A. D. Bordes, a French ship-owner of the second half of the 19th century, had specialized in the trade of nitrate from Chile. The farmers and sugar beet growers of northern France had quickly come to appreciate the usefulness of this new fertilizer and had caused demand to explode. Taking over from Bordeaux, which was the birth port of A. D. Bordes, Dunkirk became the main centre for the sale of nitrate, setting the price for the whole of France.
The port worked at the rhythm of the more and more numerous Bordes great Cape Horners, recognizable by their hulls decorated with a line of false ports. Where the English were decisively turning to steam ships, which offered the advantage of regularity and speed, A. D. Bordes persisted in an unshakeable faith in the future of long-haul sailing ships. Encouraged by a law that granted subsidies for ships built in French shipyards, the company ordered no less than 18 four-masted barques between 1895 and 1902, becoming the premier owner of sailing vessels in the world.
View of the port of Dunkirk, showing several Bordes Ships.
Photo by Falciny, circa 1890. Port Museum Collection.
During the First World War, Bordes vessels continued their voyages round Cape Horn to supply the country with nitrate destined for making explosives. But half of the fleet was destroyed.
Difficulties increased with new social laws that required that the crew be organized in three watches instead of two, which considerably increased the cost of labour. With the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914, competition with steam had become unequal. The 1929 crisis weakened the company even more and it was dissolved in 1935.
Portrait of Antoine Dominique Bordes.