ABSTRACT
Sea mail had been carried by naval vessels and by masters of sailing ships. In the 1820s the Post Office began to use specially built steam vessels in home wa ters. There they competed with enterprising private owners who offered to carry cargo and deck passengers (for which government ships were not suitable) and mail as well. Even on short runs with well developed traffic, competition reduced profits because early steamships were so expensive to work. Private owners re sented government vessels. Their operating costs were easily met, and it was alle ged that they were a drain on the national purse and less convenient for the public.3 Extravagance in government departments had become a lively political issue and in 1834 the Post Office yielded to pressure by awarding the first mail contract to a private company, the General Steam Navigation Company, for a service to Rotterdam and Ham burg .4 In the next year, in response to demand
from British and Indian mercantile interests, a government subsidy enabled the East India company to begin a mail service by steam between Bombay and Suez, a move as much political (to counteract French influence) as commercial in in tention because it enabled the newly developed overland route across Egypt to speed up communication with India. Naval steamers then carried mail through the Mediterranean to England .5
