"Adria" Royal Hungarian Sea Navigation Company Limited
Adria Plc. was the largest Hungarian commercial shipping company ever. It was founded in a succession of events between 1874 and 1882, after which it operated uninterrupted until the First World War. Its main activity was long-distance shipping from Rijeka to Western Europe and beyond.
History
Lajos Ossoinack's first attempts to organise regular boat services between Rijeka and Liverpool
As early as 1874, Lajos Ossoinack, Fiume's famous entrepreneurial genius, initiated an experiment with Count Géza Szápáry, the governor of Fiume, to have the state support the creation of a direct sea link between Fiume and Liverpool. Ossoinack was well aware of the fact that, in the context of the German customs policy in Bismarck, Hungarian flour and agricultural products could only be delivered to Western markets by sea, but the Fiume entrepreneur also had personal motives for setting up such a domestic company. As he himself was a shareholder in Hungária Gőzmalom Rt. in Budapest, it became in his interest to be able to transport Hungarian flour to England via Rijeka in barrels produced by his own factory (Ossoinack Mechanical Woodworking Ltd.). The first connection to Great Britain was made with the Liverpool company Glynn in 1877. The experiment was subsidised by the Hungarian state with a one-off contribution of 25,000 Frt. The experiment only partially fulfilled expectations, and there were problems with the quality of the ships and the number of services. The first steamship of the Fiume-Liverpool line, the Zancla, arrived at the port of Fiume on 17 March 1877 with 104 tons of cargo, and left on 20 March 1877 with 384 tons, mainly flour and to a lesser extent paper (Smith & Meynier). The company's second ship, the Zero, arrived in Rijeka a week later, on 28 March, with 29 tons of cargo and over 100 tons of goods. The parties first tried a direct Rijeka-Glasgow service in 1878, through the Maritime Authority, to ensure that Hungarian flour could be transported to the island markets by means other than transhipment from Liverpool. The British steamship Wilster made the first voyage in July 1878, fully loaded with 7,025 metric tons of flour. For the Rijeka-Glasgow line, Burrel & Son built the 986-tonne steamer Hungarian, which made its maiden voyage to Rijeka in May 1879. Within a short time, the Cunard line of Burns and Mac Iver was able to provide a service to New York via Liverpool. From the combination of these experiments and the involvement of additional shareholders (Burns & Mac Iver of Liverpool; Glarkson & Comp. of London), the Adria Steamship Company was born in 1880 and, after regular government support, the company was formally taken over by the Adria Hungarian Shipping Company in 1881.
The Adria Hungarian Royal Maritime Shipping Plc.
The headquarters of Adria Plc. became Budapest and its business centre became Rijeka. From then on, the state had a contractual relationship with Adria, which was renewed with increasing state support until 1914:
- 1880-1885: 150.000 Frt
- 1886-1890: 250.000 Frt
- 1891-1900: 570.000 Frt
- 1901-1914: 1.140.000 K
- April - July 1914: 5.200.000 K.
The new ports contracted in each year are shown in the figure below:
We have detailed data on the organisational hierarchy and structure of Adria Rt. from 1891. At that time the president of the Adria Hungarian Royal Shipping Company was István Szápáry; its vice-presidents were Sándor Lederer and Konrád Burchard. Péter Herczog, Mór Jókai, Member of Parliament, Hugó Kilényi, Minister Councillor, Leó Lánczy, János Ludvigh, Minister Councillor, Bertalan Molling, Gyula Posch, György Scheyrer, Jakab Simon and Sándor Szarvasy. The company's CEO was Emil Kuranda. The company initially had two departments: shipping and trading. In the stations of the statutory routes it maintained seven general agencies (Hoffmann S.W. in Hungary; Burrel&Son in Glasgow; Wilson&Co. in Hull; Cunard Steamship Company in Liverpool; Rombauer&Co. in Rio de Janeiro; Fratello Pardi di Giuseppe in Venice and Anchor Line in New York) and 43 agencies.
