The ships without a timetable
A liner sails on a route and a schedule. A tramp does not. A tramp steamer is a cargo ship that goes where cargo is available, loading whatever a charterer wants carried and sailing to wherever it is wanted, at a freight rate agreed for that voyage or for a period of time. The word “tramp” carried a certain romance in the 19th century, and the ships became the workhorses of the steam age.
The tramp model solved a problem. Steam made it possible to run to a timetable, but only some trades had enough cargo to fill a regular service. Coal, grain, ore, timber, sugar and many other raw materials moved in bulk and often in seasons, and their producers did not need a ship every week. Tramps filled the gap.
The British tramp
Britain dominated the tramp trade for much of the 19th and early 20th centuries. British coal was in demand around the world, and the ports of South Wales and north-east England sent out coal in large quantities, both for export and to supply the bunkering stations on which steamers depended. A common pattern was coal outward and a different cargo, such as grain, ore or timber, on the way home. Ships able to find cargo for both legs made money; ships that sailed empty on one leg risked losses.
The typical tramp was plain and economical. It had a simple hull with large hatches, one or two decks, a single engine, a modest crew and little comfort. Builders on the Tyne, Wear, Tees and Clyde produced them in large numbers, and the application of iron shipbuilding and later steel made hulls cheaper and stronger. Compound and then triple-expansion engines kept coal consumption low, which was the main running cost.
The charter market
Tramps were fixed through brokers, who matched ships with cargoes on markets such as the Baltic Exchange in London. A charter could cover a single voyage, a series of voyages or a period of months or years. Owners often owned only one or a few ships, and many of the enterprises were small family firms, which gave the trade a reputation for competitiveness and uncertainty. Freight rates rose and fell sharply with the state of trade, and a ship could be a good investment or a heavy liability depending on timing.
This wide variability gave tramp owners reasons to economise, and in the late 19th century it also led to concerns about overloaded and badly maintained ships. The reforms associated with the Plimsoll line, which marked the legal limit of loading, belong to this period.
The two world wars and after
The tramp fleet was vital in both world wars as a source of cargo capacity, and tramps were heavily attacked. During the Second World War the United States built very large numbers of standardised cargo ships known as Liberty ships, and many were sold and used as tramps in the years after 1945. The convoy system that protected such ships is described in the account of the Atlantic convoy battle.
After the war, the old general-purpose tramp began to lose ground. Costs were rising, crews were smaller on newer ships, and specialist designs offered better economics on the main bulk routes.
The rise of the bulk carrier
A bulk carrier is a ship designed for dry bulk cargoes: coal, iron ore, grain, bauxite, phosphate and similar loads. It has a single large cargo space divided into holds, big hatches for rapid loading and unloading, and machinery placed aft. This layout appeared earlier on the Great Lakes of North America, where long, narrow ships moved iron ore and grain from the late 19th century, and it spread to ocean trade as the postwar economy grew.
Loading and discharge became faster as shore equipment, including grabs, conveyors and chutes, developed. Bulk terminals, built at coal and ore ports, helped to cut port times, and the change on the quays mirrored the one container shipping brought to general cargo. Some of the same dock labour that had once shovelled and sacked cargo was replaced by machinery.
Size classes and canals
Bulk carriers grew in size, because bigger ships carry cargo more cheaply per tonne. Their classes are named after the canals they can use:
- Handysize and Handymax ships, which can use most ports.
- Panamax, built to fit the locks of the Panama Canal transit.
- Capesize, too large for those locks and so named because they have traditionally gone around the Cape of Good Hope or Cape Horn.
The largest ore carriers are among the biggest ships afloat, carrying well over 300,000 tonnes of cargo in some cases. Their routes link major iron-ore exporters, such as Australia and Brazil, with steel producers in East Asia and Europe.
Registration and crews
From the 20th century, many owners moved ships to flags of convenience such as Panama and Liberia, where regulation and taxes were lower. The practice is controversial: critics have pointed to weaker oversight and poorer conditions, while owners cite costs and competitive pressure. The bulk trade has also had a long history of casualties, leading to rule changes on survey, loading and hatch strength.
Why the story matters
Tramps and bulk carriers rarely feature in popular maritime history, yet they carried most of the weight of world trade. Without their low freight rates, imported grain and ore would have been far more expensive, and the industrial economies of Europe and later Asia could not have grown as they did. The same family of ships, much enlarged and standardised, still does that work.