Representatives Abroad

Abstract

The history of the Blue Funnel Line has been intertwined with that of its agents. Characteristic of the Company’s development has always been its close and long-standing relations with its main agents. Indeed, in the case of two, Mansfields in Singapore, and Stapledons in Suez, Holts were directly responsible for the foundation of the agents’ business in the first place, and in the case of Butterfield and Swire were indirectly responsible. Relations were built up over many years. In all the main ports of call agents appointed in the very early days were retained well into the post-Second World War era, and in many cases the connection has remained unbroken. Table 4.1 below gives a list of Blue Funnel’s principal agents in 1923, though most of them had been appointed at the inception of the particular trade. The principal agents in 1923 were virtually identical with those in 1939, while if we compare agents, or ‘correspondents’ as they were then called, for the same ports in 1902 prior to the absorption of China Mutual, we find still a very similar array of names. The full list of 1902 ‘correspondents’ is given in Appendix III, and it can be seen that Butterfield and Swire represented Blue Funnel at 18 ports (though not yet at Dairen); Port Swettenham had yet to become an established deep-sea port; Windsor and Co., a German firm, was the Bangkok agent (replaced later that year by the Borneo Co. upon Holts’ acquisition of China Mutual); and the Pacific trade (and hence Dodwell’s representation) had not yet commenced.

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