As Adria grew, so did its organisational structure.In 1896, a transport and technical department was added to the existing ones, and the company now had 14 general managers and 34 other agencies in cities in Western Europe, America and North Africa. In 1903 the company's management was also restructured. Leó Lánczy became the new chairman, Konrád Burchard and Sándor Matlekovits the vice-chairmen. This proved to be permanent, because the next restructuring took place in 1914, when the board of directors was already composed of Barta Arnold, Bernrieder János, Fleischl Sándor, Herczog Péter, Eidlitz Hugó, Kilényi Hugó, Kuranda Emil, Marx János. Gyula Posch, Jakab Simon, Sándor Teleky, Gyula Gerlóczy and István Kvassay. Adria then had 16 general agencies and 109 other agencies in all the major world ports.
In terms of salaries, we have data on the wages of seafarers who served with Adria Rt. These show that Adria Plc paid similar wages to other domestic long-distance shipping companies. Thus, depending on the length of service with the company, in 1914 first class captains earned between SEK 390 and 510 per month, second mates between SEK 270 and 300 and third mates between SEK 220 and 240. The monthly wages of the other seamen serving on the ship were as follows: a first class engineer earned between K 360 and 420, a second class engineer between K 270 and 300 and a third class engineer between K 220 and 240. The monthly wages of a master were 110 K, a chief mate 100 K, a helmsman 75 K, a mate 36-60 K, a mate 20-30 K, a chief engineer 115 K, a stoker 100 K, a coal stoker 63 K, a cook 120 K, a head waiter 86 K, a second waiter 60 K and a third waiter 40 K.
In the early history of the company, we have seen that Lajos Ossoinack proposed the creation of Adria to create a market for the export of Hungarian processed agricultural products to Britain. In fact, the port of Rijeka did indeed function later in the way Ossoinack had envisaged for Adria. It was through Fiume that foreign cheap colonial goods and raw materials arrived in Hungary and the city, some of which were processed by Fiume's industry and exported by sea as finished products. Adria Rt. was in fact a representative export company, since while raw materials such as paddy rice were mainly imported by free-ship companies from the Far East, processed paddy rice, starch, powder, rice flour, etc. were transported by Adria ships to Western Europe and America.
In this light, it is not surprising that a small part of the Adriatic's trade was accounted for by imports from Rijeka, a larger part by exports and the largest part by the company's own free trade. Initially, the largest share of the Adriatic's turnover was accounted for by exports from Fiume, but from 1893 onwards the company's own free trade clearly took the lead. In terms of figures, the latter meant that between 1883 and 1892, Rijeka exports accounted for an average of 61.12% (1,389,830 mt) of Adria's total turnover and free shipping turnover for 30.93% (703,268 q). On the other hand, between 1893 and 1902, exports decreased to 34,731 Ttpa (2,263,799 q) while free trade increased to 55,281 Ttpa (3,603,207 q) and this ratio remained the same into the third phase of the company's life, as between 1903 and 1913 exports increased by 31,541 Ttpa (3.004,331 q) and 59,89% (5,704,156 q) of the free shipping turnover, while the average annual turnover of imports from Rijeka in all three cycles was 8,84% (558,050 q).
The Articles of Association of Adria Ltd. of 1882 provided for the company's share capital of 2,500,000 Frt, through the issue of 12,500 shares with a nominal value of 200 Frt each. This share capital was first converted into SEK 2 500 000 in the 1890s, then increased to SEK 5 000 000 in 1892 and to SEK 10 000 000 in 1902 when the koruna was introduced. With regard to the company's shares listed on the stock exchange, it should be noted that the annual stock market value compared with the company's turnover is correlated with a value of 92%. In other words, the stock market value faithfully reflected the increase or decrease in Adria's turnover in a given year.
The company ceased trading at sea during the First World War and handed its ships over to the Navy. What was left of the company's fleet by 1918 was taken over by the Cossulich family of Rijeka, which by then had interests in Trieste. Although Adria, or its successor company, was still present in Hungary for a long time (the ticket office of Adria Rt. and the other Cosulich companies was in Thököly Street between the two world wars), the Hungarian company itself ceased to exist in 1921 and from then on the shares of the company were listed in lira as an Italian company.
Today, two iconic buildings stand as reminders of the former giant. The Adria Palace in Budapest's Liberty Square and the Adria Palaces on the quayside at Fiume are, and have always been, landmarks in the skylines of these cities.
(For more information see Pelles - Zsigmond 2018:95-118.)
