Titanic and Liverpool: The Untold Story, Merseyside Maritime Museum, Liverpool
Tim Bryan on an exhibition that connects the internationally famous story of the Titanic with the ship's impact on the people of Liverpool
Titling this exhibition Titanic and Liverpool: The Untold Story was a bold step by its creators since it is a story that has been told in print and on film numerous times. The ship’s sinking on its maiden voyage a century ago still resonates as one of the most shocking 20th century disasters.
And, if finding a new way of telling a familiar story was not enough, there was also the challenge of interpreting it with enough new and interesting original material.
The museum’s Titanic, Lusitania and the Forgotten Empress gallery already provides an introduction to the ship and includes original artefacts, including the 20ft-long builder’s model of the passenger liner.
As a result, the focus of Titanic and Liverpool is firmly on the stories of those who sailed on the ship, particularly Liverpool people, and it is all the better for doing so.
Although the Titanic began its fateful maiden voyage from Southampton, the ship was registered in Liverpool and carried the city’s name on her stern. The exhibition therefore plays out the Titanic drama through the stories of the Liverpool people who had such an important part in its short life.
It is thought that 133 of its 2,200 passengers and crew were born in the city or connected to Liverpool, the most infamous being J Bruce Ismay, chairman of White Star, who survived the sinking.
To provide visitors with some sense of the excitement and wonder generated by the construction and launch of the Titanic, the exhibition begins by illustrating the scale and luxuriousness of the ship itself.
Demonstrating the sheer size of the great ship is not easy with so little original material, but a simple panel of statistics helps; more than 3 million rivets were used in its construction, and the £1.5m it cost in 1912 would now be equivalent to over £85m.
Confusion and controversy
An evocative montage of stills, newsreel and period music show the Titanic and sister ship Olympic and highlights the luxurious facilities provided for passengers, although unsurprisingly the contemporary footage does not focus on the second- or third-class quarters.
A nearby display allows visitors to touch objects such as reproduction linoleum used on the ship, and to smell aromas familiar to Edwardian passengers and crew. These include soap manufactured by Lever Brothers, lubricating oil provided by Liverpool company RS Clare, and fresh bread, since Titanic’s chief baker was Charles Joughin, a Birkenhead resident.
The exhibition provides portraits of crew such as captain Edward Smith, a resident of the Liverpool suburb of Waterloo, and Joseph Bell, the ship’s chief engineer, also from the city. As it unfolds, their stories and ultimate fate are revealed.
It even includes what might well be the only surviving Titanic first-class ticket. Unsurprisingly, the context and background displayed is a precursor to the moving sections of the exhibition, which deal with the sinking of the ship and its aftermath.
An audiovisual, combining on-screen graphics and dramatised testimony from surviving passengers such as Liverpudlian Gladys Cherry, chronicles events leading up to the moment when the ship slipped below the waves.
Original telegraph messages sent by the Carpathia, the ship that rescued survivors, are shown, along with a letter written on the same ship from Mildred Brown, one of those rescued from Titanic’s lifeboats.
Although newsreel footage and photographs provide a sombre but measured account of the aftermath for visitors, I think that the confusion and controversy after the sinking is better illustrated by newspaper front pages, which show inaccurate and sensationalist journalism is clearly not a new phenomenon.
A touchscreen interactive provides audio and pictures of the testimonies of survivors given at public enquiries, illustrating the tough questions faced by Ismay and Stanley Lord, the captain of the Californian, a nearby ship that failed to respond to distress signals from the stricken Titanic.
Judgement reserved
The debate over the sinking of the Titanic that began after its loss will continue as long as there is interest in the ship, and the exhibition wisely does not try to pass judgement.
I was impressed with the way it nevertheless shows just how much debate there was following the tragedy and highlights the loss of life among passengers and crew, especially those from Liverpool. Nowhere is this better shown than in a series of graphics that list all Titanic crew and passengers.
With a panel for each class (two for third class), the names and ages of all are listed, with those who survived highlighted in red, and those lost in blue.
I found the striking number of first-class survivors hard to ignore, and the fact that the “women and children first” criterion seems to have applied less here than in other classes.
All around, the displays feature pictures of crew and passengers reproduced from local Liverpool newspapers of the time, providing a grim context to the wall of names. Another tragic exhibit is an original letter written by May Louise McMurray, the four-year old daughter of a steward on the Titanic; her first letter to her father never reached him as he perished in the wreck.
The final exhibits in the exhibition are artefacts salvaged from the wreck of the Titanic in 1985. While the sight of china from the ship is maybe not a surprise, the display of personal items such as a wristwatch, pince-nez and tie pins remind one that the Titanic remains a grave for more than 1,500 people lost in the sinking.
The Titanic still has a grim fascination for many today because of the stories of bravery, loss and redemption it still generates. This exhibition succeeds in making a real local connection between the national tragedy of the loss of the ship and the impact it had on Liverpool people.
The stories it tells provide a fitting tribute to the memory of the Titanic a century on.
