Maritime Suisse_history

The events around Maritime Suisse were more a political rather than a maritime history, a saga which continued for years until the books finally could be closed. The company was founded during World War II on the initiative of Mr. Gottlieb Duttweiler of Migros, Zürich with the assistance of Mr. Peter Kehrli of the forwarding company Kehrli & Oeler AG, Bern.

In the summer of 1940 the United Kingdom closed the Straits of Gibraltar for all Greek ships, including for those vessels chartered by KTA (Kriegs Transport Amt = War Transport Office) in Bern. Hence, vessels chartered by KTA were obliged to discharge their cargoes in Portuguese ports. In April 1941 the Swiss Government introduced a new law, governing registration of ocean going vessels flying the Swiss flag. The new law cleared the path to set up shipping companies to conduct maritime transport with Swiss registered ships (i.e. from Portugal to the Mediterranean Sea).

The foundation of the new shipping company, Maritime Suisse S. A. took place in Zurich on May 7, 1941 and the company was incorporated in Basle. According to company articles its purpose was "Acquisition and chartering of ships, as well as conducting ocean transports for the furtherance of supplies to the country". On the board of directors were Mr. Gottlieb Duttweiler, Mr. Peter Kehrli, Mr. H. Steinfels and Dr. G. Wettstein, a lawyer and cantonal councillor from Zürich, who also acted as company president.

Mr. Duttweiler and Mr. Kehrli brought into the company the old and derelict steamer "GENEROSO" ex "Varko" for a total price of 950'000.- CHF, which they purchased before through a brokerage arrangement with Mr. Marc Bloch. Mr. Duttweiler or to be more precise the MGB Migros Genossenschafts Bund (Migros co-operative society) Zürich, and Mr. Kehrli who in partnership with Mr. Bloch, the broker, constituted the 2 main groups of share holders each group controlling 44% of the shares. Other shareholders were Mr. H. Steinfels with 10% and Dr. G. Wettstein with the remaining 2% of the shares. From the beginning Mr. Duttweiler’s role was that of chairman of the company while one of his confidants Mr. O. Bürgi, an advocate (known internally as the "Admiral") acted as the General Manager. Bookkeeping was delegated to the MGB. Mr. Marc Bloch was useful because of his maritime knowledge and his contacts and seems to have been well integrated in the company. On May 29, 1941 the s/s "GENEROSO" was registered under Swiss flag and became the fourth vessel in the Swiss ship registry book. Her name was taken from the mountain Monte Generoso in the Ticino (near Lugano) whose cogwheel-railway was saved from bankruptcy in March 1941 by none other than Mr. Duttweiler,

Mr. Gottlieb Duttweiler (1888 - 1962) was a businessman from Zurich, founder of Migros (MGB, Migros Genossenschafts Bund) which today is one of the largest super market chains in Switzerland with its own production- and service companies. In 1936 Mr. Duttweiler founded his own political party the LdU (Landesring der Unabhängigen) advocating a social/liberal policy. However, after Duttweiler's death the party sank to insignificancy and was finally dissolved in 1999, see also Migros history .

Peter Kehrli was partner in the old, well known forwarding company Kehrli+Oeler in Bern. In the context of Maritime Suisse it would appear, that he may have acted and committed his company without the prior knowledge or acceptance of his partner Mr. Oeler. Thus when large financial demands on Maritime Suisse arrived in the house, the company came into great difficulties and narrowly escaped bankruptcy. As a consequence Mr. Kehrli left the company while the Oeler family continued to operate the company, which they still do today.

Mr. H. Steinfels was a scion of the owner family of the soap manufacturers Friedrich Steinfels AG, Zurich. The Steinfels production facilities in Zurich-West were demolished only a few years ago and the site redeveloped under the name “Westside”. The company’s trade marks were sold to Henkel & Cie. AG und to CWK AG.

Mr. Marc Bloch (sometimes also known as Marcel Bloch) originated from Bern. Mr. Bloch who became a Geneva businessman maintained close relations not only with leftwing circles in Geneva, but also with the socialist republicans in Spain (known as the "Red Spaniards") but above all, he understood excellently to further his own interests and use them to his own advantage. He appears to have possessed good contacts and considerable knowledge about the shipping industry.

