P&O Rajah and the Experimental Manila Line, 1857
A forgotten side-line of the great steamship company
This article was first published as “P&O Rajah and the Experimental Manila Line, 1857” in India Post 58 no. 2 whole no. 231 (2024): 63-71. India Post is the journal of the India Study Circle for Philately.
One of the more obscure routes on which the steamers of the Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O) operated was the so-called ‘Manila Line’, which operated between mid-1857 and early 1860. The purpose of this article is to discuss the experimental period of this line which lasted May to December 1857.
Brief Background
Between 1565 and 1898, Philippines was under Spanish dominance; Manila had been its capital since 1571. The country was initially under the Viceroyalty of New Spain1 (Figure 1) until the independence of Mexico from Spain in 1821. Then on, Philippines was governed directly by the Spanish crown from 1821 to 1898. In the latter year, the United States, having decided to taste imperialism and colonialism, took over for another 48 years, when they defeated Spain in the American-Spanish war.
Philippines’ economy depended heavily on the ‘Manila galleons’ i.e. the huge trading ships that linked the ports of Acapulco in New Spain and Manila for about 250 years until 1815. Porcelain, silk, spices, cloth, and precious stones from China and India were transhipped via Manila to Mexico in exchange for New World silver (Figure 1). From Mexico, though not officially permitted, part of the goods would find the way to Spain and Europe. However, the galleon trade didn’t benefit Philippines much since, in the words of one governor-general, Jose Basco y Vargas Valderrama y Rivera (1777-1787), they left “nothing but the traces of their passing by.” Hence, during his tenure, Basco instituted several reforms including economic ones; by 1785, European traders were allowed in. However, it was only after 1821, when the crown took over, that trade really flourished. A few years later, in 1835, Manila formally became an international open port with no restrictions.
Consequently, traders of various nationalities set up offices in Manila. For instance, Peele, Hubbell and Company (1822) and Russell, Sturgis and Company (1828) of the United States and Ker and Company (1827) and Smith, Bell and Company (1847) of Great Britain. Competing with the foreign firms were home grown merchants such as Bartolome Antonio de la Cruz Barretto (B.A. Barretto) founded by a Portuguese-Goan-Macanese gentleman of that name sometime in the early 1850s or a bit earlier.
Not surprisingly, firms and individuals in Manila felt the need for regular and quick communications with places in the East as well as India and Europe. Their clamour led the Spanish government in Philippines to start negotiations with P&O and later sign a contract for the Manila Line (Figure 2).
In the line’s ‘experimental period’ or ‘first phase’,2 P&O Rajah made a total of seven trips from Singapore to Manila (six round trips between the two ports) carrying mails and cargo. In the ‘contract period’ or ‘second phase’ from December 1857 to February 1860, four different steamers carried mails between Hong Kong and Manila.
Prelude to Experiment
As of 1857, P&O had long-standing contracts to ferry mails between Calcutta and Suez (touching at Madras, Galle, and Aden), Hong Kong and Bombay (via Singapore, Penang, and Galle), and Bombay and Suez (via Aden) (Figure 2).3 The company hadn’t yet concluded negotiations with the Spanish government on connecting Manila with one of these centres and thereby India and Europe.
On 10 September 1857, P&O issued a circular4 which said, among other things:
The Directors of the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company beg to announce to Merchants, Travellers and other interested in the trade and intercourse with India, China, and other places in the East, certain arrangements which they are now actively engaged in carrying out, with a view to increase the communication by Steam Navigation with those places.
In making this announcement, they deem it right to state, that most of these arrangements were intended to have been carried into effect about three years ago. The breaking out of the war, however, caused the Government to put in force the power of appropriating the Company’s Ships exclusively to the public service in case of need. Availing itself of that power, requisitions were made on the Company for a considerable number of its Vessels for the War Transport Service; and most of these Vessels being the new large Screw-propelled Steamers, which the Directors had caused to be constructed expressly for the purpose of improving and extending the communications with the East, the contemplated arrangements have been unavoidably retarded and the trade and intercourse thereby inconvenienced to an extent which has caused the Directors much regret.
