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Ralph Carr: A Newcastle Merchant and the American Colonial Trade
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 June 2012
Abstract
What were the ingredients for success for British merchants in the eighteenth-century trans-Atlantic trade? In the failure of Ralph Carr of Newcastle to market European goods in America during the 1750's, Professor Roberts personalizes an answer.
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- Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1968
References
1 On the value of analyzing the mistakes of businessmen, see Bruchey, Stuart, “Success and Failure Factors: American Merchants in Foreign Trade in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries,” Business History Review, XXXII (Autumn, 1958), 272–92CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
2 The Carr Business Papers are part of the Carr-Ellison Collection on deposit at Northumberland Record Office, Newcastle upon Tyne, 3 and are quoted with the permission of the family. Beginning in 1748, the American correspondence is segregated into two letterbooks which supply the basis for this study. Unless otherwise indicated, all letters cited hereafter are from this source. A thorough study of Ralph Carr's entire business career is being done by Professor W. Mark Hughes of the University of Durham.
3 On the eighteenth-century trade between Amsterdam and New York, see Harrington, Virginia, The New York Merchant on the Eve of the Revolution (New York, 1935)Google Scholar, and White, Philip L., The Beekmans of New York (New York, 1956)Google Scholar.
4 New York vessels usually stayed with Carr only three or four days. See Letters to Gulian Verplanck and Robert Crommelin, August 1, 1749, and David Provoost, September 10, 1756. Customs clearance alone generally took two days. Letter to Nathaniel Marston, May 27, 1752.
5 See Letter to Thomas Hutchinson, August 21, 1750, regarding an error in charging commission at 2 per cent instead of 2½ per cent.
6 The cheapness of ballast commodities in comparison to their bulk make the tonnages run high. For example, a Newcastle chaldron of coal, weighing 2.97 U.S. tons, cost only 9s. to 11s. for “Smiths' Coals” (small coal fit for a blacksmith's fire). For coal prices see Letters to the following Boston merchants: John Jones (June 29, 1749), William Cooper (February 18, 1748/49), John Irving (August 15, 1752), and Thomas Boylston (February 14, 1760). Grindstones were equally cheap in proportion to weight and bulk. See Letter to Thomas Boylston, February 14, 1760.
7 See, for example, Carr's list of certificates needed from New York in Letter to Charles and Robert Crommelin, June 6, 1753.
8 Letter to William Mollineaux, August 11, 1757.
9 Carr charged for this service. He charged Mollineaux a fee of 3s. for collecting a drawback of £9–9–0, an amount considerably less than the standard 2½ per cent commission. Letter to William Mollineaux, February 14, 1760
10 On the vigorous expansion of the export of new textiles and metalwares to the North American colonies following King George's War, consult Davis, Ralph, “English Foreign Trade, 1700–1774,” Economic History Review, Series 2, XV (1962), 285–303Google Scholar. For a recent description of the industrial growth of Yorkshire and the Northeast at this time, consult Wilson, Charles, England's Apprenticeship, 1603–1763 (New York, 1965), 294–96, 303Google Scholar.
11 Letter to Henry and John Cruger and Nathaniel Marston, June 26, 1750.
12 According to an estimate in the Rockingham Papers, such savings were considerable:
Rockingham Papers, R–42–8, Sheffield Central Library, Sheffield, 1 quoted with the permission of Earl Fitzwilliam. These figures support the contention of Ebenezer McCulloch of the British Linen Company that charges for the sale of Scottish Linens in London were 7 to 7½ per cent. See Hamilton, Henry, An Economic History of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century (Oxford, 1963), 152Google Scholar.
13 Letter to Henry Lane, January 21, 1752.
14 Regarding Carr's interest in the British Linen Company, see Letter to Ralph Inman, January 4, 1750/51, and Letter to Thomas Gunter, March 20, 1750/51.
15 On the founding of the British Linen Company and their efforts to compete with European linens in the American market, consult Henry Hamilton, Economic History of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century, 149–53, and Campbell, R. H., Scotland since 1707 (New York, 1965), 61–62Google Scholar.
16 “I dare say you'll find nothing from Holland or Hamburg to equal them in quality and cheapness.” Letter to Adoniah Schuyler and Henry Cuyler, Jr., June 26, 1750. Carr claimed the transportation costs from Edinburgh to Newcastle were “a trifle expense.” Letter to Ralph Inman, January 4, 1750/51.
17 Letter to Henry Lane and Isaac La Touch, May 25, 1751.
18 Letter to Henry Lane, January 21, 1752.
19 Letters to Verplanck and Crommelin, June 26, 1750, July 15, 1750, July 28, 1750, and March 20, 1750/51; Letter to Henry and John Cruger and John Watts, July 19, 1751; Letter to John and Philip Livingston and David Provoost, June 4, 1751; and Letter to Henry Lane, October 6, 1751.
20 Letters to Cornelius Clopper, Jr., May 31, 1751, August 23, 1751, May 27, 1752, March 2, 1753, May 3, 1753, and September 25, 1753. Letter to John Beekman, April 8, 1757.
21 On the prevalence of smuggling among New York merchants, consult Harrington, New York Merchant, and White, Beekmans of New York.
