History
The Company was set up with less than £5,000, given to Richardson by his father in 1860. This was enough for him to found the Neptune Shipyard at Wallsend.
Its first ship, a 65 ft (20 m) paddle steamer called Victoria, was launched on the River Tyne that summer. She was commissioned to carry passengers, carts and livestock between Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight, and is thought to have cost around £700.
At least part of Wigham Richardson's success in the latter part of the 19th century was through the surge in demand for passenger ships, taking emigrants to the New World.
In 1903, Wigham Richardson merged with Swan and Hunter specifically to bid for the prestigious contract to build the RMS Mauretania. Their bid was successful, and she went on to capture the Blue Riband for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic - a record she held for two decades. Even today, she is the largest liner ever built on the Tyne.
The company flourished, and between 1906 and 1912, no other company in the world could match it in terms of the tonnage of shipping produced. In 1907, for example, 15% of the world's shipping, in tonnage terms, was built by Swan Hunter and Wigham Richardson.
Read more about this topic: Wigham Richardson
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