Sources
- 1880:Act XXV.
- 1886:XXXI. tc.
- 1891:XXX. tc.
- 1914:Act XX.
- Budapest Gazette, 1 May 1877:3410.
- Budapest Gazette, 31 July 1878:5531.
- Budapest Gazette, 24 June 1879:4923.
- Compass (1875-1922)
- Državni Arhiv u Rijeci - Rijeka State Archives.
- DAR. PO-3. Adriatic captains.
- DAR. TH. 732-1914-I-4232.
- DAR. TH. 396-1907-I-5785.
- DAR. TH. 412-1907-XVIII-1768.
- DAR TH. 7-1907-IV-416.
- DAR. TH. 678-1913-I-10013.
- DAR. TH. 70-1892-XVIII-101.
- Béla Gonda (1906):The seafaring and the port of Fiume. Budapest. Fiume and the Fiumiume Shipyard.
- Hungarian Statistical Yearbooks 1885-1918. Budapest. The Athenaeum R. Society Book Printing House.
- Hungarian Maritime Yearbooks 1891-1914. Fiume. Published by the Hungarian Royal Maritime Authority of Fiume. Stabilimento Tipo-litografico di Emidio Mohovich.
- Pelles Márton - Zsigmond Gábor (2018): The Hungarian maritime trade history of Fiume (1868-1918). Pécs, Pro Pannonia.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, . May 15.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, 25 December 1878:409.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, 12 October 1879:409.
Founded in 1880
Termination time not set
Founders: Lajos Ossoinack
Securities issued:
| "Adria" Hungarian maritime shipping department. |
Decisive leaders:
1880 | gr. Tibor Károlyi; |
1885-1901 | gr. István Szapáry |
1902-1903 | Sándor Lederer |
1903-1918 | Leó Lánczy |
1920-1921 | Endre Ossoinack |
Principal activity: long distance shipping, cargo and first class passenger transport in the Atlantic and Mediterranean
Main products are not set
Seats:
1880-1921 | Budapest, V. Szabadság tér 16. |
Locations:
1880-1921 | Rijeka, Riva 16 |
Main milestones are not set
Author: by Dr. Márton Pelles
Founded in 1880
Founders: Lajos Ossoinack
Decisive leaders:
1880 | gr. Tibor Károlyi; |
1885-1901 | gr. István Szapáry |
1902-1903 | Sándor Lederer |
1903-1918 | Leó Lánczy |
1920-1921 | Endre Ossoinack |
Principal activity: long distance shipping, cargo and first class passenger transport in the Atlantic and Mediterranean
Main products are not set
Seats:
1880-1921 | Budapest, V. Szabadság tér 16. |
Locations:
1880-1921 | Rijeka, Riva 16 |
Main milestones are not set
Author: by Dr. Márton Pelles
"Adria" Royal Hungarian Sea Navigation Company Limited
Adria Plc. was the largest Hungarian commercial shipping company ever. It was founded in a succession of events between 1874 and 1882, after which it operated uninterrupted until the First World War. Its main activity was long-distance shipping from Rijeka to Western Europe and beyond.
History
Lajos Ossoinack's first attempts to organise regular boat services between Rijeka and Liverpool
As early as 1874, Lajos Ossoinack, Fiume's famous entrepreneurial genius, initiated an experiment with Count Géza Szápáry, the governor of Fiume, to have the state support the creation of a direct sea link between Fiume and Liverpool. Ossoinack was well aware of the fact that, in the context of the German customs policy in Bismarck, Hungarian flour and agricultural products could only be delivered to Western markets by sea, but the Fiume entrepreneur also had personal motives for setting up such a domestic company. As he himself was a shareholder in Hungária Gőzmalom Rt. in Budapest, it became in his interest to be able to transport Hungarian flour to England via Rijeka in barrels produced by his own factory (Ossoinack Mechanical Woodworking Ltd.). The first connection to Great Britain was made with the Liverpool company Glynn in 1877. The experiment was subsidised by the Hungarian state with a one-off contribution of 25,000 Frt. The experiment only partially fulfilled expectations, and there were problems with the quality of the ships and the number of services. The first steamship of the Fiume-Liverpool line, the Zancla, arrived at the port of Fiume on 17 March 1877 with 104 tons of cargo, and left on 20 March 1877 with 384 tons, mainly flour and to a lesser extent paper (Smith & Meynier). The company's second ship, the Zero, arrived in Rijeka a week later, on 28 March, with 29 tons of cargo and over 100 tons of goods. The parties first tried a direct Rijeka-Glasgow service in 1878, through the Maritime Authority, to ensure that Hungarian flour could be transported to the island markets by means other than transhipment from Liverpool. The British steamship Wilster made the first voyage in July 1878, fully loaded with 7,025 metric tons of flour. For the Rijeka-Glasgow line, Burrel & Son built the 986-tonne steamer Hungarian, which made its maiden voyage to Rijeka in May 1879. Within a short time, the Cunard line of Burns and Mac Iver was able to provide a service to New York via Liverpool. From the combination of these experiments and the involvement of additional shareholders (Burns & Mac Iver of Liverpool; Glarkson & Comp. of London), the Adria Steamship Company was born in 1880 and, after regular government support, the company was formally taken over by the Adria Hungarian Shipping Company in 1881.
