Vereenigde Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Maatschappij

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The Vereenigde Nederlandsche Scheepvaartmaatschappij (VNS) was a Dutch shipping company that existed from 1920 to 1970 .

history

From the foundation to the Second World War

The end of the First World War was followed by a period of high demand for freight tonnage. At the same time, German shipping companies had little competition for Dutch shipping companies due to the lack of shipping space. In this phase of the boom, the following Dutch shipping companies decided to set up a new company to fill this gap.

Together they raised a start-up capital of 200 million guilders and on April 30, 1920, the NV Vereenigde Nederlandsche Scheepvaartmaatschappij (VNS) was founded in 's-Gravenhage . The VNS took over the jointly operated Holland-British-Indië Lijn of Holland Amerika Lijn and Van Ommeren, Holland-Australië Lijn of Rotterdamsche Lloyd, Holland-Oost Azië Lijn of Stoomvaart Maatschappij "Nederland" and Holland-Oost Afrika Lijn der Koninklijke Nederlandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij. Shortly afterwards, the joint Netherlands-West Africa service of the shipping companies Hollandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij and Koninklijke Hollandsche Lloyd was added.

Since newbuildings were still too expensive in the first post-war years, VNS and KNSM founded the British subsidiary David Steamship Company Limited, which acquired 17 German ships given to Great Britain as reparations and sold them to the Netherlands in 1921 with the permission of the British government. After the ships were transferred under the Dutch flag, fourteen of these ships were transferred to the VNS, three to the KNSM, the David Steamship Company was dissolved again.

The Maaskerk built in 1929 for the VNS

In 1919 the Dutch government took part in the establishment of the NV Nederlandsche Zuid-Afrikaansche Stoomvaart Maatschappij (NZASM) in order to create a regular shipping connection to South Africa. After five years of subsidized operation, this Holland-South Africa service of the NZASM was merged from 1924 with the Holland-East Asia line and the Holland-South Africa service of the VNS and continued as Holland-Afrika Lijn.

Then the VNS operated the following lines:

  • Holland-Africa Lijn
  • Holland-Australië Lijn
  • Holland-West-Africa Lijn

When the NZASM was dissolved in 1932, the VNS took over its fleet. During the Second World War, the VNS lost eleven ships.

1945 until the merger in 1971

The Simonskerk , a VNS ship from the 1960s

The first post-war years brought a large-scale new construction program that compensated for the war losses and rejuvenated the fleet. This included, for example, the Z-Class and S-Class series . The 1960s brought two major changes. Initially, the volume of the once successful passenger services to Africa was reduced in the wake of the independence struggle there, then this continued to collapse due to competition from air transport until the shipping company finally replaced the flagships Oranjefontein and Jagersfontein with fast freighters in 1967 . As early as October 24, 1968, the VNS ordered the Abel Tasman , a sister ship of the Sydney Express , the first Dutch container ship from the Van der Giessen-De Noord shipyard in Alblasserdam - but it was only delivered to after the merger on March 19, 1971 Koninklijke Nedlloyd.

Overall, the approaching containerization turned out to be too capital-intensive for the shipping company, whereupon the company finally merged with the shipping companies Stoomvaart Maatschappij "Nederland", Koninklijke Rotterdamsche Lloyd and Koninklijke Java-China-Paketvaart Lijnen to form the Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Unie (NSU ) merged.

literature

  • Wilke, J. Th .; Halfweg, S. (Ed.): Neerlands Scheepsbouw en Scheepvaart . Deel II - Scheepvaart. Uitgevers Wyt, Rotterdam 1946.
  • Moojen, Wilhelm H. (Ed.): Nederlandse Koopvaardij in beeld . 1960-1969 (I). 1st edition. Lanasta, Emmen 2006, ISBN 90-8616-007-7 .

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