The Company’s Ships being now released from the War Service, the Directors have lost no time in proceeding to refit them for the employment for which they were originally destined, and they expect in a short time to carry out the following arrangements:
(The war being talked about is the Crimean War of 1853-56).
One of the arrangements mentioned was:
Branch Line to Manila. – The Directors are in negotiation with the Spanish Authorities to connect the Trade, Passenger and Postal intercourse of the Philippines with their main lines, by means of branch Steamers to run between Manila and Singapore.
P&O Rajah
P&O Rajah was a steamer measuring 600 tons (restated to 537 tons in 1857) (Figure 3). Launched in 1853, she was registered for the P&O the same year. Barque-rigged, she had a single screw driven by low-powered steam engines and was P&O’s first use of the auxiliary steam concept whereby the sails were accepted as the main power with steam primarily used to fill in when there was little wind. P&O only had two auxiliaries, the other was Manilla.
Rajah was intended for service east of Suez, carrying coals from Labuan in northern Borneo to P&O depots throughout the East. In May 1854, she was requisitioned for services in the Crimean War and was only returned to the company in June 1856.
On 6 October 1856, Rajah departed Southampton for Bombay (via the Cape) arriving 24 December, and then she was sent to the Far East. On 18 May 1857, she sailed on the first of the experimental trips between Singapore and Manila.
Once the contract between the Spanish and P&O was signed, Rajah arrived at Hong Kong from Manila on 14 December 1857 and made her first Hong Kong-Manila voyage when she left the Hong Kong on 30 December 1857. From then on, she along with P&O Chusan, P&O Shanghee, and P&O Aden, ferried mails on the line twice a month.
After the contract had run 18 months, P&O decided to withdraw its services from this line from January 1860 and gave notice to this effect (Figure 4). The reason given by P&O in its company report dated 3 December 1859 was that “the line has been shown not to be susceptible to development owing to restrictions imposed on vessels not sailing under the Spanish Flag”. Cable (1937, p. 149), who wrote a history of P&O on its centenary, believed that these words hinted at bribery and corruption at Manila; customs, port, and other officials, whose pay was quite frequently in arrears, resorted to such and specifically targeted foreign companies.
Fittingly, Rajah made the line’s last round trip, leaving Manila on 9 February and arriving Hong Kong on 13 February 1860.
Afterwards, Rajah was used on China coast services before being sold in May 1861 to R.D. Sassoon of Hong Kong. On 6 January 1861, she sank when she collided with Hugh Streatfield off Newarp lightvessel when on voyage from London to Shields.
The Experimental Singapore-Manila Line
While P&O was in talks with the local government in Manila, things didn’t progress initially owing to the insignificant offers made to P&O.
On 9 March 1857, Lieutenant-General Fernando Norzagaray y Escudero (Figure 5) took charge as the governor-general (or captain general) of Philippines. After discussions with Captain Norie of Rajah, he offered P&O 2,500 Spanish dollars a month for one round trip, exempted their vessels from port charges, and about 300 dollars more for the transmission of the Spanish mails between Singapore and Manila; all-in-all about 1,500 dollars more than that offered by his predecessors.5
Whether this proposal was accepted or not isn’t known, but P&O must have been encouraged enough to start a monthly branch line between Singapore and Manila. The experiment came to an end in six months once a formal contract was entered into sometime in mid-1857.6 The contract substituted Singapore with Hong Kong7 and made the sailings twice a month. An annual sum of 120,000 dollars (recoverable monthly) was paid by the Philippines government to P&O for this service.8
In the experimental period, P&O Rajah made all the trips between the two ports. While P&O Manilla was also intended to be used on the route, she was never actually deployed.9
Rajah made a total of six complete round trips between Singapore and Manila. The seventh voyage was Singapore-Manila-Hong Kong. She was sent to Hong Kong to commence the contract sailings. Details of each of these trips are filed in the adjoining table, which has been adapted from Kirk (1982).
Postal History
Letters from Manila which transited the Indian post office in Singapore and/or were destined for India legitimately come under ‘Indian postal history’.10 Such mails, especially prior to 1860, are uncommon. Scarcer are letters which were carried by P&O’s Manila Line in the experimental and contract periods, especially the former since it lasted for just six months.