The Adria Hungarian Royal Maritime Shipping Plc.
The headquarters of Adria Plc. became Budapest and its business centre became Rijeka. From then on, the state had a contractual relationship with Adria, which was renewed with increasing state support until 1914:
- 1880-1885: 150.000 Frt
- 1886-1890: 250.000 Frt
- 1891-1900: 570.000 Frt
- 1901-1914: 1.140.000 K
- April - July 1914: 5.200.000 K.
The new ports contracted in each year are shown in the figure below:
We have detailed data on the organisational hierarchy and structure of Adria Rt. from 1891. At that time the president of the Adria Hungarian Royal Shipping Company was István Szápáry; its vice-presidents were Sándor Lederer and Konrád Burchard. Péter Herczog, Mór Jókai, Member of Parliament, Hugó Kilényi, Minister Councillor, Leó Lánczy, János Ludvigh, Minister Councillor, Bertalan Molling, Gyula Posch, György Scheyrer, Jakab Simon and Sándor Szarvasy. The company's CEO was Emil Kuranda. The company initially had two departments: shipping and trading. In the stations of the statutory routes it maintained seven general agencies (Hoffmann S.W. in Hungary; Burrel&Son in Glasgow; Wilson&Co. in Hull; Cunard Steamship Company in Liverpool; Rombauer&Co. in Rio de Janeiro; Fratello Pardi di Giuseppe in Venice and Anchor Line in New York) and 43 agencies.
As Adria grew, so did its organisational structure.In 1896, a transport and technical department was added to the existing ones, and the company now had 14 general managers and 34 other agencies in cities in Western Europe, America and North Africa. In 1903 the company's management was also restructured. Leó Lánczy became the new chairman, Konrád Burchard and Sándor Matlekovits the vice-chairmen. This proved to be permanent, because the next restructuring took place in 1914, when the board of directors was already composed of Barta Arnold, Bernrieder János, Fleischl Sándor, Herczog Péter, Eidlitz Hugó, Kilényi Hugó, Kuranda Emil, Marx János. Gyula Posch, Jakab Simon, Sándor Teleky, Gyula Gerlóczy and István Kvassay. Adria then had 16 general agencies and 109 other agencies in all the major world ports.
In terms of salaries, we have data on the wages of seafarers who served with Adria Rt. These show that Adria Plc paid similar wages to other domestic long-distance shipping companies. Thus, depending on the length of service with the company, in 1914 first class captains earned between SEK 390 and 510 per month, second mates between SEK 270 and 300 and third mates between SEK 220 and 240. The monthly wages of the other seamen serving on the ship were as follows: a first class engineer earned between K 360 and 420, a second class engineer between K 270 and 300 and a third class engineer between K 220 and 240. The monthly wages of a master were 110 K, a chief mate 100 K, a helmsman 75 K, a mate 36-60 K, a mate 20-30 K, a chief engineer 115 K, a stoker 100 K, a coal stoker 63 K, a cook 120 K, a head waiter 86 K, a second waiter 60 K and a third waiter 40 K.
