Expert: Mark Smith - 3/20/2010

Question
QUESTION: I'm interested in passenger travel from India to England in the first half of the 19th century.
Did travelers usually go by sea around the Cape of Good Hope?
Was Calcutta one of the main points of departure? I'm assuming so because of Fort William.
From Calcutta, did passengers disembark in London, or some other port?
Due to winds and weather, were there only certain times of year when it was possible to depart from Calcutta?
Did passengers hitch rides on trading vessels, or did they use passenger lines?
What kind of ship carried passengers?
How many passengers on board?
Who were they? Mostly men? Any wives, children? Civil Servants? Military? Art collectors? Scholars? Missionaries? Or was it too early for some of them? Were most connected with the East India Trading Company?

These are a lot of questions! Any insight or direction would be much appreciated. This is a wonderful site. Thank you!

ANSWER: Hello Catherine.
There were two routes to India before the Suez Canal opened in 1869. One was the long route via the Cape of Good Hope. The other, which began in the mid 1830s, was by sea to Alexandria in Egypt then overland across the Suez Peninsula to Port Suez on the Red Sea where they took another ship to India.
The main ports of call in India were Bombay on the west coast, Madras in the south east and Calcutta in the north east. Some ships called at all three, others only at one or two.
Ships generally left from London and Southampton, depending on which Line you travelled.
Voyages were all year round, but in the monsoon season they could take longer if docking was a difficulty.
Sailing ships up to the mid 1830s when steamships began to take over. The England-Egypt-India route was entirely by steamship.
Less than 100 passengers on any one voyage in sailing ships, steamers could carry more. The later the date the larger the ship and therefore the larger the passenger load.
Army Regiments travelled as a whole in their own troopships, but individual soldiers and everyone else on your list would go by commercial carrier. Wives and children would accompany their husbands/fathers. Up to the 1850s most passengers would be connected to the East India Co as traders or administrators etc.
Mark

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Before steamships, how long did the sea route around the Cape take from Calcutta to London?
By commercial carriers, do you mean passenger lines and not trading vessels?
(It's amazing to think that year round passenger service existed in the early 1800s)
Do you know the names of any of the commercial lines, and the types of ships they sailed?
Was it dangerous, sailing around the Cape? Sounds like a rough ride.

This has been so helpful. Thank you again, very much.

Answer
Hello Catherine.
The voyage would have taken about four to six months depending on the weather and the speed of the ship.
There were no such things as dedicated passenger ships in the first half of the 19th century. Passengers travelled in merchant ships, which is why passenger numbers were quite small per ship, most of the spce was taken up with cargo.
By far the most dominant company sailing to/from India was the East India Company. Although it lost its monopoly of trade with India in 1813 it remained the dominant player in the trade until the 1850s.
The voyage could be dangerous, a number of ships were lost on the long voyage to/from India.

In 2005 there was a TV drama titled "To the Ends of the Earth" based on the William Golding trilogy of the same name about a voyage to Australia in 1813 on board a Navy warship. If you can get it on DVD or read the novel it gives a good idea of what a long sea voyage was like at that time.
Mark