In June 1823 De Nederlander, the first Dutch steamboat (with English engines) started its service, which would become a line between Rotterdam and Antwerp.

In 1824 the Nederlandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij (NSM, but also NSBM) was founded and succeeded to Van Vollenhoven, Dutilh en Co. Roentgen became one of its two executives.

Its first business activities consisted of founding a number of lines from Rotterdam to Antwerp, Veere, Nijmegen and Arnhem.

The idea for the corporation was that Cockerill would have the monopoly on steam engines for ships in the Netherlands, and would only deliver to the NSM.

A positive explanation for this monopoly was that the NSM wanted to prevent its knowledge from leaking away via Cockerill, but of course it could not hold.

[9] The invention of the compound engine was of great significance for the company because it gave the NSM a competitive advantage.

The main building of the factory was the old Pesthuis, literally 'plague house' where the city previously isolated plague victims.

The construction of the Mosel had just begun, and a new iron ship for a line to Antwerp had been laid down in October and was expected to be launched in February.

[14] In 1826 NSM had contracted to build the steamships Orestes and Pylades to combat piracy in the Dutch East Indies.

However, the heavy tugboat tugged river barges upstream and proved more than a match for rail transport, especially for bulk cargo.

[8] In 1836 the Dutch government wanted to promote the export of colonial goods to Germany by improving transport on the middle Rhine.

It advanced 260,000 guilders to construct a steam tugboat meant to serve on the Rhine between Lobith and Cologne.

[21] In 1829 the NSM had operated the Stad Keulen, a ship that was previously the English James Watt, and had been lengthened at Fijenoord.

[30] This was probably the steam vessel De Nederlanden mentioned as built in 1838, having a wooden hull over an iron frame, and being meant for a line to Mannheim.

[23] The message that in early May 1838 Fijenoord launched the steam vessels Admiraal de Ruyter and Graaf van Rechteren for the Rijn- en IJssel Stoombootmaatschappij.

[33] The iron Drusus was built for the Rijn- en IJssel Stoombootmaatschappij to use on the line from Kampen to Cologne that would be tuned to the service by the Admiraal van Kinsbergen.

The king also inspected the engines that were being built for the warships Bromo and Merapie, and the steam vessel De Rijn.

[36] After the disaster with the Pylades in 1835, the construction of a new steam ship for the East Indies deserved special mention.

[37] In November 1839 the big iron sea steamer Batavia planned for 300 hp engines was under construction.

In May 1847 the Samarang, Cerberus and Suriname sailed to Helsingør in order to tow Dutch ship with Cereal towards the North Sea.

In April 1850 the NSM put the newly built screw ship Fijenoord into service on the London line.

[50] In 1853 the paddle gunboat Admiraal van Kinsbergen, built by Fijenoord, arrived in Java on board the Maria Magdalena.

Apart from having the very vulnerable paddle propulsion, Stoom Kanonneerboot No 1 was a simple casemate ironclad like the much bigger CSS Virginia.

One of the reasons was that the government wanted to have a facility for repairing armored ships in the south in case of war.

Dutch shipping companies had insufficient confidence in the capabilities of the indigenous industry and therefore used to order their ocean going steamers in Great Britain.

On 1 January 1882 this ship left Rotterdam for New-York, and suffered so much damage in a storm, that she had to be saved by the Napier of captain Anderson.

From 1863 onward the British Nederlandsch-Indische Stoomvaartmaatschappij had held the concession for a number of subsidized shipping lines in the Dutch East Indies.

[64] The first ships that Fijenoord built for the KPM were the Carpentier launched on 5 June 1890[65] and the Van Diemen, launched 16 July 1890[66] For the KPM Fijenoord later built e.g. the Oranje (1903), SS 's Jacob (1907), the Melchior Treub (1912) and the Van Overstraten (1912) For some time the shipping lines of the NSM had not operated to satisfaction.

In 1895 the name was changed to NV Maatschappij voor Scheeps- en Werktuigbouw Fijenoord, which better reflected the activities of the company.

The slipways and other installations continued for some time at the Fijenoord location before the new company was able to concentrate all activities in Schiedam.