Belfast: Rising From Ashes of The Troubles

(From RealClearHistory)

Over the summer, RealClearHistory Editor Samuel Chi embarked on a two-week tour of the British Isles and France. He filed a few dispatches via the transatlantic telegraph cable, which we just received now.

Part I: Guernsey - British Land Under German Boots

Part II: Cobh - Titanic and 'The Saddest Place in Ireland

As the MS Caribbean Princess got tied up to the dock in the port of Belfast, a gleaming, glass and steel structure just across the ship channel came into view on the starboard side. It's a dream building that was completed just a year ago to commemorate the centennial of RMS Titanic. It also stands as a symbol of hope and progress - but most of all, rebirth.

Not that long ago, Belfast was considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world. During 'The Troubles' in the 1970s and '80s, bombings, assassinations and government crackdowns were a way of life in the hard-scrabble capital of Northern Ireland. The six predominately protestant Ulster counties opted not to join the new Irish Free State in 1920 and remained in the United Kingdom. There were sporadic conflicts between the republicans (those wishing to join Ireland) and loyalists (those wishing to remain in the UK) for the next half century, before an orgy of bloodshed erupted.

'The Troubles' finally came to a halt in the early 2000s after the Belfast Agreement in 1998. All told, over 3,500 people would lose their lives as part of the 50,000 casualties during the tumultuous three decades. In the past 10 years or so, there was finally sustained peace, and civic leaders went about rebuilding a once prosperous city that was the envy of the British Empire.

In the second half of the 19th Century, Belfast underwent a rapid transformation, becoming a boomtown while the rest of Ireland was ravaged by the Great Famine. People flocked into Belfast's new linen mills, whiskey distilleries and the burgeoning docks. As Belfast's population went from 87,000 in 1851 to 350,000 in 1901, it also became the world's biggest shipbuilding center.

The city's harbor commission had the foresight to dredge the River Lagan and redevelop the pleasure grounds of Queens Island into shipyards. Harland & Wolff would set up shop there and begin building the biggest ocean liners the world had ever seen. In 1909 workers started laying the keel for two enormous ships, side by side, under the monstrous Arrol Gantry - Titanic and Olympic.

While Titanic spent barely two weeks in the water before she met her untimely demise, Olympic had a 24-year career including a stint as a troop ship during World War I. In the slipways where the Arrol Gantry once stood is now a park commemorating the twin ships, with wooden benches laid out as the way they did on the deck of Titanic. At the foot of the park is the newly opened attraction - Titanic Belfast.

Titanic would've been drawfed by our ship, the MS Caribbean Princess (photoshoped to scale).

Opened March 31, 2012, to coincide with the centennial of its nameshake ship, Titanic Belfast is both a museum and a vision, of Belfast's past and future. The massive seven-story building tells the story of not just Titanic, but also the city itself. The exhibitions serve to weave the story of how Belfast emerged from a sleepy seaside hamlet to a martime powerhouse, as the birthplace to the greatest ships the world had seen at the turn of the 20th Century.

The exhibitions include not just images and old films, but also replicas and renderings of all areas of Titanic, including a ride that takes you from the top deck all the way to the boiler room as the ship was being built. In another interactive presentation, the visitors are whisked from the crew's living quarters in the bottom of the ship, through third-class accomodations, all the way up to the iconic grand staircase and the wheelhouse.

But Titanic Belfast is but one part - though a central one - of Belfast's rebirth. It serves to anchor a new development named Titanic Quarter, which consists of a 185-acre area of abandoned shipyards south of the ship channel and River Lagan. A short walk from downtown Belfast, the new development is home to Titanic Belfast, Titanic Studio (in which HBO's popular series 'Game of Thrones' was produced), and eventually also up to 28,000 residents.

The new Belfast seeks to move the city past a violent half century that included not only 'The Troubles,' but one of the most destructive air raids in the history of the United Kingdom. On the night of April 15, 1941, the Luftwaffe launched a massive air attack that sought to cripple Belfast's aircraft and shipbuilding facilities and, by being able to follow neutral Ireland's brightly lit coastlines all the way to Belfast, it was a devastating success. The 180 planes dropped 674 bombs and 76 mines that completely caught the city off guard, destroying much of its industries and killing 745 people. That, and other parts of Belfast's World War II history are captured in the small yet captivating Northern Ireland War Memorial on the ground floor of an office building right by St. Anne's Cathedral in downtown Belfast.

After Belfast, we finally bade farewell to Ireland, as the MS Caribbean Princess sailed toward the North Sea, heading for a destination where the greatest navy in the world once called home.

Following in RMS Titanic's Wake

(From RealClearHistory)

Over the summer, RealClearHistory Editor Samuel Chi embarked on a two-week tour of the British Isles and France. He filed a few dispatches via the transatlantic telegraph cable, which we just received now.

Part I: Guernsey - British Land Under German Boots

Here's the second installment:

Aboard the MS Caribbean Princess, the first part of our itinerary followed closely the maiden (and only) voyage of RMS Titanic. We began in Southampton, just as Titanic did, made a stop across the English Channel (we in the Channel Island of Guernsey; Titanic in the French port of Cherbourg), and then arrived in Cobh, Ireland.

Cobh (pronounced "Cove," which was its original name) is located on the southeastern coast of Ireland. Historically it's better known as Queenstown, the name of this small but important port when it was under British rule. It was here on April 11, 1912, when Titanic made its last, ahem, scheduled stop.

Queenstown, the name it took in 1850 after a visit by Queen Victoria and kept until 1920, looks remarkably unchanged over the past 100 years. There's an eerie timelessness to this place. Sure, there are ATM machines now and your mobile phone works wonderfully, but from the dock where our ship was tied up it bears a striking resemblance to photographs taken a century ago.

