Note 389 — Chapter III

‘By the Union, however, new views were opened up to the merchants of the city; they thereby obtained the liberty of a free commerce to America and the West Indies, from which they had been before shut out; they chartered English vessels for these voyages, having none at first fit for the purpose; sent out cargoes of goods for the use of the colonies, and returned home laden with tobacco. The business doing well, vessels were built belonging to the city, and in the year 1718, the first ship, the property of Glasgow, crossed the Atlantic.’ Denholm's History of Glasgow, p. 405, 3rd edit. Glasgow, 1804. Brown (History of Glasgow, vol. ii. p. 330, Edinburgh, 1797) says, that the Glasgow merchants ‘chartered Whitehaven ships for many years:’ but that, ‘in 1716, a vessel of sixty tons burden was launched at Crawford's dike, being the first Clyde ship that went to the British Settlements in America with goods and a supercargo.’ But this date is probably two years too early. Mr. M'Culloch, in his excellent Geographical and Statistical Dictionary, London, 1849, vol. ii. p. 659, says: ‘But for a while, the merchants of Glasgow, who first embarked in the trade to America, carried it on by means of vessels belonging to English ports; and it was not till 1718 that a ship built in Scotland (in the Clyde), the property of Scotch owners, sailed for the American colonies.’ Gibson, also (History of Glasgow, 1777, p. 206), says: ‘In 1718, the first vessel of the property of Glasgow crossed the Atlantic.’ And, to the same effect, Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. v. p. 498, Edinburgh, 1793.