Booth Line
House flag of the Booth Steamship Co
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| Fate | divided and sold |
|---|---|
| Founded | Liverpool, United Kingdom, 1863 |
| Founder | Alfred Booth; Charles Booth |
| Defunct | 1986 |
| Headquarters | Liverpool, United Kingdom |
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Area served
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UK, USA, South America |
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Key people
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Alfred Allen Booth |
| Services | leather, merchant shipping, tourism, civil engineering |
Alfred Booth and Company was a British trading and shipping company that was founded in 1866 and traded for more than a century. It was founded in Liverpool, England, by two brothers, Alfred and Charles Booth. It grew into a significant merchant shipping company with its head office in Liverpool and interests in the USA and South America. The group was broken up in 1964 and the last Booth company from the group was sold in 1986.
Alfred and Charles Booth were cousins of William James Lamport, co-founder of the Liverpool shipping company Lamport and Holt Line, and worked in the company's office. In 1851 Lamport transferred minority shareholdings in a cargo steamship, the Nile, to several associates including Charles Booth and George Holt. In 1854 Lamport, Holt, Booth and Holt's father, also called George Holt, all took minority shares in a new ship, the Orontes. At the time it was common for a merchant ship to be in 64 shares held by a number of owners. Charles Booth had two shares in the Nile and one in the Orontes.
In 1863 the Booth brothers founded a partnership, Alfred Booth and Company, to export English light leather to the USA, which was in the midst of its civil war. The company had headquarters in Liverpool and a US office in New York City.
In February 1865 the Booth brothers ordered two new ships. Once again they were part-owners; relatives including Alfred Holt and his brother Philip held most of the remaining 64 shares in each ship. The ships were named Augustine and Jerome after St Augustine of Hippo and St Jerome, two of the great Doctors of the Church. It became a company tradition to name ships after notable bishops and other historic figures. The ships carried English leather, both tanned and untanned, to the USA. In 1866 Booths started a regular steamship service between Liverpool and ports in northern Brazil and on the Amazon River. In 1881 the shipping line became a limited company, Booth Steamship Co Ltd.
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