248
HAMBURG.
The entire municipal area of Hamburg covers 19,027 acres, occupied in 1905
as follows :—Covered with houses, including courtyards, 5,366 acres ; roads,
streets, and railways, 2,470 acres ; public gardens and parks, 671 acres ;
cemeteries in use, 63 acres ; gardens, forest, and agricultural land, 7,350 acres ;
and water, 3,107 acres. The outer area includes the districts of Geestlande,
Marschlande, Bergedorf, and Ritzebüttel, with Cuxhaven at the mouth of the
Elbe, having together an area of 83,237 acres, making the area of the entire
State territory 102,264 acres (160 square miles).
Hamburg’s growth by the absorption of a large immigrant population was
specially stimulated after the middle of last century by the fact that within this
Free State the right to a free choice of occupations was legalised some years
before the principle was embodied in the legislation of the North German
Confederation. The exceptional increase of population and the large addition
from the outside which occurred between 1885 and 1890 were due to the
inclusion of Hamburg in 1888 within the German Customs Union. Up to that
year the city and port of Hamburg, together with the “old town ” of Altona—
Ottensen being, therefore, excepted—and Wandsbeck, had constituted a customsfree
area. The result was that all goods whether imported or manufactured on
the spot, sent from Hamburg and Altona into the territory of the Customs Union
were dutiable unless specially immune under the Customs Tariff. Hence the
carrying on of industries was in both towns a matter of difficulty, and while
Hamburg enterprise was compelled to seek an outlet in the “customs inland ”
across the Prussian frontier, Altona’s industries became concentrated in Ottensen.
The inclusion of the sister towns in the Customs Union of the Empire
removed the disabilities under which they had laboured, but if they were henceforth
theoretically free to establish such industries as they would without the
obstacle of duty-protected German markets, it was now no longer so easy to do
this as it would have been twenty or thirty years before. Germany’s industrial
advance had already begun ; the great staple industries had found their
natural centres, and to this extent the relief to local enterprise came too late.
Altona for a time positively lost ground, for many undertakings which
had taken root in the town were removed to Hamburg owing to the more
favourable conditions there prevailing, and its increase of population during the
decade 1858-1895 was far less relatively than that of Hamburg. While, as
has been shown, 73 per cent, of Hamburg’s increase during the period
1885-1890 was due to excess of immigration over removals, the percentage of
Altona’s increase due to that cause during the same period was only 48, and
during the following quinquennial period 4,406 more persons left Altona than
took up their homes there, with the result that the nett increase of population
was only 4 per cent.
Hamburg’s expansion since 1888 has been unique, though it has been more
commercial than industrial. As a result of its admission to the Customs Union,
new harbours and docks, with warehouses of various kinds, had to be constructed
at a cost exceeding five million pounds sterling, of which the Imperial Treasury
contributed two millions by way of solatium. There is still, however, a large
customs-free territory {Freihafengebiet), in which merchandise is received in
bond for transhipment, subject to the usual duties if it enters Hamburg or any
other part of the Customs Union. This Free Harbour area is 2,518 acres in
extent, 1,245 acres being water.
In 1906 the aggregate number of sea-going ships (including coasters)
which entered the port was 15,778 of 11,039,000 tons register, and the number
which cleared was 15,790 with 11,008,000 tons register. Of the vessels which
entered, 3,913 with 3,814,997 tons register were British, and of those which
cleared, 3,902 with 3,795,471 tons register were British. The total value of
the Hamburg merchant fleet was estimated in 1905 at over twenty million
pounds. Altona’s shipping trade is for the most part an incoming trade.
The industries of Hamburg and district include shipbuilding, machine
works, iron foundries, rice and corn mills, oil refineries, chemical, rubber, and
asbestos factories, margarine factories, wool-combing, jute spinning and weaving,
glass bottle blowing, tobacco and cigar manufactures, and a considerable clothing
trade. Altona’s special industries include some important engineering works,
which are largely dependent on the shipping trade, glass, margarine, and
chemical works, timber yards and saw mills.
