Feature will honour the crew of Titanic (From Daily Echo)
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Feature will honour the Southampton's Titanic crew
10:03am Monday 31st August 2009 in Hampshire Heritage
Plaque will honour the crew of Titanic
PLANS have been unveiled to celebrate the city’s Titanic crew members who lost their lives in the disaster by creating a permanent commemorative feature in the heart of the city.
More than 1,520 people lost their lives when the Titanic sank on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York on April 15, 1912, after hitting an iceberg off Newfoundland.
Around 670 were crewmembers and around 500 were from Southampton. The City of Southampton Society has put forward plans to build the memorial next to the existing Second World War remembrance feature outside the mayor’s parlour at the Civic Centre. Society trustee and former chairman Jack Candy said: “There is a plaque to those who died at the cenotaph as well as a plaque for the Titanic engineers but there is no single commemorative feature for the Southampton crew of the Titanic.
“Many of the crew were from the city and this feature would be a fitting way to remember them.”
Similar to the existing memorial to the city’s war dead inside the Civic Centre, it would consist of a record of names contained in a wooden cabinet resting on a marble plinth. It would be paid for by leftover money raised by the society to fund the Queen’s Peace Fountain in East Park, which was built in 2001 to mark 56 years of peace. Then, around £90,000 was raised, but the fountain only cost £67,000 to build.
“We plan to use the balance from the Queen’s Peace Fountain donations to pay for the memorial,” Mr Candy added. “We have contacted all the 148 donors and had no objections to our proposals.
Now we are just waiting for listed building consent to be granted so we can put it in the Civic Centre.”
He said that if plans for a Titanic museum in the city go ahead the feature would be moved there from the civic centre.
Comments(7)
Night Mare
says...
11:09am Mon 31 Aug 09
Why does Southampton have to exploit a single, albeit terrible, disaster for its cultural identity. The ship sailed from the port only once and was registered in Liverpool.
What has the sinking of the Titanic got to do with peace? I wonder whether the people who donated to the Queen's Peace Fountain would have done so if they had thought the funds would be diverted to another cause.
Jammy Donut
says...
11:30am Mon 31 Aug 09
About time Hannides was given a bus pass
freemantlegirl2
says...
1:44pm Mon 31 Aug 09
Night Mare wrote:Why don't you two read the article properly?
90 plus years too late.
Why does Southampton have to exploit a single, albeit terrible, disaster for its cultural identity. The ship sailed from the port only once and was registered in Liverpool.
What has the sinking of the Titanic got to do with peace? I wonder whether the people who donated to the Queen's Peace Fountain would have done so if they had thought the funds would be diverted to another cause.
1)Mr Candy added. “We have contacted all the 148 donors and had no objections to our proposals.
2)“There is a plaque to those who died at the cenotaph as well as a plaque for the Titanic engineers but there is no single commemorative plaque for the Southampton crew of the Titanic.“Many of the crew were from the city and this feature would be a fitting way to remember them.”
Southampton is inextricably linked with the Titanic, the fact that it sailed from here is extremely relevant, poignant, and as the article says many of the crew were from our City. Whilst I'm not a fan of the current Council this is NOT being funded from council coffers but private donations, I really don't see what the problem is?
Linesman
says...
6:13pm Mon 31 Aug 09
I wonder whether, in 2066, there will be a palque to commemorate the FA Cup winning team or one in 2035 to commemorate the spitfire and the part it played in the defence of Britain!
Derek of Dibden Purlieu
says...
10:45am Tue 1 Sep 09
Linesman wrote:"which had little bearing on the truth?"
Would they have gone to this bother if Hollywood had not made a film of that name - which had little bearing on the truth?
I wonder whether, in 2066, there will be a palque to commemorate the FA Cup winning team or one in 2035 to commemorate the spitfire and the part it played in the defence of Britain!
Didn't the ship really sink then?
mr_lee_white@hotmail.com
says...
4:11pm Tue 1 Sep 09
The plaques and monuments, which let's face facts were put there at a time whrn the city actually felt grief are sufficient. This is an act of greed not grief, they're cashing-in and in my opinion this has nothing in my view whatsoever to do with memorial or respect.
That money would be better spent, donated or otherwise on something for the future. If the best this city can come up with to celebrate it's hertitage is a tragic shipping disaster then something is horribly wrong!
Jammy Donut says...
11:03am Mon 31 Aug 09
Why do we need to waste money on another ? When the park memorial was dedicated in 1914 100,000 people attended, what chance a hundred would turn up now?