Shipowners of Cardiff Author:David Jenkins Between 1790 and 1914 Cardiff was transformed from a modest borough town into one of the greatest coal-exporting ports of the world. David Jenkins's fascinating, detailed and lavishly illustrated book is a study, based on original research, of the Cardiff and Bristol Incorporated Shipowners' Association. Established in 1875 to represent the... more » interests of Cardiff's shipowners during a period when the export of steam-coal from south Wales was booming, the Association has had a distinguished history and was for many decades a considerable influence on the development of the British mercantile fleet. The Association's members were, at its inception, a body of men of crucial commercial importance. Dr Jenkins discusses their successes, their policy on labour relations and their reactions to such testing events as the building of the new docks at Barry in the 1880s and the Seamen's Strike of 1911. From the 1920s onwards the Association's reports provide an often poignant comment on the long decline of a once great industry, but despite the collapse of the coal trade and the consequent near disppearance of ship-owning in Cardiff and its sister ports, it continues to function today.« less