This volume of Research in Maritime History comprises of papers written for presentation at Session C.10 of the Twelfth Congress of the International Economic History Association, which was to have been held in Seville, Spain in August 1998. That session, built around the theme “Merchant Organization and Maritime Trade in the North Atlantic, 1660- 1815,” had its origins in my research into an attempt by Scottish merchants early in the eighteenth century to break into the Newfoundland fish trade. I was particularly interested in the social and economic context of this venture, but soon found myself exploring larger questions about the way in which credit and marketing networks were developed in the eighteenth century; how trade was organized; and, in general, about the means and circumstances which caused merchants to invest in trades that were already well-established but which were new to them.

Recognizing that these were questions which had long engaged maritime economic historians, I concluded that they could serve as the focus of a session at the IEHA Congress. I therefore approached a number of specialists in maritime commerce, inviting them to participate in the proposed session by preparing papers with an emphasis on the logic and strategies employed by merchants in coping with the many challenges of trading within the North Atlantic region during the period 1660 to 1815. I was much encouraged by the positive response to that invitation, and I wish to say here how much easier my task of organizing this session has been, thanks to the contribution of scholars who have complied so generously and so willingly to my every request. Naturally, with nearly a dozen papers analysing maritime commerce from Iceland to the West Indies and both sides of the Atlantic, the risk was great that the very diversity of the North Atlantic mercantile experience would overwhelm the underlying unity provided by the session theme. Special thanks are therefore owing to Professors Ian K. Steele and Henry Roseveare, who accepted the unenviable task of preparing the introductory and concluding essays for this volume which reaffirm that unity.

From the beginning I decided to publish the papers in advance of the Congress largely to make them as accessible as possible.