With a view to purchase a second vessel, the s/s "ZÜRICH" ex-"Ergo" the share capital was increased to 2.0 Mio. CHF on April 7, 1943. The Zurich bank SBG (now Union Bank of Switzerland) became a shareholder and Dr. Th. Jäger from the same bank was elected to the board of directors. The ZÜRICH, a steamer built in 1893 was essentially a scrap vessel, which was again made seaworthy only at excessive costs. The "ZÜRICH" the oldest vessel ever registered under Swiss flag, entered service under the Swiss flag on March 30, 1943.

We assume, that Maritime Suisse was also negotiating with the Danish shipping company "Vesterhavet" (J. Lauritzen København) about the purchase of their steamer "NANCY" (BRT 1153/year of build 1921), which lay interned in the harbour of Lisbon. In the company chronicle by Søren Thorsøe, a possible sale of this vessel to Swiss interests in summer 1943 was recorded. At about the same time Mr. G. Duttweiler mentioned in an article in the "Brückenbauer" of 16.04.1943, that Finnish and Danish ship owners mistrusted the Swiss Franc and were not really keen to sell, possibly only with a clause, that the ships have to be returned after the war.

In the early years the company flourished and even made a profit, but soon disagreement between Mr. Duttweiler and Mr. Bloch developed as Mr. Bloch, apparently on the suggestion of the federal department of economy, tried with assistance of Mr. Kehrli to obtain the share majority. It appears that Mr. Duttweiler, was considered an unwanted political adversary, which especially the KTA in Bern pushed hard to remove. During all of this time the KTA which was the sole shipper for Swiss ships and wielded considerable power, threatened to withdraw all cargo consignments to enforce their demand to have Mr. Duttweiler removed from the board. This is the version of Mr. Duttweiler (see "Brückenbauer" of December 7, 1956, article "Die ungleichen Ellen"), a claim which was later rejected in a reader's letter to the "Brückenbauer" (January 11, 1957) by the federal councillor Dr. W. Stampfli who was the director of the federal department of economy at the time (1940 until 1947).

Under the prevailing circumstances Mr. Duttweiler preferred to withdraw from Maritime Suisse S.A. and on September 28, 1943 the MGB sold its 2000 shares for an amount of 900'000.- CHF (10 % below their nominal value) to Mr. Bloch and Mr. Kehrli. Soon after the SBG decided to sell its shares, again to Messrs. Bloch and Kehrli. During the next meeting of the board of directors on October 7, 1943 Mr. Duttweiler together with Dr. G. Wettstein and Dr. Th. Jäger of the SBG resigned from the board of directors. In November of the same year the company moved to Geneva and Mr. Marc Bloch and Mr. Albert Oeler were both elected to the board of directors with Mr. Peter Kehrli now as chairman of the board.

In the autumn of 1943 elections to the national assembly were held and Mr. Bloch brought the so called "Dossier B" into circulation to incriminate Mr. Duttweiler. In short, Mr. Bloch brought Mr. Duttweiler in contact with Mr. Léon Nicole, the boss of the Federation Socialiste Suisse to try and secure his support for his (Mr. Duttweiler’s) independent candidate, Prof. Rappard from Geneva. The point being that the Federation Socialiste Suisse was blacklisted by the government because of alleged subversive activities. Although no real wrong doings to implicate Mr. Duttweiler could be found, it caused considerable damage to his political party the LdU.

Despite all the personal and political adversities the s/s "GENEROSO" and the s/s "ZÜRICH" transported during World War II approximately 75'000 tons of general cargo for Switzerland from Portugal to the Mediterranean ports of France and Italy, mainly Marseille and Genoa.

The company’s real difficulties began with the total loss of first the "GENEROSO" in the port of Marseille on September 19, 1944 and relatively shortly thereafter the loss of the "ZÜRICH", which stranded near Gibraltar in January 1946. Although the ships were insured, the compensations paid out by the insurers were primarily used to meet demands from the banks.

Although the company didn’t have anymore ships, all kinds of shipping contracts were concluded and with a view to create an image of respectability Mr. Marc Bloch succeeded in recruiting two local politicians to join the board of directors, the liberal Geneva town councillor and director of finance Jules Peney and Francois Graisier, a prominent boss of the PdA party (communist party) who eventually became director of Maritime Suisse S.A. in 1945.