These letters were directed to places like Great Britain, Spain, Hong Kong, and India. Most of the letters were carried under cover or per favour from Manila to Singapore and the only way to identify a Manila origin is by looking inside at the dateline. This article will illustrate three of them.
Figure 6 shows a lithographed printed circular (or prices current) from one of the oldest foreign firms in Manila, the American merchant, Peele, Hubbell & Co., to New Port, United States. As was common with printed matter, which were generally treated by post offices as poor cousins, there aren’t the usual postal markings on it that one associates with letters. Almost certainly, it was carried under cover or per favour to Singapore on the fifth return sailing of P&O Rajah from where it was forwarded by Wm. MacDonald & Co, whose handstamp appears on the rear. The Singapore agent applied stamps of 2a being the postage on printed matter such as newspapers and circulars to Great Britain via Marseilles not exceeding 4 oz in weight.11 Further, the very scarce handstamp ‘8’, struck at Boston, indicated postage due of 8 cents on delivery.12
Figure 7 shows an entire letter from Manila-based, B.A. Barretto, to Bombay-based Parsi merchant Cursetjee Furdoonjee Esq. Clearly endorsed on the outside and inside ‘p St. Rajah / to Singapore’, the letter was carried privately to Singapore on the same voyage as Figure 6. There is no Singapore datestamp but the black rectangular INDIA UNPAID was most likely struck there. While not marked as such, a sum of 4a (=6d) would be collected from the recipient being the ‘port-to-port’ charge on letters carried by British packets in the region. The manuscript ‘4d’ is the credit of 4d by the Indian post office to its GB counterpart.13
Finally, Figure 8 shows a cover (with letter inside) from the same correspondence as Figure 7 which was also privately carried to Singapore on the sixth return trip of Rajah (final round sailing). On its front is a manuscript black ‘6’ indicating postage due of 6d (=4a), possibly applied in Bombay. The rear shows a Singapore datestamp of 20? November 1857 and that of Bombay of 6 December 1857. Next to the latter is a manuscript ‘4 as’ indicating postage due of 4a on delivery.
Acknowledgements: Max Smith, as usual, for his suggestions. Thanks to Geoffrey Lewis and Colin Tabeart who went through the draft and gave encouraging feedback, and Richard Winter who commented on the Manila-USA item discussed above. All feedback is welcome; send your emails to abbh [at] hotmail.com.
References
Abeug, Luisito. 2017. “An Econometric History of Philippine Trade: 1810-1899”. DLSU Business & Economics Review 26 (2): 125-146.
Bowring, Sir John. 1859. A Visit to the Philippine Islands. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
Cable, Boyd. 1937. A Hundred Year History of the P. & O. Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company 1837-1937. London: Ivor Nicholson and Watson.
Kirk, R. 1982. The P&O Lines to the Far East. Vol. 2. 4 vols. British Maritime Postal History. Heathfield, East Sussex: Proud-Bailey Co. Ltd.
Lewis, Geoffrey. 2008. “India Used in the Philippines”. India Post 42 (1 whole no. 170): 16-18.
Nigel Gooding, n.d. “BA Barretto”. Accessed 7 February 2024. http://www.nigelgooding.co.uk/Spanish/Business%20Firms/BA%20Barretto/BABarretto.pdf.
P&O Heritage. n.d. “P&O Archive”. Accessed 7 February 2024. https://www.poheritage.com/our-archive.
Peterson, Don. 1992. “History of Four Major Business Firms and their Mail from the Spanish Philippines”. Philippine Philatelic Journal (XIV no. 1 First Quarter): 9-15.
———. 1993. “History of Four Major Business Firms and their Mail from the Spanish Philippines”. Philippine Philatelic Journal (XV no. 2 Second Quarter): 5-13.
———. 1996. “Ker and Company – A British Business Firm in the Spanish Philippines: 1827-1898”. Philippine Philatelic Journal (XVIII no. 4 Fourth Quarter): 10-20.
———. 1997. “Smith, Bell and Company: A British Business Firm in the Spanish Philippines 1847-1898”. Philippine Philatelic Journal (XIX no. 3 Third Quarter): 1-10.
Winter, Richard F. 2006. Understanding Transatlantic Mail. Volume 1. Bellefonte, PA, USA: American Philatelic Society.
