The Fleets

Christian Salvesen & Co.

From the beginning of the 19th century the Salvesen family owned several commercial enterprises in their native Norway, including shares in a number of ships. In 1843 Johan Theodor Salvesen set up in business as a shipbroker at Grangemouth, a few miles west of Edinburgh and three years later opened another office at Leith. In 1851 his brother, Christian, left Norway to join him in Scotland and was given responsibility for the Leith office.
At the time Christian joined the company, the Leith office was being operated jointly with George Turnbull as Turnbull, Salvesen and Company. Their main trade involved the export of coal and the import of timber. In 1872, the partnership with Turnbull ended and Christian Salvesen and Co. was formed.
Meanwhile, Johan concentrated on the Grangemouth office and, in 1853, withdrew completely from the Leith business. Eventually, the company started at Grangemouth passed to the control of F.T. Everard.
In 1864 the Leith-based business, under the management of Christian Salvesen, became agents for Norwegian whale oil and in 1879 the steamship Marna (1879 - 1,027gt) was acquired for use oil a regular Leith to Norway service. To allow access to the lucrative Norwegian coastal trades, the ship flew the Norwegian flag, even though Christian Salvesen had become a British citizen in 1857. So regular was this Norwegian trade that the route became a liner service in 1886. It was strengthened in 1928 by the acquisition of the Aberdeen-based Glen Line of John Cook and Son who had three ships employed in the Scotland Norway trade, and in the 1950s UK west coast ports were also served with direct loadings to Norway.
Other liner services were tried with varying degrees of success. These included services to the Mediterranean and Black Sea but were relatively short lived. Except for these various liner services, the rest of the Salvesen fleet was engaged in tramp trades.
Except for the Nazi occupation of Norway during World War II, the Norwegian liner route was operated successfully until 1971. The last vessels employed on this liner route were Tolsta and Laksa (both 1960 - 1,323gt) and were both sold to John Stewart & Co. and renamed Yewglen and Yewkyle respectively when the route closed.
Salvesen's association with the importation of whale oil encouraged the company to set up a land-based whaling station at Olna in the Shetland Isles in 1904 where whale catchers were based until the station was closed in 1929. In 1907, the company had started Antarctic whaling. Initially a base was established in the Falkland Islands but was soon relocated to Leith Harbour, South Georgia, to be nearer the whaling grounds. Floating factory ships were acquired to operate from the new base, which in turn was serviced by supply ships drawn from the company's tramp ship fleet. The whole operation was managed by the newly formed South Georgia Company. By 1914, Salvesen's whaling fleet consisted of two factory ships, five supply ships and 18 whale catchers.
The introduction of stern ramps on factory ships in the late 1920s enabled the whale carcasses to be hauled up onto the deck for cutting up, before then, harpooned whales were dissected alongside the vessels. Salvesen's first factory ships to be fitted with stem ramps were Salvestria (1913 - 11,938gt) and Sourabaya (1915 - 10,107gt). Many of the factory ships were converted liners. The aforementioned pair were formerly Royal Mail Steam Packet Company's Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire respectively. Other converted liners which found their way into Salvesen's ownership were the former White Star vessels Runic (1900 - 13,801gt) and Regina (1918 - 16,289gt). On conversion, Runic was renamed New Sevilla but the planned conversion of Regina to Westernland was dropped and she was broken up in 1947.

During the depression of the 1930s, several whaling competitors were taken over, so by 1939 a substantial whaling fleet was in operation. It consisted of at least five factory ships, four dedicated support vessels and over 60 catching vessels. During World War II many of the whale catchers were pressed into naval service, while the factory ships were used as tankers and heavy lift vessels.
In 1941, the Southern Whaling Company was purchased from Unilever when they ceased whaling. This increased Salvesen's fleet by two factory ships and 15 whale catchers. However, war losses were considerable all the 1939 factory ships were lost during the conflict, as well as half the catchers and support ships. Limited whaling took place between 1939 and 1941, while no expeditions were rnade until the end of hostilities.
The increased competition and the decline in the number of whales after the war meant commercial whaling was becoming less viable. Expeditions were still mounted but with only limited success. In 1963, the company ended whaling operations and the factory ships were sold. The last one, Southern Harvester (1946 - 15,364gt), was bought by the Japanese who wanted her whale quotas. The vessel was resold twice but never used again and was broken up in 1971. Of the company's 38 whale catchers, 12 were sold, 16 scrapped and the remainder abandoned at the South Georgia base.

