Belfast: the city that built Titanic

With a workforce of almost 15,000, the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast not only created Titanic; it shaped the fortunes of the city and its people. But life was not easy for those who built the ship, writes ALF MCREARY

THE EARLY 20th century was a golden age for shipbuilding and for Belfast, but for the men who made Titanic, it was a hard life – eight died in industrial accidents before it ever sailed. The ship was launched 100 years ago tomorrow, but would not make her maiden voyage for another 10 months. When it left Belfast on April 2nd, 1912 it carried with it the good wishes and pride of the shipyardmen who had worked under hazardous conditions and with poor pay to construct the greatest vessel the world had ever known.

This was not without its human cost, and during the construction of Titanic alone, there were 254 reported accidents, including the eight fatalities.

The Labour leader James Connolly remarked that a list of the maimed and hurt in accidents on any one of those big ships “would read like a roster of the wounded after a battle upon the Indian frontier”.

By the early 20th century 9,000 men were employed at the Harland and Wolff shipyard, rising to almost 15,000 around the time Titanic was built. Conditions were harsh; shipyardmen worked from 6am or 6.30am, with only short breaks for breakfast and lunch. They were restricted to a maximum of seven minutes in the toilet each day.

They generally worked a 60-hour week, which included Saturday mornings – the Sabbath was sacrosanct in Protestant east Belfast, but the men were back to work first thing Monday morning.

They had only one week’s summer holiday (around the 12th of July), and one day at Christmas and Easter. Average pay was £2 daily, but this was stopped if the men were late, or damaged the firm’s property or otherwise broke the company’s rules.

The Belfast shipyard had a world-class reputation, after more than 80 years of experience in building vessels.

In the half-century from the 1850s onwards, Belfast grew more rapidly than any other city in the British Isles. This was partly because of the growth in textiles, engineering and shipbuilding which, by the turn of the century, employed around 164,000 people.

The completion of Belfast’s ornate City Hall in 1906 symbolised the contemporary sense of pride of the city and its people, and the feeling of grandeur emanating from its many achievements.

There was also a strong sense of pride in Titanic, which not only provided huge employment for the shipyard and ancillary businesses, but also symbolised the engineering skill and initiative of Belfast and its people in producing what would be the biggest and best vessel in maritime history.

Alf McCreary is the author of Titanic Port – The Illustrated History of Belfast Harbour, published by Booklink. See titanicport.com

At the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum tomorrow, a new £1 million exhibition – TITANICa: the Experience – will be launched, featuring more than 500 original artefacts