Tim Bryan is the head of collections and interpretation at the Heritage Motor Centre, Gaydon
And, if finding a new way of telling a familiar story was not enough, there was also the challenge of interpreting it with enough new and interesting original material.
The museum’s Titanic, Lusitania and the Forgotten Empress gallery already provides an introduction to the ship and includes original artefacts, including the 20ft-long builder’s model of the passenger liner.
As a result, the focus of Titanic and Liverpool is firmly on the stories of those who sailed on the ship, particularly Liverpool people, and it is all the better for doing so.
Although the Titanic began its fateful maiden voyage from Southampton, the ship was registered in Liverpool and carried the city’s name on her stern. The exhibition therefore plays out the Titanic drama through the stories of the Liverpool people who had such an important part in its short life.
It is thought that 133 of its 2,200 passengers and crew were born in the city or connected to Liverpool, the most infamous being J Bruce Ismay, chairman of White Star, who survived the sinking.
To provide visitors with some sense of the excitement and wonder generated by the construction and launch of the Titanic, the exhibition begins by illustrating the scale and luxuriousness of the ship itself.
Demonstrating the sheer size of the great ship is not easy with so little original material, but a simple panel of statistics helps; more than 3 million rivets were used in its construction, and the £1.5m it cost in 1912 would now be equivalent to over £85m.
Confusion and controversy
An evocative montage of stills, newsreel and period music show the Titanic and sister ship Olympic and highlights the luxurious facilities provided for passengers, although unsurprisingly the contemporary footage does not focus on the second- or third-class quarters.
A nearby display allows visitors to touch objects such as reproduction linoleum used on the ship, and to smell aromas familiar to Edwardian passengers and crew. These include soap manufactured by Lever Brothers, lubricating oil provided by Liverpool company RS Clare, and fresh bread, since Titanic’s chief baker was Charles Joughin, a Birkenhead resident.
The exhibition provides portraits of crew such as captain Edward Smith, a resident of the Liverpool suburb of Waterloo, and Joseph Bell, the ship’s chief engineer, also from the city. As it unfolds, their stories and ultimate fate are revealed.
It even includes what might well be the only surviving Titanic first-class ticket. Unsurprisingly, the context and background displayed is a precursor to the moving sections of the exhibition, which deal with the sinking of the ship and its aftermath.
An audiovisual, combining on-screen graphics and dramatised testimony from surviving passengers such as Liverpudlian Gladys Cherry, chronicles events leading up to the moment when the ship slipped below the waves.
Original telegraph messages sent by the Carpathia, the ship that rescued survivors, are shown, along with a letter written on the same ship from Mildred Brown, one of those rescued from Titanic’s lifeboats.
Although newsreel footage and photographs provide a sombre but measured account of the aftermath for visitors, I think that the confusion and controversy after the sinking is better illustrated by newspaper front pages, which show inaccurate and sensationalist journalism is clearly not a new phenomenon.
A touchscreen interactive provides audio and pictures of the testimonies of survivors given at public enquiries, illustrating the tough questions faced by Ismay and Stanley Lord, the captain of the Californian, a nearby ship that failed to respond to distress signals from the stricken Titanic.
Judgement reserved
The debate over the sinking of the Titanic that began after its loss will continue as long as there is interest in the ship, and the exhibition wisely does not try to pass judgement.
I was impressed with the way it nevertheless shows just how much debate there was following the tragedy and highlights the loss of life among passengers and crew, especially those from Liverpool. Nowhere is this better shown than in a series of graphics that list all Titanic crew and passengers.
With a panel for each class (two for third class), the names and ages of all are listed, with those who survived highlighted in red, and those lost in blue.
I found the striking number of first-class survivors hard to ignore, and the fact that the “women and children first” criterion seems to have applied less here than in other classes.
All around, the displays feature pictures of crew and passengers reproduced from local Liverpool newspapers of the time, providing a grim context to the wall of names. Another tragic exhibit is an original letter written by May Louise McMurray, the four-year old daughter of a steward on the Titanic; her first letter to her father never reached him as he perished in the wreck.
The final exhibits in the exhibition are artefacts salvaged from the wreck of the Titanic in 1985. While the sight of china from the ship is maybe not a surprise, the display of personal items such as a wristwatch, pince-nez and tie pins remind one that the Titanic remains a grave for more than 1,500 people lost in the sinking.
The Titanic still has a grim fascination for many today because of the stories of bravery, loss and redemption it still generates. This exhibition succeeds in making a real local connection between the national tragedy of the loss of the ship and the impact it had on Liverpool people.
The stories it tells provide a fitting tribute to the memory of the Titanic a century on.
Tim Bryan is the head of collections and interpretation at the Heritage Motor Centre, Gaydon
Project data
- Cost £181,000
- Main funder European Union
- Curators Ian Murphy, Rebecca Watkin
- Research Alan Scarth
- Exhibition design and build National Museums Liverpool (NML)
- Project management NML
- Marketing NML
- Audiovisuals NML
- Graphics production and installation Service Graphics
- Image research Zooid Pictures
- Display cases ClickNetherfield