Following the company's withdrawal from whaling, new trading activities were pursued. This led the company to adapt the surplus Algerine class minesweeper, HMS Felicity (1944 - 1,241gr, built as HMCS Cappercliff for use as a fishing vessel under the name Fairfee. The fitting of a factory ship stern ramp and refrigeration equipment produced the world's first combined freezer/stern trawler. After five years of experimentation, she was laid up in 1952 but was followed by three purpose-built vessels: Fairtry (1954 - 2,605gt), Fairtry II (1959 - 2,857gt) and Fairtry III (1960 - 12,857gt). However, due to increased competition, in part from subsidised Eastern Bloc fleets, the company were forced to withdraw all three vessels by 1968. It therefore founded another business: its shore based freezer plants.
Although the stern trawlers had gone, Salvesens still owned several other fishing fleets in Britain, Canada, Peru and Ireland. These fleets contained over 70 vessels and mainly served the fish meal trade. The British flagged fleet produced another innovative development with the introduction of Semla (1967 - 249gt), the UK's first purse seiner net fishing vessel. However, the fishing vessel operations gradually declined. The Peruvian fleet was nationalised and other fleets sold off.

Having been involved in trawler operations, it was a logical step for Salvesen to operate former trawlers as standby safety ships when the offshore oil industry began to expand. A joint venture with Boston Deep Sea Fisheries, Safetyships Ltd. was started and this went on to become the wholly owned subsidiary Salvesen Offshore Services. More ships were acquired for this business: stern trawlers were converted to survey ships, former ferries became pollution control vessels and even an old coastal tanker was converted into an oil recovery vessel. The first of two drilling ships was commissioned in 1974, but by 1980 both had been sold.

Salvesen's tramp services had prospered, with Norwegian, Baltic and Mediterranean services being particularly profitable. Regular services to Malta and Alexandria were run for some years prior to 1914. At the start of World War I, the company owned eight tramp ships, three of which were sold and three of which were lost. The doubtful distinction of owning the first British merchant ship lost in World War I belongs to Salvesen. Glitra (1910 - 2,925gt) was sunk by U-17 on 20 October 1914 off the Norwegian coast.
During Wold War I, 20 ships were purchased, six of which were lost. After World War I no fleet replacement programme was undertaken. Instead, many vessels were sold at the extremely high prices being offered during the short lived postwar shipping boom. During the slump that followed, Salvesen was able to buy up to date ships to modernise its fleet. In 1934, the company took advantage of low building rates and ordered Saganaga (1935 - 5,452gt), the company's first newly built cargo ship for 40 years.

Of the ten ships in the tramping fleet at the outbreak of World War II, seven were lost and three sold by early 1943 leaving the fleet devoid of tramp ships for the rest of the war. Immediately after World War II, to make up the shortage of vessels, Culrain (1941 - 6,765gt, ex- Empire Darwin), Culross (1946 - 7,331gt, ex- Empire Antiqua), Struan (1942 - 2,893gt, ex- Empire Patriot) and Cutler (1941 - 7,030gt, ex- Empire Rhodes) were purchased from the Ministry of War Transport.

However, no more ships entered the fleet until the newly built 8,995gt Saldanha was acquired in 1959. So successful was this vessel that five similar vessels were added to the fleet over the next four years. These ships remained in the fleet until the early 1970s and were employed on liner charters or on the short-lived liner service to North America. The bulk carrier Inverleith (1961 - 15,628gt) entered the fleet in 1966.

In 1964 the company re-entered the coastal trade when another Leith-based company, A.E. Henry and MacGregor and its fleet of five ships, was acquired. Founded in 1887 as shipbrokers, Henry and MacGregor began ship owning in 1907 after buying the puffer Mayflower (1882 - 69gt) for short voyages. Later vessels were employed in the Forth-South Coast coal trade. Voyages undertaken by A.E. Henry and MacGregor's ships became more varied, including Baltic and Great Lakes destination when not carrying coal. This new excursion into the coal trades led Salvesen to construct a number of small bulk carriers suitable for the trade. Two colliers were subsequently sold to the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) but left under Salvesen management. Over the next few years other CEGB vessels were transferred to Salvesen management.
Christian Salvesen withdrew from shipping related activities in 1989. The company's colliers were sold to A/S Jebsen, of Norway, who also took over the management of the CEGB's super colliers. throughout its history the company has shown a remarkable talent for adapting to the prevailing trading conditions of the time and developing new businesses both at sea and ashore. The company's landbased activities, many of which are still being carried out, encompass the refrigeration and distribution trades as well as construction.

Many thanks to Henk Jungerius and Ted Finch for his assistance in collecting this data. The following list was extracted from various sources. This is not an all inclusive list but should only be used as a guide. If you would like to know more about a vessel, visit the Ship Descriptions (onsite) or Immigrant Ship web site.

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