WILLIAM CROSBY & CO. PTY. LTD.

The flag is identical to that of the associated William France, Fenwick & Co. The FOTW rendering follows Brown 1926.

Captain William Crosbie and his eldest son William founded William Crosbie & Co. as merchants and agents at the end of 1853. They held interests in vessels and owned Seashell in 1875. After the captain retired in 1878, William and Charles continued at Hobart and Melbourne. Their partnership ended in 1885, but both offices continued separately under the same name. The Melbourne business became William Crosby & Co. Pty. Ltd. in 1926 and acquired the dissolved Hobart business in 1934.

The company acted for Devitt & Moore, Hine Bros., Holme Line and other overseas concerns. Its phosphate trade is dated to 1906 in one account, while another gives Wonganella in 1909 as the first vessel acquired for that trade. The last ship was sold in 1946.

Australia, Melbourne.

The holding-company name history could not be retrieved directly, and the archive also includes the older nineteenth-century shipping firm. The 1954 company is not assumed to be legally identical to every William Crosby shipping predecessor.