Greek Steamship Company - Late 1880s Decline

Late 1880s Decline

Sometime towards the end of the 1880s decline became apparent at the Greek Steamship Company. One factor was the opening of the Corinth Canal in 1882 which meant that much shipping travelled by a more direct route rather than going by Syros. Another factor was the expansion of railways, offering alternative methods for getting goods between destinations. A third factor was the growth of Piraeus, the port of Athens, which had evolved into the primary port in Greece (Athens in the meantime had overtaken Ermoupoli as the chief centre of Greek trade). The decline in ship building and repair on Syros was further accelerated following the Balkan Wars of 1912-13 when centres such as Crete, Chios, Samos, Epiros and southern Macedonia were united into Greece -- each of these became important commercial centres.

As he sensed the competition coming from Piraeus and Athens (and other locations), Stephanos Skouloudis a member of Parliament representing Syros led strenuous campaigns in both 1881 and 1890 to seek to forge a large "Greek National Steamship Company" (which would have included the Greek Steamship Company), but these efforts eventually failed to keep steamship firms based in Syros. In 1892 the company found itself compelled into bankruptcy. John MacDowell and Barber Co. (owners of the "Hephaistos" shipyard at Piraeus) rented the ships and factory.

In a letter dated April 12, 1893 British Consul William Henry Cottrell (who lived in Ermoupoli) stated that "ten steamers belonging to the Hellenic Steam Navigation Company were sold off" and that the company had gone bankrupt. One consequence of this, which Cottrell highlighted in the same letter, was the disruption of the postal service to and from Syros. The loss of the ten steamships was more than a loss of ships, it was a major blow to the retreating economy of Syros which had been the economic centre of Greece until the mid-19th century.

Significant effort went into launching the "New Greek Steamship Company" later in the 1890s, but this was short-lived and in 1905 was declared bankrupt.