East Indiaman Ship

East Indiaman — a ship belonging to the British East India Company.
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East Indiaman ship East Indiamen, the name generally applied to the ships of the (British) Honourable East India Company during the 18th and 19th centuries, were often specially designed to carry both passengers and goods and to defend themselves against piracy, and so constituted a special class of ship. In the period of the Napoleonic Wars they were painted to resemble warships, and some carried a sizeable armament. A number of these ships were in fact acquired by the Royal Navy, and in some cases they successfully fought off attacks by the French. One of the most celebrated of these incidents occurred in 1804, when a fleet of East Indiamen successfully fought off a marauding squadron commanded by Admiral Linois in the Indian Ocean.

The shipwreck of one of the largest East Indiamen, the Earl of Abergavenny, is located at Weymouth Bay, England. The word is also used as a translation of the Dutch Oost-Indiëvaarder of the Dutch East India Company.

The East Indiaman & Pirates

An East Indiaman was by far the biggest and most suited for long voyages — imagine this behemoth being twice as large as a Fluyt and weighing in at 700 tons. Many a pirate would have doubloon signs in his eyes when he spied this pregnant guppy on the horizon. The maximum crew of 300 was probably employed only after crushing attacks in the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, and the top gun capacity of 54 was often undercut to save room and weight for more goods. With practices like these, the East Indiaman practically begged to be plundered.

See also our page about all pirate ships.