{{Short description|English-German shipbuilder (1783–1867)}} {{other people|Robert Sloman|Sloman}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2018}} {{Use British English|date=January 2018}}
[[File:Robert Miles Sloman.jpg|thumb|Robert Miles Sloman in 1839]] '''Robert Miles Sloman''' (23 October 1783, [[Great Yarmouth]] – 2 January 1867, [[Hamburg]]) was an [[England|English]]-[[Germany|German]] [[Shipbuilding|shipbuilder]] and ship owner.
==Biography==
===Shipping=== Robert Miles Sloman was the son of William Sloman, an English ship's captain who in 1785 settled in Hamburg with his wife and two sons William Palgrave Sloman and Robert Miles Sloman. William Sloman became a Hamburg citizen in 1791 and established his first company in 1798 as a ship broker. On his death in 1800 Robert Miles Sloman, then 17 years old inherited the ship broker business and a few sailing ships. After the [[Treaty of Amiens]] (25 March 1802) Robert Miles went to [[Antwerp]] to found a shipbroking-company but as war broke out again he had to return to Hamburg. [[Napoleon I]] then blocked the harbour of Hamburg as part of the [[Continental System]] so Sloman moved his business to [[Tönning]] at the mouth of the [[Eider (river)|river Eider]], then a part of Denmark. In 1806 he married Gundalena Brarens, the daughter of pilot inspector and nautical examiner [[Hinrich Braren]]s from Tönning.<ref>{{cite book|last=Zacchi|first=Uwe|title=Menschen von Föhr|year=1986|publisher=Boyens & Co|location=Heide|isbn=3-8042-0359-0|page=29|language=German}}</ref>
Denmark eventually joined the Continental System but the company survived. In 1814 Sloman reopened his shipping business, at first in [[Cuxhaven]] English [[Consul (representative)|Consul]]. When French troops gave up Hamburg, Sloman returned but his last ship sailing under English colours was confiscated by the French and it was not insured properly. Under Hamburg laws as a broker Sloman was forbidden to act as a ship owner so his captains, who part-owned the ships founded ghost-shipping-companies.
The shipping company Rob. M. Sloman & CO. oHG took passengers to and from England but on 17 February 1836 the shipping company opened the first regular transatlantic service from Hamburg to New York with the [[bark (ship)|bark]] ''Franklin'' and two other sailing packets. On 8 May 1841 Sloman and eight other shipowners formed Hanseatische Dampfschiffahrts-Compagnie and built in England two [[paddle steamers]], the ''Hamburg'' and the ''Manchester'' which sailed to and from [[Kingston upon Hull]] and by 1846 the transatlantic fleet had grown to seven. The Sloman Line had a competitor in the [[Hamburg America Line|Hamburg- Amerikanische Packetfahrt Aktien-Gesellschaft]] which was formed in May 1847. When their first sailing packet, ''Deutschland'', left Hamburg on her maiden voyage in October 1848, Sloman responded in 1850 by changing from sail to steam with the British-built, iron-hulled screw steamship, ''Helena Sloman''. This ship was lost on only her third transatlantic voyage. Another iron screw ship was ordered by Sloman in 1853, but then Hamburg- America decided to switch from sail to steam. Sloman immediately offered to run a joint service with his rival's steamships, but they rejected his proposal. Hamburg-America's transatlantic steamship service began on 1 June 1856, when the ''Borussia'' set off for New York with sister-ship ''Hammonia'' following a month later. Sloman gave up on steamships and remained a sailing packet line. In 1898 R Slowman Company bought the 3739 ton steamer Moravia from the American Hamburg Line and renamed it the Parma.
===Other activities=== Robert Sloman with business associates [[Johann Cesar VI. Godeffroy]], [[Jauch family|Johann Christian Jauch]], [[Ernst Merck]] and [[Johann Heinrich Schröder]] organised the ''Internationale Landwirtschaftsaustellung'' (International Agricultural Exhibition) at [[Heiligengeistfeld]] in 1863<ref>{{cite book|title=House Documents, Otherwise Publ. as Executive Documents: 13th Congress, 2d Session-49th Congress, 1st Session|year=1863|publisher=United States Congress|page=31|chapter=Message from the President of the United States, transmitting Correspondence of the minister of the Hanseatic republics in relation to an international agricultural exhibition in the city of Hamburg}}</ref> and was a member of its guarantee fund.<ref>{{cite news|newspaper=Illustrierte Zeitung|date=4 July 1863|location=Hamburg|page=8|language=German}}</ref> In 1865 he was a joint founder of the [[German Maritime Search and Rescue Service]].
Sloman was a member of the [[Hamburg Parliament]] from 1859 to 1861.<ref>{{cite book|last=Hinz|first=Frank M.|title=Planung und Finanzierung der Speicherstadt in Hamburg: Gemischtwirtschaftliche Unternehmensgründungen im 19. Jahrhundert unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Hamburger Freihafen-Lagerhaus-Gesellschaft|year=2000|publisher=Lit Verlag|isbn=3-8258-3632-0|page=40, footnote #120|language=German}}</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}} *{{cite book|first=Jürgen |last=Meyer |title=Hamburgs Segelschiffe von 1795-1945 | isbn= 3-89225-400-1 |location= Bielefeld | pages=16ff, 205 |publisher=Delius Klasing|year=1999}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sloman, Robert Miles}} [[Category:Businesspeople from Hamburg]] [[Category:English shipbuilders]] [[Category:German shipbuilders]] [[Category:1867 deaths]] [[Category:1783 births]] [[Category:19th-century British businesspeople]] [[Category:British emigrants]] [[Category:Immigrants to the Holy Roman Empire]]