In the early history of the company, we have seen that Lajos Ossoinack proposed the creation of Adria to create a market for the export of Hungarian processed agricultural products to Britain. In fact, the port of Rijeka did indeed function later in the way Ossoinack had envisaged for Adria. It was through Fiume that foreign cheap colonial goods and raw materials arrived in Hungary and the city, some of which were processed by Fiume's industry and exported by sea as finished products. Adria Rt. was in fact a representative export company, since while raw materials such as paddy rice were mainly imported by free-ship companies from the Far East, processed paddy rice, starch, powder, rice flour, etc. were transported by Adria ships to Western Europe and America.
In this light, it is not surprising that a small part of the Adriatic's trade was accounted for by imports from Rijeka, a larger part by exports and the largest part by the company's own free trade. Initially, the largest share of the Adriatic's turnover was accounted for by exports from Fiume, but from 1893 onwards the company's own free trade clearly took the lead. In terms of figures, the latter meant that between 1883 and 1892, Rijeka exports accounted for an average of 61.12% (1,389,830 mt) of Adria's total turnover and free shipping turnover for 30.93% (703,268 q). On the other hand, between 1893 and 1902, exports decreased to 34,731 Ttpa (2,263,799 q) while free trade increased to 55,281 Ttpa (3,603,207 q) and this ratio remained the same into the third phase of the company's life, as between 1903 and 1913 exports increased by 31,541 Ttpa (3.004,331 q) and 59,89% (5,704,156 q) of the free shipping turnover, while the average annual turnover of imports from Rijeka in all three cycles was 8,84% (558,050 q).
The Articles of Association of Adria Ltd. of 1882 provided for the company's share capital of 2,500,000 Frt, through the issue of 12,500 shares with a nominal value of 200 Frt each. This share capital was first converted into SEK 2 500 000 in the 1890s, then increased to SEK 5 000 000 in 1892 and to SEK 10 000 000 in 1902 when the koruna was introduced. With regard to the company's shares listed on the stock exchange, it should be noted that the annual stock market value compared with the company's turnover is correlated with a value of 92%. In other words, the stock market value faithfully reflected the increase or decrease in Adria's turnover in a given year.
The company ceased trading at sea during the First World War and handed its ships over to the Navy. What was left of the company's fleet by 1918 was taken over by the Cossulich family of Rijeka, which by then had interests in Trieste. Although Adria, or its successor company, was still present in Hungary for a long time (the ticket office of Adria Rt. and the other Cosulich companies was in Thököly Street between the two world wars), the Hungarian company itself ceased to exist in 1921 and from then on the shares of the company were listed in lira as an Italian company.
Today, two iconic buildings stand as reminders of the former giant. The Adria Palace in Budapest's Liberty Square and the Adria Palaces on the quayside at Fiume are, and have always been, landmarks in the skylines of these cities.
(For more information see Pelles - Zsigmond 2018:95-118.)
Sources
- 1880:Act XXV.
- 1886:XXXI. tc.
- 1891:XXX. tc.
- 1914:Act XX.
- Budapest Gazette, 1 May 1877:3410.
- Budapest Gazette, 31 July 1878:5531.
- Budapest Gazette, 24 June 1879:4923.
- Compass (1875-1922)
- Državni Arhiv u Rijeci - Rijeka State Archives.
- DAR. PO-3. Adriatic captains.
- DAR. TH. 732-1914-I-4232.
- DAR. TH. 396-1907-I-5785.
- DAR. TH. 412-1907-XVIII-1768.
- DAR TH. 7-1907-IV-416.
- DAR. TH. 678-1913-I-10013.
- DAR. TH. 70-1892-XVIII-101.
- Béla Gonda (1906):The seafaring and the port of Fiume. Budapest. Fiume and the Fiumiume Shipyard.
- Hungarian Statistical Yearbooks 1885-1918. Budapest. The Athenaeum R. Society Book Printing House.
- Hungarian Maritime Yearbooks 1891-1914. Fiume. Published by the Hungarian Royal Maritime Authority of Fiume. Stabilimento Tipo-litografico di Emidio Mohovich.
- Pelles Márton - Zsigmond Gábor (2018): The Hungarian maritime trade history of Fiume (1868-1918). Pécs, Pro Pannonia.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, . May 15.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, 25 December 1878:409.
- Railway and Transport Gazette, 12 October 1879:409.