 Heavily laden East Indiamen travelled from British Indian port cities such as Bombay and Calcutta to the United Kingdom carrying millions of pounds worth of goods.From Britain, the ships returned on the same routes, often carrying soldiers for the growing British Indian Army, then under the control of the Honourable East India Company (HEIC).Following the outbreak of the Napoleonic Wars in 1803, the British Admiralty had made the security of these routes a priority, and by 1807, the Dutch bases at the Cape of Good Hope and Java had been neutralised by expeditionary forces to prevent their use by enemy raiders.