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Marfret (Shipping company, France)

Presentation of Marfret
House flag of Marfret

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Presentation of Marfret

Marseille-Fret was founded in 1951 by the ship broker Claude Vidil and his associate P. Giraud. The first vessel chartered by the company, MS Douce-France, was used for coastal sailing in the western Mediterranean basin. In 1955, Marseille-Fret bought its first ship, MS Côte-des-Légendes, mostly used on the Algerian coast for the redistribution of military material on the smaller ports. On 24 December 1964, an explosion in the hold of MS Méjean caused a fire, and the ship was abandoned by heavy wind (mistral) off Cap Sicié, near Toulon. In 1972, MS Méjean-II was used as a floating zoo for the quarantine of wild animals imported from Kenya. MS Niolon was sold in 1974 and renamed Lucona, under Panamanian flag. On 23 January 1977, the ship sunk off the west coast of India, following a criminal explosion. The Austrian journalist Hans Pretterebner related the attempt in his book The Lucona Case, from which a film was made in 1993.

In 1973, the company decided to sail also out of the Mediterranean Sea. Scheduled lines were set up between the northern ports and Middle-East. The company operated seven vessels in 1975.
Marseille-Fret also traded with Libya, which retained its flagship MS Le Rove in Benghazi from 1980 to 1985. The ship was "exchanged" with the Libyan Ghat, retained in Marseilles, but in such a bad state that it had to be scrapped.
In 1980, MS Douce-France-III served a new line between Rouen and the Caribbean islands. The ship was replaced in 1986 by MS Antilles, serving the line Dunkirk-Fort-de-France (Martinique).

The company was restructured in 1987 and became the line operator Compagnie Maritime Marfret, serving lines from the Mediterranean Sea to the Caribbean islands, later (1989) to the Indian Ocean, and, more recently, to Algiers (1998).

Sources:

Marfret website
Paul Bois. Armements marseillais - Compagnies de navigation et navires à vapeur (1831-1988), published by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry Marseille-Provence [boi03]

Ivan Sache, 28 February 2004

House flag of Marfret

House flag of Marfret - Image by Dominique Cureau, 10 April 2004

Another house flag of Marfret - Image by Jorge Candeias, 31 March 1999

The flag of Marfret, as shown in Carga e Transportes (Cargo and Transportation), the Monday's supplement to the Portuguese newspaper Publico, is white with two thin blue stripes on the top and bottom of the flag and the red letters MF in the white field.

Jorge Candeias, 31 March 1999

Yet another version of the house flag of Marfret - Image by Ivan Sache, 29 February 2004

Josef Nuesse's website shows another Marfret flag, blue with horizontal black margins and a red MF in the middle, similar to the MF on Jorge's image, but not identical.

House flag of Marseille-Fret - Image by Ivan Sache, 28 February 2004

According to Bois (op. cit.), the house flag of Marseille-Fret was horizontally divided black-blue-black with the red letters MF in the blue stripe.

Ivan Sache, 29 February 2004