Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company

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Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company Limited, often referred to simply as Scotts, was a British shipbuilding company based in Greenock, Scotland, on the River Clyde.

[edit] History

John Scott commenced shipbuilding at Greenock in 1711. The Scott familly took over the Greenock Foundry in 1790 and C G Scott started building at Cartsdyke Dockyard in 1850 as Scott & Company

John Scott (II) and Robert Scott acquired the adjacent yard of R Steele & Company in 1883 to create the Cartsburn Dockyard, which was laid out for naval construction. By 1900 John Swire & Company were major shareholders and Henry Scott was a director of Swire Scotts. He specified and oversaw construction of Swire's Taikoo Dockyard in Hong Kong. Swire's was 25% owned by the Scott Family.

In 1925 Scott's took over Ross & Marshall's Cartsdyke Mid Yard. In 1934 they exchanged their Cartsdyke East yard for Cartsdyke Mid yard with Greenock Dockyard Ltd. In June 1965 the Company took over Scott's & Sons (Bowling) Ltd and in December 1965 Scott's merged with Greenock Dockyard and the Cartsburn and Cartsdyke Dockyards were fully integrated in 1966. From 1969 the Company was owned by Scott Lithgow Ltd, operating as Scotts Shipbuilding Co (1969) Ltd. Scott Lithgow Ltd was absorbed into the nationalised British Shipbuilders in 1977.

Cartsdyke Shipyard was closed in 1979 and Cartsburn in 1984. In 1984 the Scott Lithgow company and yards were sold to Trafalgar House plc.

No further shipbuilding was undertaken and the 270 year old Scott shipbuilding company finally closed. During their time in Greenock Scotts built over 1250 ships. Notable vessels built included the early Royal Mail Steam Packet Company liners Clyde, Solway, Tweed and Dee in 1841, the early taker Narragannsett in 1903, the barque Archibald Russell, the first submarine, S1, in 1914, the Cruiser HMS Glasgow in 1937 and the drilling ship Ben Ocean Lancer in 1977. Principal customers of Scotts were A Holt & Co (Blue Funnel Line) (88 ships), China Navigation Co / John Swire (95 ships) and the Royal Navy (114 ships). In 1988-97 the Cartsburn and Cartsdyke shipyards were demolished and redeveloped as insurance offices, computer warehouses and fast food restaurants.

[edit] References