Exploring a Legend Larger Than Life in Halifax, Nova Scotia

03 Jul Exploring a Legend Larger Than Life in Halifax, Nova Scotia

“It took five days for the rescue ship Mackay-Bennet to reach the site where the Titanic went down on April 16, 1912,” said Blair Beed as we gazed out over the misty harbor of Halifax, Nova Scotia. “By the time they got there, and saw the bodies bobbing in their life jackets, they were no longer calling themselves a rescue ship. They were a recovery ship.”

Titanic Graveyard Sign Halifax
© shaunl

In this 101st year since the Titanic went down, no place on earth is more redolent of the tragic sunken passenger ship than Halifax.

It was from Halifax that the rescue cum recovery effort was made to reach the site, some 750 miles away. You can walk into the excellent Maritime Museum and see a deck chair recovered from the ship, as well as other flotsam and jetsam. They recently had an exhibit about the cable ships like the Mackay-Bennet that were sent out for the rescue and recovery effort. Even a stroll into the lush and magical Victorian-style Public Gardens of Halifax yields a sighting of the Titanic – albeit a scale model of the ship in a pond.

To show you around this the charming seaport, you could find no better guide than Beed, a born and bred Haligonian. Beed has been leading tours in Halifax for 39 years and he specializes in tours about the Titanic.

Friendly and soft-spoken, Beed is not only steeped in the lore and minutiae of the famous shipwreck, he’s also the author of T_itanic Victims in Halifax Graveyards_. His family, which has been in Nova Scotia for 175 years, was involved in the recovery. Beed’s grandfather, then a mere boy of 12, was hastily employed to work on the wharves by a local undertaker, who was overwhelmed by the hundreds of bodies that were eventually brought to shore. Indeed, many families in Halifax have a personal connection to the 1912 tragedy.

Actually, Beed explained to me, Halifax wasn’t the closest point to the sinking. That would have been Newfoundland. “But in 1912,” Beed said, “Newfoundland wasn’t much more than a collection of fishing villages. It lacked the infrastructure. And the owners of the White Star Line, which owned the Titanic, did not want to make families seeking loved ones endure a sea voyage from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland. They thought the idea of a sea voyage would be too traumatic for them, given the circumstances.”

So they chose Halifax instead, on the southern coast of Nova Scotia.

“Halifax was the closest developed mainland harbor,” Beed said. “The city had train service, undertakers and hotels for families arriving to find out about their loved ones.”

Thus the Mackay-Bennett, which was normally deployed to lay communication cables across the North Atlantic between Nova Scotia and England, was marshaled into service.

“The Mackay-Bennet found 328 bodies,” Beed continued. “Some were brought on board and then tossed over the side, usually because they had ‘charms’ around their necks.”

Charms?

“Religious medallions,” Beed said. “They were Catholics, Irish most likely. Don’t forget the animosity between Protestants and Catholics that existed at the time.”

I thought of my own grandmother, who emigrated from County Donegal a year or two later, “charms” aplenty around her own neck.

“In the end, they brought 209 bodies back to Halifax,” Beed said as we did a leisurely drive through the city, stopping at various points of Titanic interest.

A tour around Halifax with Beed is an extraordinary experience. He’ll take you past the house of Halifax millionaire George Wright, on Young Avenue. Wright perished when the ship went down, “three days after signing his will. He left his house to the Halifax Women’s Council and they still own it.”

Wright is commemorated in stately St Paul’s, in downtown Halifax, which seems like an English country church erected in the middle of the New World.

We drove to leafy Fairview Lawn Cemetery and walked around the graves which are laid out, somewhat eerily, in the shape of a ship’s prow, courtesy of White Star Line. There are 121 graves of Titanic victims, made from Nova Scotia granite. The cruise line paid for all of them.

“The gravesite is pointed northeast, just as the bow of Titanic was pointed northeast,” Beed said. We walked past various graves, some simply numbered, their inhabitants unknowns. Other have names and dates and even inscriptions. Their stories, when known, are enhanced by Beed’s deep knowledge of their lives.

“Jakob Alfred Wiklun,” Beed said, reading the inscription. “He was Finnish and going to work on a farm in Quebec. There’s Harry Reynolds. He was on his way to Toronto to join a friend in the bakery business. And here’s James McGrady. He was a steward on the Titanic and his was the last body found.”

There are more graves in a Jewish burial ground in Fairview, which requires special permission to visit. There are also 19 Catholics graves at Mt. Olivet, thanks in part to a priest who was sent out on one of the recovery ships to prevent those wearing “charms” from being tossed back over the side.

“Who’s buried there?” Beed asked. “You can only imagine. If you had dark hair, you were considered an ‘Italian type’ and you were put in the Catholic cemetery. There were Greeks and Syrians on board whose bodies were recovered and buried. What was their religion? It was guesswork.”

We came upon the grave of John Laws Hume.

“He was a violinist in the Titanic band, the band that was instructed to just play on,” Beed said.

A moment later we paused at the gravestone of one “J. Dawson.”

His name was appropriated by director James Cameron for the character played by Leonardo DiCaprio in the film “Titanic,” which was recently re-released in 3D.

“Ever since the movie came out, I’ve had young women fall to the ground weeping when they see his stone,” Beed said.

Wherever you go in Halifax, you have a powerful sense of lives interrupted, of extraordinary loss — and exceptional valor.


Blair Beed (902-455-9977; $150 for up to six passengers) is a terrific a local who brings tales of the Titanic to life.

The Maritime Museum of the Atlantic (675 Lower Water Street; 902-424-7490; http://museum.gov.ns.ca) has ship models and a variety of poignant artifacts.

For more on Titanic and Halifax, visit Destination Halifax.

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Everett Potter
Everett Potter is the editor and publisher of Everett Potter’s Travel Report, an online magazine that The Wall Street Journal has called “a terrific mix of profiles and interviews, all designed to make the best use of your travel budget.”
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