Andrew Norman, Bound for the East Indies: Halsewell - Shipwreck that Gripped the Nation by Jacob Bart Hak

In 1602, Elizabeth I gave her assent to a charter to the Honourable East India Company (HEIC) that granted a monopoly of trade between London and the East Indies.Trade with the East was not without challenge.The Dutch and the French had also made their way to the subcontinent and the rich islands of Indonesia.Although the English Navy defeated the Dutch in the First Anglo-Dutch War (1652-1654), the Dutch stayed entrenched in the eastern trade.The HEIC broadened its horizons, obtained footholds in Asia and the fight between England and France was concluded with defeat of the latter at Arcot in 1751.Internal resistance in Bengal was squashed at Plassey in 1757.While the Royal Navy controlled the seas, the HEIC ruled a large part of the Subcontinent.It was for them the Honourable Company's Ship Halsewell sailed the seas and carried their trade.The ship was launched on 24 August 1778, with three masts and three decks, it displaced 776 tons, had a length of 139 feet, 7 inches, and was armed with 26 cannons.The HEIC traded in the best of the products of the East: mace, nutmeg, tea, sugar, silks, cloths, precious stones like rubies, diamonds, sapphires, pearls, red coral, indigo, cotton wool, linen, pepper, rice, ginger, opium, exotic birds, and beasts.Halsewell's captain, Richard Peirce, was born 1736 in Calcutta, the capital of the Indian State of Bengal.In 1761, aged 25, Peirce was made third mate on HCS Horsenden, and sailed to China.A few years later, he was second mate on Pacific.In 1767, in London, Peirce married Mary Burston.They lived at Kingston-upon-Thames, in Surrey, raising two sons, and seven daughters.In 1768, Peirce became captain of East Indiaman Earl of Ashburnham, making several voyages to China.Appointed captain of Halsewell in 1778, Peirce's first voyage to India and China lasted three years and spanned 35,000 nautical miles.On board the vessel was a cargo of copper, plus an army detachment of ninety-three military personnel, plus five women, and two children.The ship called into Madeira, Goree (Senegal), Table Bay in South Africa, Madras, and China.During this voyage Peirce lost a part of his crew to a British naval officer named Horatio Nelson, whose vessel was short-handed.On Peirce's second voyage with Halsewell in 1782, he sailed to Cape Verde, East Africa, and the Bay of Bengal, with a cargo of copper, lead, iron, and brass ordnance.On board were 141 military personnel, two women, the painter Johan Zofany, who had painted a portrait of King George III, his Queen and family, and portraits for royals on the European mainland.On the return voyage, the cargo consisted of bales of cotton and sappan wood [an astringent].

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