New Spain comprised large parts of southern and western North America, including what is now Florida, California, Louisiana, and Mexico, Central America, Caribbean, north parts of South America, and pacific archipelagos such as Philippines and Guam.
Kirk (1982, p. 192) splits the sailings on the Manila Line into ‘first’ and ‘second phase’; I call them ‘experimental’ and ‘contract’ period respectively. I derive the word ‘experimental’ from a news report filed from Manila and published in the China Mail of 2 July 1857 and reprinted in The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser of 30 July 1857 which begins by stating, “…Rajah has just left us on its first experimental trip…”
P&O also held contracts to ferry mails in the Mediterranean and to the Peninsula. Sometime later, they also signed contracts for carrying mails on the Australian (1859) and Mauritius routes (1858).
Published in The Straits Times of 25 November 1857.
Reported in the China Mail of 2 July 1857 and reprinted in The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser of 30 July 1857.
Unfortunately, a copy of the contract is elusive. The contract must have been agreed upon sometime in the mid of 1857. A report in the British newspaper Northern Daily Times dated 15 October 1857 reports, “A contract has been entered into between the Spanish Government and the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, for the conveyance of mails twice a month between Hong Kong and Manila.”
The distance between Manila and Hong Kong is just about half that between Manila and Singapore (see Figure 2). This is probably the reason for substituting Singapore with Hong Kong; the Spanish government in Philippines would have been required to pay P&O a lower amount. The report in China Mail of 2 July 1857 referred to earlier was prescient: “We could have wished that it had been to Hongkong instead, and are inclined to favour the supposition that the Singapore line will, after a trial, be abandoned, and one to China substituted, which will be found less expensive, and more useful and profitable.”
Mentioned in Bowring (1859, p. 302). Sir John Bowring (1792-1872) was the fourth Governor of Hong Kong between 1854 and 1859. His efforts in negotiating with the Kingdom of Siam (now Thailand) led to the “Bowring Treaty” between that country and Britain in 1855. When his book on the Philippines was published in 1859, the Manila Line was operational, and Bowring talks about it in the present tense.
The Sun (London) of 16 March 1857 carries a report from Singapore dated 8 February which says that P&O’s Manilla and Rajah, “intended to run between Singapore and Manila”, are in the Singapore harbour. It mentions that it appears that negotiation between the Spanish government has been broken off, so Rajah proceeds to China and Manilla to Bombay. This indicates P&O’s initial intent to use Manilla on the route. She was never pressed into service probably because the sailings were monthly, and one steamer could very well do the job.
It would also be appropriate to classify such letters under the postal history of the Straits Settlements (in case of letters transiting that post office); of Philippines; the destination country (for example, Spain in case of letters from Manila to Spain); and the dispatching country (Great Britain, when letters are from GB to Manila).
A notice dated 28 July 1856 issued by G. Paton, Officiating Director General of the Post Office in India, reduced the rate on newspapers conveyed via Marseilles to 3d or 2a, down from 4d or 3a. While this notice refers to newspapers addressed to a British colony only, the same rate surely applied also to printed circulars addressed to other destinations (such as USA in this case) via Marseilles and Great Britain. This is apparent since this notice amended a previous one dated 16 August 1855, which had introduced the 4d rate on newspapers and prices current “sent through Great Britain viâ Marseilles.” To avail this lower rate, only one newspaper or circular could be sent under one cover and the weight scale was 4 oz.
So, the printed circular in question was paid all the way to GB. Hence, GB shouldn’t have debited USA 6c (manuscript ‘6’ on front) (=3d). Either the London postal clerk failed to notice the stamps worth 2a (=3d) affixed on its rear or disregarded them altogether for some unknown reason. USA added 2c as its own postal charge and hence the 8c postage due.
A Treasury Warrant dated 19 September 1855 effective 1 January 1856 reduced the packet rate on letters not exceeding half-ounce and transmitted by British packet-boats between any ports in the British colonies, or between any ports in the British colonies and any foreign port (not in any such cases passing through the United Kingdom) to 4d. The postage collecting colony needed to credit this amount to the British post office’s account. Also note that the total postage that India collected was 4a (=6d) which included 1d for the dispatching colony and 1d for the recipient colony.