Part A
By Dr. Anthony Madella
Introduction by Dr. Mimis Sophocleous
It was in the year 1905, when a group of progressive Limassol entrepreneurs decided to set up a wholly Cypriot shipping company, under the name Limassol Steamship Company to facilitate the transport of passengers and cargo between Cyprus and Egypt. A year later, the Company expanded and was entrusted, by the British administration in charge of Cyprus, with the task of carrying mail between Cyprus and other countries. Two steamships were in operation at the time, named LEFKOSIA (Nicosia) and SALAMIS. A third one named KYPROS (Cyprus), acquired in 1906, was sold in 1907. The Limassol Steamship Company can rightly be seen as the first genuinely Cypriot shipping company of modern times, ushering in the dawn of today’s Cyprus shipping industry. The Limassol Steamship Company lasted for nearly 10 years and in 1914-1915 it reached the stage where it had to sell its ships on its way to liquidation. It is, of course, to be noted, that the Company was established and operated in turbulent politico-economic circumstances, both locally and internationally.
Until recently very little was known about the Limassol Steamship Company and its work. However, we now have a much clearer view and understanding, thanks to the work of fellow Limassolian Dr. Anthony Madella, a legal expert and a maritime history researcher.
According to Dr. Madella, the initial vision of the founders of the Limassol Steamship Company was to establish a Pancyprian shipping company, with the participation of investors and capital from the entire island. However, a negative stance by Larnaca investors resulted in the creation of two separate shipping companies. First came, in February-March 1905, the Cyprus Steamship Company Ltd (comprising Larnaca investors) and a few weeks later, in April 1905, there emerged the Limassol Steamship Company.
The founders of the Limassol Steamship Company were the Pilavakis family, the brothers Aristocles and Euripides and their younger siblings Nicolas and Cyrus who had settled in Egypt from a young age and were already established as noteworthy merchants with adequate capital. Company shareholders were leading Limassol entrepreneurs, such as members of the well-known Lanitis, Haggipavlu and Droushiotis families.
The Limassol Steamship Company apparently came about as a result of a combination of factors: the need to develop sea transport seen by visionaries such as Christodoulos Sozos (Company President between 1909 and 1912) and Aristocles Pilavakis, the availability of the necessary capital ensured by the younger Egypt-based Pilavakis brothers and the zeal of the British High Commissioner in Cyprus Sir William Haynes Smith to promote the idea of an exclusively Cypriot shipping company. Sir William might well have been influenced by an idea mooted at the time for Jews to move to and settle in Cyprus! There are indeed indications that the setting up of the Limassol Steamship Company was not unrelated to that “paradoxical”, one might say, idea...