22 This method of smuggling is described by Sir Charles Hardy, Governor of New York, in a letter to the Board of Trade, July 10, 1757: “Another method the Importers take is to stop at some of the Outports of Britain (in their outward passage from Holland) and make a report and enter only half their cargo, by which the King is defrauded of his duty on the other half;…” New York Colonial Documents (Albany, 1856), VII, 272Google Scholar. Cadwallader Colden, while serving as Lieutenant Governor in 1763, also described New York smuggling technique to the Board of Trade: “I have lately observed that one method taken to cover and conceal Illicit Trade from Holland (the most injurious to Great Britain of all in America) is by ships from Holland taking in a double cargo, one part of which is entered and duties paid in Britain, the other part is pretended to be for some foreign port, and is accordingly reported in the Ports of Great Britain;.… An Act of Parliament seems necessary to prevent this fraud, by prohibiting any vessels carrying any goods into America from Holland under any pretence, without having first paid duties in Britain.” Ibid., VII, p. 585.
23 Letter to Adoniah Schuyler and Henry Cuyler, Jr., June 26, 1750.
24 Letter to Henry and John Cruger, Nathaniel Marston, and John Watts, March 20, 1750/51
25 Letter to Adoniah Schuyler and Henry Cuyler, Jr., July 22, 1749.
26 Letter to Adoniah Schuyler and Henry Cuyler, Jr., June 26, 1750.
27 Letter to Henry Lane, August 21, 1750.
28 Ibid.
29 Letter to Henry and John Cruger and John Watts, June 3, 1751; Letter to Philip and John Livingston and David Provoost, September 7, 1756.
30 Letter to Henry Lane, October 6, 1751.
31 Letter to Charles Crommelin, September 17, 1755.
32 Letter to Philip and John Livingston and David Provoost, September 7, 1756.
33 Letter to Adoniah Schuyler, September 9, 1756.
34 See Letters to: Tole and Piekerman, September 15, 1755; William Kelly, September 29, 1756; The Owners of the Charming Nancy, April 8, 1757; and Bomper and De Ronde, August 27, 1761.
35 Regarding activities of New York merchants during the French and Indian War, see Harrington, New York Merchant.
36 The thirty-six vessels cleared for New York include an indeterminate number which were engaged in smuggling and took little or no goods from Newcastle.
37 At mid-century the Northeast was the foremost shipbuilding center in England. See Davis, Ralph, Rise of the English Shipping Industry in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (London, 1962), 61–66Google Scholar.
38 Letter to Ralph Inman, January 4, 1751.
39 Letter to Edmund Quincy, June 29, 1749.
40 Letter to Edmund Quincy and Son, March 20, 1750/51; Letter to Quincy, Mason, and Jenkinson, May 7, 1751.
41 Letters to William Bowdoin, July 14, 1750 to May 10, 1751 (fourteen letters).
42 Letter to Inman and Gunter, August 13, 1751.
43 Letter to Ralph Inman, June 16, 1752.
44 Letter to Thomas Gunter, June 16, 1752.
45 Letter to Ralph Inman, June 16, 1752.
46 Letter to Inman and Gunter, July 9, 1751.
47 Letter to Ralph Inman, June 16, 1752.
48 Letter to Ralph Inman, March 12, 1754 to July 8, 1760 (nine letters).
49 See Letters to: John Scollay, January 15, 1757 and December 7, 1757; Samuel Hughes, February 8, 1760 and February 19, 1760; Timothy Fitch, August 11, 1761; Andrew Oliver, August 11, 1761; and Samuel Hewes and Son, July 22, 1760.
50 Letter to Stephen and William Greenleaf, August 21, 1751.
51 Letters to Thomas Fletcher, September 21, 1750 to March 19, 1751 (four letters); Letters to William Fletcher, May 7, 1751 to February 26, 1761 (seventeen letters).
52 See Letters to Joseph and Peter Harrison of Newport, July 17, 1753 and March 26, 1754. These shipments were at the direction of two firms in Hull: the house of Mssrs. Rawson, and that of Christopher Scott.
53 See Letters to Quincy, Mason, and Jenkinson, March 15, 1751 to November 2, 1753 (eight letters); Letter to Joseph and Peter Harrison, March 26, 1754; and Letter to Josiah Quincy, September 18, 1753.
54 Letter to Quincy, Mason, and Jenkinson, March 15, 1751.
55 Letter to Ralph Inman, June 16, 1752.
56 See, for example, the letters selected by Bruchey, Stuart to illustrate typical business operations of colonial merchants in The Colonial Merchant, Sources and Readings, (New York, 1966)Google Scholar, especially the letters of Henry Laurens of Charleston and of Jackson and Bromfield of Newburyport, Massachusetts to merchants in Bristol, Birmingham, and Liverpool concerning the establishment of correspondence by shipments of manufactured goods on credit (pp. 146–51, 188–89).
57 Roberts, William I. III, “Samuel Storke: An Eighteenth Century London Merchant Trading to the American Colonies,” Business History Review, XXXIX (Summer, 1965), 147–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
58 William I. Roberts, III, “The Losses of a Loyalist Merchant in Georgia,” to be published in the Georgia Historical Quarterly.
59 Soltow, J. H., “Scottish Traders in Virginia, 1750–1775,” Economic History Review, Series 2, XII (1959), 83–97Google Scholar.
60 Letter to Cornelius Clopper, Jr., September 25, 1753.
61 According to Henry Hamilton, this was the period of greatest growth in the export of Scottish linens to the colonies (Economic History of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century, 262–63). Soltow speaks of the use of “extensive credit” in the Piedmont tobacco trade (“Scottish Traders in Virginia, 1750–1775,” Loc. cit. pp. 95ff.).
62 Letter to Henry Lane, January 21, 1752.
63 Bruchey, Stuart's essay, The Roots of American Economic Growth, 1607–1861 (New York, 1965)Google Scholar, illustrates this point. Bruchey emphasizes the role of British credit in the development of the southern colonies (pp. 31–37), but ignores it in discussing the merchants of the northern colonies (pp. 48–57).