The Stoomvaart Maatschappij Zeeland was founded in June 1875 and opened a service from Vlissingen to Sheerness in Kent on July 26 of that year. However, poor support led to the service being suspended for the following winter and re-opened on May 15, 1876 to nearby Queenborough. The service was temporarily transferred to Dover in 1882 following a fire at the Queenborough pier. At the request of the Dutch postal authorities the service was doubled in 1887 but the service suffered further disruption in 1897 due to flooding of the railway to Queenborough and another fire at the pier in 1900. During this period, competition from the Great Eastern Railway's services to Harwich had grown and forced the company to invest in 3 new vessels from Fairfields of Govan. In 1911 further new tonnage was introduced and they were placed on a service to Folkestone leaving older paddle steamers to service Queenborough, but as they were retired the operation to that port was ended. At the outbreak of war in 1914 the service was switched to Tilbury, and following the war in January 1919 a daylight service was introduced to Gravesend. In 1927 an agreement was reached with the London and North Eastern Railway to switch the service to Harwich, and that agreement was further enhanced in 1946 after World War II when services were moved to the Hook of Holland, the company's facilities at Flushing having been destroyed during the hostilities. A secondary service from Vlissingen to Folkestone was introduced in 1949 but lasted only three seasons. In the meantime, British Railways had taken over from the LNER at Harwich in 1948 and the service evolved to a full co-operation, the two companies providing the night and day services respectively employing four ships plus two relief vessels. In 1968 with the introduction of car ferries, the SMZ and Sealink services were fully amalgamated. In 1989 Swedish ferry operator Stena Line acquired SMZ. The following year Stena Line also acquired SMZ's UK partner Sealink. The Harwich operations of Sealink were transferred to Stena Line BV.
Fleet
Passenger ships
PS Stad Middleburg - renamed Aurora in 1881 - Sold 1888.
MS Koningin Beatrix - sold to Stena Line BV in 1988.
Cargo ships
Domburgh - lengthened 1962 and re-built as 77 twenty-foot equivalent unitcontainer vessel - chartered by SMZ from W.H.Muller and Co N.V. in 1968 for joint container service Harwich-Rotterdam. Charter ended in 1972.
