Articles with the Tag J. Bruce Ismay

Liverpool Seamen’s Pension Fund

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The Ismay Family: Pension Funds for Seamen, Widows and Widows ‘of those whose lives are lost while they are engaged upon active duty’

The driving force and founder of the modern White Star Line (Oceanic Steam Navigation Company), Thomas Henry Ismay, oversaw the growth of a company which made a significant economic contribution to Britain (and Liverpool, in particular). However, the Ismay family also arranged for significant social provision for retired seafarers, their widows, and the widows of those lost at sea. 

Thomas Henry Ismay, J. Bruce Ismay’s father, founded the Liverpool Seamen’s Pension Fund in 1887 to provide pensions ‘for deserving seamen of whatever rank sailing from the port of Liverpool, who are past work’.  It was intended to provide pensions of £20 a year. (Later, the Margaret Ismay Widows Fund was established to provide for their widows as well.)  The Mercantile Marine Service Association administered the fund as the trustees and by c. 1912 it had grown to about £69,000 (£52,000 of which came from contributions either by the Ismay family or the White Star Line). (Its assets were amalgamated into the Nautilus Welfare Fund in 2009.)

By that time, the number of pensioners receiving pension payments was 126.  They ranged from 54 to 94 years old and included 38 former commanders, 48 ship’s officers and 40 seamen.  During the quarter of a century since the fund had been established, 423 pensioners had received pension payments from the fund, equating to a total of £37,876.  (The number of widows receiving a pension from the newer Margaret Ismay Widows Fund was 74.)

Following the Titanic disaster, J. Bruce Ismay returned to the United Kingdom.  He arrived in Liverpool onboard the White Star liner Adriatic on Saturday 11 May 1912.  He lost no time in writing to the Lord Mayor of Liverpool later the very same day, proposing a new fund providing ‘for widows of those whose lives are lost while they are engaged upon active duty…upon the mercantile vessels of this country’.  The ‘terrible disaster to the Titanic’ highlighted the ‘necessity of such a fund’ and he proposed to contribute £10,000 with a further £1,000 from his wife.  It would ‘continue for all time’.  News of Ismay’s letter apparently reached the press and the Earl of Derby, Lord Mayor of Liverpool sent a telegram to Ismay asking if he could publish it ‘saying I have gratefully accepted your offer?’  Ismay responded: ‘Please act in whatever manner you think best, leave myself entirely in your hands’.

See Chirnside, Mark.  The ‘Olympic’ Class Ships: Olympic Titanic & Britannic. History Press; revised and expanded edition 2011.

 

Above: Thomas Henry Ismay (1837-99). (The Marine Engineer, 1899/Author’s collection)

 

 

‘Olympic & Titanic: “A Very Remote Contingency” – Lifeboats for All’

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‘‘Olympic & Titanic: “A Very Remote Contingency” – Lifeboats for All’ 

 

 

 

My presentation in September 2021 at PRONI discussed the topic of lifeboats.  I set the scene by covering the key points about lifeboat provision during the decades preceding the Titanic disaster; the regulations in 1912 and how they had evolved; and how Harland & Wolff and the White Star Line exceeded the legal requirements for lifeboat capacity.

 

Contrary to popular belief, there is no evidence that Harland & Wolff recommended to the White Star Line that more lifeboats should be fitted.  What they did do is provide a new Welin davit design which would enable them to carry more lifeboats in the future, if the regulations changed.  They also provided four additional semi collapsible boats for each ship.  Comparing the number of lifeboats shown on the ‘Design “D”‘ concept which the White Star Line approved in July 1908 with Titanic as completed in April 1912, the number of lifeboats increased from 16 to 20.     

I closed the presentation by covering some examples of inaccurate claims about Titanic‘s lifeboats in the mass media.  One was a completely inaccurate characterisation of a Harland & Wolff drawing office notebook, which a television programme claimed was evidence that Harland & Wolff had intended originally for Titanic to be fitted with enough lifeboats for everyone (in fact, it was a document recording changes to Olympic‘s lifeboat configuration in the 1912-13 refit).  Another was a newspaper article mischaracterising notes which were authored by Board of Trade surveyor Captain Maurice Harvey Clarke.  They were written after the disaster, not before.   

Mark explores the issue of lifeboat regulation over the decades preceding the Titanic disaster and discusses the context immediately prior to 1912. He discusses the question of lifeboat provision for these new White Star giants and dispels a few longstanding myths and false claims made about Titanic’s lifeboats.

 

 

 

 

 

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Presentation from the Archives: ‘The Chairman & The Commander: J. Bruce Ismay and Captain “E. J.” Smith’

 

 

 

My ‘superb’ presentation in September 2020 at PRONI discussed both J. Bruce Ismay and Captain Smith.  Key topics include J. Bruce Ismay’s correspondence several weeks before the Titanic disaster, when he writes about his daughter’s wedding coming up in March 1912 and explains that he will sail on Titanic on 10 April 1912, expecting to return to Southampton on 27 April 1912; Captain Smith’s ‘uneventful’ career is discussed in some detail, including the Hawke collision on 20 September 1911.   

A talk focusing on two of the key personalities in the Titanic story: the White Star Line’s chairman, J. Bruce Ismay, and the Line’s senior captain, ‘E. J.’ Smith. Mark explores some of the history of these two men in the years leading up to 1912, including little known anecdotes and events – as well as some of the misconceptions surrounding them.