Expenditures of the Russo-Japanese war / by Gotaro Ogawa.

EFFECTS ON COMMUNICATIONS

227

Effects on home routes
At the outset of the war, the Nippon Yusen Kaisha owned
81 vessels, with an aggregate tonnage of 260,000 tons, of
which 60 vessels were commandeered by the Army and Navy
at the time of opening hostilities. With the remaining 21
vessels, the company managed to maintain both its foreign
and home services. Nine vessels were allotted to the foreign
routes, while to the home service twelve vessels were given,
the decrease in its transportation capacity being over twothirds as compared with the ante bellum year, when nearly
one-half of the company's vessels were used for coasting service. The Osaka Shosen Kaisha, too, whose vessels mostly
engaged in coastwise service, had some one-half of its ships in
number and two-thirds in tonnage commandeered for the
war; of the 117 vessels owned by the western branch of the
league of shipowners, 64 were requisitioned by the middle of
February, 1904. No small number of privately owned ships
were also taken on account of the war.
THE OSAKA SHOSEN KAISHA BOATS, 1903-1905
Boats owned Company boats
by the company commandeered
Year
Number Tonnage Number Tonnage
1903 (ist half)............... 81 66,429 I 451
1904 (Ist half)............... 79 63,173 48 48,625
(2d half).... 84 69,040 39 40,014
1905 (2d half)................ 94 90,626 38 43,519

Had not the situation been relieved by purchasing and
chartering foreign ships, our trade at home and abroad might
have been entirely crippled owing to the scarcity of ships.
But the authorities did not forget to take the necessary steps,
and as early as February I, 1904, just before the outbreak of
the war, a notice was given by the Department of Communications to the effect that a license would be granted, as a
special arrangement for the time being, for chartering foreign