Volume Twelve - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - further aspects - Mercantile Marine Offices - An article from the Nautical Magazine for 1876. . . .

The utility of these remarks will be more evident by a reference to one or two ports which we have in our mind's eye. Take, for instance, the foreign port of New York. For many years the complaints there from masters of ships regarding the actions of crimps and their lawyers, have been loud and long. The boarding house keepers had a "ring", or “union", and, from the power derived there from, they actually fixed the rate of wages for seamen for a whole year. In a free country like America, this seems almost incredible, if we did not know it on the most indubitable testimony. This is the consequence of having no statute law bearing on the evils complained of, and the degeneracy of too much liberty (of a certain kind) into licence. It is to be hoped that the shipping office now formed there, and the amendment of the law, will have the desired effect of stopping such an embargo on trade, and, also, of mitigating the other evils connected with the Mercantile Marine of such a great country.

It is quite possible, at the same time, to have an institution of good, sound constitution, and laudable objects, but still with abortive and ineffective results. We cannot hide from ourselves the fact that some of our own Mercantile Marine offices have not achieved the good results they are fitted to effect. Whether that is the fault of too much parsimony in the design, or weakness in their administration, we are not prepared to say, but certain it is they would be much more conducive to the public interest, and much more popular among those who have business to do with them, than they at present are, if some improvement were made in their working.

As an instance of what is meant in the foregoing sentences, take the case of Cardiff. This place has been growing rapidly in the extent of its commerce for forty years. At the time of the introduction of the shipping-office system, in 1850, the population was about 18,000, and now it numbers more than 70,000. A continued and regular growth, in proportion, has taken place in its shipping. At that time the system of shipping crews was done by “licensed shipping agents", who had no official or legal force further than to engage seamen, and charge their fees for so doing.

In 1851,a small office was attached to the Custom House for the purpose of facilitating the engagement and discharge of crews, and, generally, to carry out the purposes of the Act of 1850. In it a solitary clerk was placed, and he, with the help of the “licensed shipping agents", continued, with but little other assistance, to do all the business up till 1866.