
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