Gujarati Merchants and American Trade in the Western Indian Ocean in the 19th Century

Ghulam A. Nadri, Georgia State University

In the 19th century, members of the Gujarati merchant communities, Parsis, Bohras, and Khojas in particular, played a prominent role in western Indian Ocean trade. These merchants, mainly from Bombay and Kachh, were versatile economic actors who not only firmly held on to long-established business practices but also proactively embraced new business opportunities. They relocated themselves or expanded their business operations to various western Indian Ocean ports. Thus, at Bombay, Mocha, Aden, Muscat, and Zanzibar, they were shipowners and commodity traders and also provided significant banking, brokering, and agency (supplying or contracting) services. Some family businesses even transformed into formal trading firms (Ardaseer Dossabhoy & Co. and Dossabhoy Merwanjee & Co.) and became exclusive dealers and suppliers of merchandise, such as hides and skins, ivory, cloves, gum copal, American cottons, kerosene oil, among others. American merchants from Salem, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia trading in the western Indian Ocean depended on Gujarati merchants for these services. This relationship morphed into long-term Indo-American agency and partnership networks. This paper studies the geographical spread and dynamics of these commercial networks and their role in the expansion of Indo-US trade and capitalism in the western Indian Ocean.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 58. Indo-Us Maritime Trade, c. 1780-1950: Merchants, Networks, and Commodities