The replacement of the lost ships in the post war period proved to be a very troublesome task. Two vessels, the s/s "ASCONA" ex-PAN ORLEANS and the s/s "PONTRESINA", ex- "LORENZ L.-M. RUSS" (in the Swiss newspapers also called s/s LORENZO RUSS) were purchased and appear to have been taken over in 1948. The repairs of the two vessels required huge sums of money and on November 27, 1948 the shipping company was declared bankrupt with a deficit of about 3,5 Mio. CHF.

The subsequent fate of the two vessels largely lies in the dark. However, according to Lloyd's Register of London the "ASCONA" sailed under the Honduran flag until 1952 for Cargo S.A., Hafenstrasse 19, Basel. Afterwards she sailed under Italian flag, under the same name until September 1959, when she was scrapped in Savona, Italy. From information received from an old lady in Basle, we learned that her late husband sailed as a crewmember from Antwerp to Haifa under the Swiss Captain Gerber on the "ASCONA" in 1948. From unconfirmed hearsay, the steamer was operated by a company called Kehrli Transport AG in Bern. Unfortunately no further details are known to us at this time.

The "PONTRESINA" was purchased by Maritime Suisse S,A. as the wreck LORENZ L.-M. RUSS and was repaired during 1948 in Genova. Whether the ship ever sailed for Maritime Suisse S.A. is very doubtful, since the company went bankrupt in November of the same year. The "PONTRESINA" sailed until 1960 under the Panamanian flag when she changed name, most likely through a sale. She continued to sail until June 11, 1968, when she was lost on the coast of Greece. It appears, that Mr. Kehrli (possibly together with Mr. Bloch – but we cannot be certain about this) was able to effectively save the two ships from the liquidators and continued to operate them.

The investigation of the Maritime Suisse affair turned out to be a complicated task, lasting about seven years. In the first years no irregularities could be found in the book keeping and the two vessels generated a good profit. However, after 1943 when Mr. Marc Bloch became both the majority share holder and director of the company, and in essence the “owner” of Maritime Suisse S.A. the situation changed dramatically and already in 1945 the balance sheet showed a considerable deficit which he was able to hide by means of creative book keeping which seems to have gone from bad to worse - becoming irregular. Vouchers were missing and Mr. Marc Bloch frequently mixed up his private affairs with company business. Despite the miserable state of the company’s financial situation, he allocated himself a generous salary of 4'000.- CHF and used large sums for representation and travel expenses, as well as taking, mostly unjustified, personal commissions. In the end he was accused of embezzlement in the order of about 3,0 Mio. CHF.

In January 1956 the affair was finally taken to a court in Geneva and the only accused, Mr. Marc Bloch was found guilty of fraudulent bankruptcy and fraud. On June 21, 1957 he was sentenced to 2 ½ years in prison.

But the saga was by no means finished. In March of 1953 the liquidators demanded the payment of a sum of 785'100.- CHF from Mr. G. Duttweiler and Mr. P. Kehrli, who as former board members had accepted liability for a bill of exchange taken out on September 28. 1943.

The two men declined to pay and the case was brought before the civil court in Geneva which on September 18, 1957 ordered them to pay. However, in consideration of the bad management by Mr. Bloch for which they could not be held responsible, the sum was reduced to 628'084.- CHF plus 5,0 % interest. The verdict was confirmed in April 1958 by the "Cour de Justice" of Geneva.

Subsequently an appeal of the cantonal adjudication was brought before the Federal Court where it was confirmed in February 1959 and in April of 1959 the assembly of the MGB board unanimously agreed to pay the demand (Mr. P. Kehrli unfortunately had no funds).

With this final act the last chapter of this infamous saga was brought to a close.

As a final remark we wish to add that at the beginning of 1942 Mr. Marc Bloch together with the MGB/Migros offered the Swiss authorities the three-masted schooner “DAVIDA” for a training ship. Unfortunately the project never came to fruition because the Italian Government confiscated the vessel.

We wish to thank Mrs. C. Imhof for giving us access and insight into the various documents and the collection of contemporaneous news paper articles held in the archives of the MGB in Zurich.

HPS-SwissShips, May 2011

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