Showdown in South America: James Scrymser, John Pender, and United States–British Cable Competition

Abstract

The British dominated the world's submarine cable business over the second half of the nineteenth century, but they encountered significant challenges in the 1880s and 1890s—especially from James Scrymser, an upstart entrepreneur from New York. Scrymser exploited a strategic gap in the cable system in the Western Hemisphere and became locked in a confrontation along the west coast of South America with John Pender, the leading British cable magnate. Scrymser gained the upper hand in Chile by outmaneuvering Pender and used this victory to expand his operations with the telegraph network that linked South America, North America, and Europe.

Why do states in conflict with each other also sustain resilient cooperation in international regulation? Britain and telegraphy, 1860s–1914

“…Pender, and later, Denison-Pender, of the Eastern group, were able ask for and secure favours from British diplomats in difficult negotiations with foreign states over landing rights concessions following the Treasury decision in principle in 1867 to allow this support to given on a case-by-case basis, where wider British interests could be argued to be at stake (Headrick and Griset, 2001; however all British cable companies sought and sometimes obtained such diplomatic support: e.g. Britton and Ahvenainen, 2004). In the third sub-period, despite Hicks-Beach's protests in 1901-1902, the Treasury's purse was sometimes but after 1902 fairly rarely prised open to subsidise companies' unprofitable lines around the globe where imperial 'all-red' arguments could be presented for them, apparently feather-bedding not just Eastern but others too, and often more on the basis of Admiralty arguments for lines than company pressure.…”