Black and white lines linked with a star to nautical past

We’re currently enjoying a flurry of memorable maritime events which is nothing new as virtually every date on Northern Ireland’s calendar marks the anniversary of ships launched or handed over in times past.
Watch more of our videos on Shots! 
and live on Freeview channel 276
Visit Shots! now

The annual commemoration is approaching of RMS Titanic’s fateful maiden voyage in April 1912 and earlier this month Titanic Belfast reopened after a multi-million pound refurbishment.

Leaving aside ships built in Londonderry and Carrickfergus, today is the anniversary of nine Lagan-built vessels, from the 4,000-ton cargo ship Imaum in 1890 to the 180,000-ton super tanker Coastal Hercules in 1980. And one of the nine made bigtime maritime history!

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The 8,000-ton cargo ship Roxburgh Castle, launched by Harland and Wolff on 25 March 1937, fronted one of WWII’s most heroic Allied operations.

Black Star Line's SS YarmouthBlack Star Line's SS Yarmouth
Black Star Line's SS Yarmouth

Having navigated a ferocious barrage of air and sea attacks approaching Malta, MV Roxburgh Castle was the first arrival of five severely damaged survivors of Operation Pedestal - the Malta Convoy.

Greeted by a military band and cheering islanders on the quays, the battered Castle steamed into Malta’s deep-water Grand Harbour at Valetta on 13 August 1942 with the remnants of a torpedo embedded in her fractured hull!

“If only one of the 14 merchant ships reaches Malta,” Winston Churchill had said, “the convoy will be considered a success. Otherwise Malta will fall.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Five miraculously arrived, securing Malta and the Mediterranean for the Allies and opening safer routes for vital amphibious landings in North Africa, Sicily and Italy. An imminent maritime event in Belfast stars another of the Lagan’s wartime heroes.

Marcus Garvey,1924Marcus Garvey,1924
Marcus Garvey,1924

Built in Birkenhead but berthed in the Titanic Quarter, the historic HMS Caroline reopens to the public next Saturday, April 1. And completing our feast of nautical rendezvous - from early February we’ve been able to view previously unseen film footage of the discovery of the wreck of the Titanic, far beneath the Atlantic. In less than 24 hours from going online the footage attracted almost half-a-million YouTube viewers.

But there’s an additional Titanic ‘link’ that’s rarely recounted. Belfast’s most famous ship, like many others launched on the Lagan, was built for the enormously successful White Star Line. Another shipping company, seeking similar success, adopted the name, with a slight adjustment.

The idea behind black nationalist Marcus Garvey’s shipping line in 1919 was to transport America’s Africans back to their homeland. He called it the Black Star Line. It was a stupendous failure, but a gripping yarn.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Garvey, with his ‘Back to Africa’ movement, was the inspiration for future US civil rights activists. Born in Jamaica in 1887, the youngest of 11 children, Marcus left school at 14, became a printer’s apprentice and led a strike for better pay.

Advertisement for Black Star LineAdvertisement for Black Star Line
Advertisement for Black Star Line

After some travelling including the UK, and returning to Jamaica to start a black rights organisation, he moved to New York. In 1916 he called on African Americans to be proud of their race and return to Africa. He attracted thousands of supporters and set up his Black Star Line to transport them to Africa.

Garvey also encouraged black economic independence and tried unsuccessfully to persuade the Liberian government to grant land to his followers. Three months after creating his new shipping line Garvey purchased the first of four vessels - SS Yarmouth, an overpriced WWI coal boat in poor condition.

He intended to rename it the SS Frederick Douglass after the famous former slave, social reformer, abolitionist, writer and statesman. Semi-reconditioned, the ship sailed for three years between the U.S. and the West Indies with a black crew and skipper Joshua Cockburn. Its first voyage, a shipment of whiskey from the U.S. to Cuba (pre-Prohibition) lost a lot of money because it didn’t have docking arrangements in Havana.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The Black Star Line’s SS Shady Side, also in very bad condition and overpriced, sank due to a leak. Then the Line’s steam yacht Kanawha, renamed the SS Antonio Maceo, blew a boiler that killed a crewman. As well as acquiring overpriced, poor-condition ships, the Black Star Line was beset by mismanagement and fraud and

Garvey was sentenced to five years in prison. He was then deported to Jamaica.

In 1935, he moved permanently to London where he died on 10 June 1940. In 1964, his body was returned to Jamaica where he was declared the country’s first national hero.