Macgregor Laird

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Macgregor Laird (* 1808 in Greenock , Scotland , † January 9, 1861 in London ) was a Scottish traveling salesman in Africa and a pioneer in establishing British trade on Niger .

Life

Macgregor Laird was the younger son of the Scottish shipbuilder William Laird . He received his education in Edinburgh and worked in a mechanical engineering company in Liverpool until 1832 . In 1831 he and some Liverpool merchants founded a company for the commercial development of the Niger region. This company dispatched two ships to the Niger Delta in 1832, one of which, the Alburkah , a 55-ton paddle steamer designed by Laird, was the first iron-walled ship to sail the ocean. Laird accompanied the expedition led by Richard Lander , in which 48 Europeans took part, but only nine of them returned. The rest died of fever or fighting with African tribes; Lander died from a gunshot wound in the thigh. In this venture, Laird had sailed up the Niger to the confluence of its largest tributary, the Benue (then called Shary or Tschadda ) and explored the latter 130 km upstream. However, his health suffered greatly from the deprivation and climatic conditions. The expedition returned to Liverpool in 1834. In addition to Laird and surgeon R. A. K. Oldfield, Lieutenant William Allen was the only surviving officer on the voyage he had taken on the orders of the Admiralty to inspect Niger. Laird and Oldfield described their trip to Niger in Narrative of an Expedition into the Interior of Africa by the River Niger… in 1832, 1833, 1834 (2 vols., London 1837; 2nd ed. 1856).

After his return home, Laird initially participated in ventures to promote transatlantic steam shipping . In 1837 he supported a company that should operate a steamboat service between England and New York City ; and the ship belonging to this company, Sirius , was the first in 1838 to sail from Europe across the Atlantic to the United States by steam power alone . In 1844 Laird moved to Birkenhead and contributed significantly to the development of this town; and a few years later he moved to London.

In the last decade of his life, Laird devoted himself exclusively to promoting traffic with inland West Africa by opening up Niger shipping, even if he no longer went to the black continent himself. His view was that only through trade could Europe elevate the civilization of Africa and suppress the slave trade . Although the goal of Lander's journey of opening up direct traffic with the African interior had not been achieved, the navigability of the lower Niger and the ease of use of the great river for trade had been demonstrated. In 1852, with the support of friends and the British government, he founded the African Steamship Company , which was supposed to maintain monthly trips to the coast of Africa. In 1854 he equipped the steamer Pleiad , which, under the command of William Balfour Baikie, came up the Niger 400 km over the furthest point previously reached by Europeans. Encouraged by this success, he prompted the government to sign contracts for annual trade voyages by ships specially built for the Niger navigation. For this purpose he built the steamers Dayspring , Sunshine and Rainbow and let them sail frequently on the Niger. In the process, factories were established at the mouth of the Benue and further downstream the Niger. In early 1861, Laird died in London at the age of 52.

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personal data
SURNAME Laird, Macgregor
BRIEF DESCRIPTION scottish traveler
DATE OF BIRTH 1808
PLACE OF BIRTH Greenock
DATE OF DEATH January 9, 1861
Place of death London