Probable causes of the depression in England and America.
The commercial crisis, however, which occurred on
both sides of the Atlantic, at the close of 1857, necessarily
operated injuriously upon the progress of
English trade, and consequently on English shipping.
It must be also remembered that the Russian war,
and, subsequently, the disturbances in British India,
created a large and abnormal demand for tonnage,
which ceased with the termination of those temporary
causes; and, as tonnage employed exclusively
in the Government transport service, does not appear
in the preceding account, it is probable that, during
1858, there was a still greater check to the demand
for tonnage than is therein expressed.
The temporary depression was, however, by no means confined to the shipping of the United Kingdom, as we have shown; similar symptoms had manifested themselves in other maritime countries.[1]
American jealousy and competition. Although the competition of British shipping in steam navigation had been the subject of loud complaint in America, it will be found that the decline in the building and employment of British shipping in 1858 was not so great in proportion as that which was indicated by the annual accounts of the imports
[*Footnote: Thus the Foreign Trade rose from 39,163,407l. in 1847, to 85,039,991l. in 1857, and the Colonial Trade from 13,686,038l. in 1847, to 37,115,257l. in 1857.]
- ↑ The shipping accounts of the United States of America for the
year ended 30th June, 1858, showed a corresponding decline in
the employment of United States tonnage.
The total tonnage entered and cleared of United States ships in the
two years 1856-7, and 1857-8, having been
1856-7, 9,302,021 tons.
1857-8, 8,885,675 tons; Decrease 416,346 tons.
