Steerage trade
In 1848, John Stanton Williams (c. 1810–1876) and Stephen Barker Guion (1820-1885) formed the New York firm of Williams and Guion to operate the Black Star Line of sailing packets on the Liverpool-Queenstown-New York route.[5] In 1852, Guion relocated to Liverpool as the firm's agent while Williams remained in New York.[5] The next year, Guion's older brother, William H. Guion joined the firm's New York office.[5] The Black Star Line concentrated on the steerage trade[6] and ultimately owned 18 sailing ships.[5] Black Star was shut down in 1863 because of the success of iron-screw liners in attracting steerage passengers and the danger of Confederate commerce raiders during the Civil War.[1] Stephen Guion, by now a naturalized British citizen, contracted with the Cunard Line and the National Line to provide steerage passengers.[3]
In 1866, Stephen Guion incorporated the Liverpool and Great Western Steamship Company in Great Britain to operate a quartet of 2,900 GRT liners for a weekly service to New York.[1] Although 52% of the capital came from the Williams and Guion partnership,[5] the Guion Line was formed as a British company because American law only allowed U.S.-built ships to be registered in the U.S., and American shipyards were incapable at that time of building the iron-hulled screw steamers required to compete on this route.[3] Guion took advantage of an 1846 legal decision that considered a British corporation as a British citizen even if its shareholders were largely foreigners.[3]
By 1870, the Guion Line ranked third in the delivery of immigrants to New York, with 27,054 steerage passengers, but only 1,115 first class.[3] The line's eight ships were known as good sea-boats and had a reputation for innovative engineering.[6] Guion's Wisconsin and Wyoming were the first liners on the Atlantic built with compound engines.[1] Unfortunately, Guion's ships also had a reputation for being slow.[7] In 1873, the New York Times urged the U.S. Post Office to contract with another line because of the long passage times of Guion ships.[7]
Ocean greyhounds
The five-year shipping depression beginning in 1873 changed the character of the Guion Line. By 1875, the fleet was reduced to the four newest ships.[1] The directors decided that they needed record breakers to change the company's image and ordered two 17 knot steamers, the Montana and the Dakota, to win the Blue Riband. However, both ships proved to be major failures and only achieved 11.5 knots in service.[1] In 1877, Dakota became a total loss after stranding off Anglesey, and in 1880 Montana was lost after she also stranded only a few miles away from her sister.[1] Guion purchased Cunard's ten-year-old Abyssinia to take her place in the schedule.[1]
William Pearce, the controlling partner of the John Elder shipyard, was convinced that a crack steamer that carried only passengers and light freight could be profitable because she would attract more passengers and spend less time in port.[6]
Final chapter
The new directors, chaired by Sir William Pearce himself, continued a weekly schedule with the old Nevada, Wisconsin and Wyoming along with the relatively new Arizona and Alaska, while Abyssinia was put on long-term charter to the Canadian Pacific Line. In 1886, the line was granted a share of the British transatlantic mail contract. However, the company's reputation was hurt in 1891 when the recently returned Abyssinia burned at sea, fortunately without loss of life.[9] In 1892, the cholera scare caused New York officials to quarantine vessels arriving with steerage passengers.[10] The Wyoming was one of the ships detained and a crewman on the ship died of cholera.[10] Immigration regulation was taken over by the Federal Government and steamship lines were made responsible for returning any immigrants found unfit. In December 1892, Guion directors decided to retire the three oldest steamers, which were primarily in the steerage trade.[4] In 1894, outpaced by the latest twin-screw liners from Cunard, White Star and Inman, the directors also withdrew the two former record breakers and liquidated the remaining assets.[1]