One of the more famous pictures of the Queenstown docks was snapped by Father Frank Browne, who sailed from Southampton to Queenstown on a ticket gifted to him by his uncle. Browne wanted to continue sailing to New York, but was ordered off the ship by his Jesuit superiors, who were expecting him in Dublin to continue his seminary training. Browne obeyed the order, which most likely saved his life, and also the unique visual records of Titanic's voyage from Browne's photographs.

Whereas Browne and half a dozen others disembarked in Queenstown, 123 passengers boarded Titanic - most of them perishing four days later. Even before the disaster, Queenstown was known as "the Saddest Place in Ireland." Between 1851 and 1921, over two million Irish immigrants to America bade their families farewell in Queenstown. Back in the day, there was virtually no chance for the poor immigrants to make a return voyage, so for most, it was the last time they'd ever see some of their loved ones.

That history is vividly captured at the Cobh Heritage Centre, adjacent to the quayside train station. On display are documents and photographic records of the Irish immigrants' plight and journeys, dating to the Irish Potato Famine in 1845 that precipitated the mass emigration. And besides Titanic, another famous and ill-fated ship also has a connection to Queenstown. Lusitania was sunk by a German U-Boat off the coast of Ireland during World War I in 1915. Most of the 761 survivors were ferried to Queenstown while 150 victims were buried in mass graves just up the hill.

Memorials for Titanic (left) and Lusitania (right) in Cobh

There are statues and plaques commemorating the dead from both Lusitania and Titanic in the small town center. Across the street, the old White Star Line ticket office on the dock is preserved and refurbished, now housing a small interactive museum Titanic Experience.

In a kid-friendly fashion (I have an 8-year-old and appreciated the help), the story of Titanic is told through photographic and interactive exhibits. You're handed a ticket upon entering the museum, on it is the name of one of the 123 passengers who embarked Titanic in Queenstown. You'll see what they experienced on the ship from replicas of accommodations, all the way until the meeting with the iceberg. At the end, you'd learn their fate. (Hint: If you're a man, it probably won't work out too well, as only a handful of those Irish male passengers survived.)

Outside the former ticket office is the skeleton of the old pier that served to shuttle passengers to large ocean liners - including Titanic - via tender boats. Luckily for us, this is where the parallel tracks of our two ships end. Whereas Titanic sailed into the cold North Atlantic toward her demise, Caribbean Princess instead worked her way up the Irish Sea, to where Titanic was born.

British Land Under German Boots

(From RealClearHistory)

Over the summer, RealClearHistory Editor Samuel Chi embarked on a two-week tour of the British Isles and France. He filed a few dispatches via the transatlantic telegraph cable, which we just received now. Here's the first installment:

Sailing on the MS Caribbean Princess, one of those monster cruise ships that carries thousands of mostly geriatric passengers from one tourist destination to the next, our first port of call was St. Peter Port, on the Channel Island of Guernsey. 

Though on the French side of the English Channel and bracketed by the Cotentin Peninsula and Brittany, the eight permanently inhabited islands are unmistakably British, going back nearly one thousand years to the reign of William the Conqueror. The biggest two islands Guernsey and Jersey are British crown dependencies - called Bailiwicks - with their own governments and even own currencies (though they'll happily take your Sterling Pounds at a 1-to-1 exchange rate).

The most remarkable part of the islands' history, however, was the five years during which they were NOT under British rule. Ja, in 1940, the Luftwaffe and the Wehrmacht showed up, as the Channel Islands became the only British territory fell under Nazi occupation during World War II.

After the fall of France and the near annihilation of the British forces on the continent in June 1940, it was evident that Channel Islands could not be defended. The British quietly evacuated the islands and demilitarized them - but never bothered to tell the Germans about it. The Luftwaffe made a probing air raid on June 28, killing 33 civilians in Guernsey. Only then did the British government notify Berlin - via the American embassy - that the islands were no longer defended and the Germans were welcome to them.

Life under the Nazi boots wasn't easy, but make no mistake, also not quiet as harsh as what was experienced in the German-occupied eastern territories. The first thing the Germans did - aside from having a military parade - was making everybody drive on the right side of the road and change the time from British time to Central European time. Over time, the Germans would station up to 100,000 troops on the islands, though the Allies never even contemplated an invasion.

The remnants of the German defensive works - erected with the help of 16,000 slave laborers imported to the islands - are still evident today on the shores of Guernsey. And the life and times of those five years are faithfully chronicled at the German Occupation Museum.

Located in the town of Forest, about a 15-minute bus ride from St. Peter Port, the German Occupation Museum is housed in an inauspicious one-story building surrounded by farms (yes, there are plenty of Guernsey cows on Guernsey). But once inside, you'll find a rich collection of armaments, munitions, automobiles, uniforms as well as documents retelling the stories from 1940-1945. You can easily spend two hours walking through the museum's grounds.

Closer to St. Peter Port, there's another, smaller museum also devoted to the wartime experience of the Channel Islands. La Vallette Underground Military Museum is located inside the underground tunnels the Germans built to store massive quantities of oil, though ironically it was never used during the enitre war. This museum has an interesting exhibition of all kinds of paraphernalia confiscated from all German service branches (Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine), as well as wartime posters and documents.

The war officially ended for the Channel Islanders actually a bit later than for everybody else in Europe, as the British had to arrange for ships to bring troops and supplies to the islands - there's a transcript (available at both museums) of the somewhat humorous exchange between the British and German commanders on how the surrender should be handled, with the British requesting the Germans maintain order until they arrive. The worst period of the war for the islands was its final 11 months, following the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1945, as the Germans could no longer resupply the islands after losing control of the French coast. With acute shortages of food and fuel, the Red Cross had to come in to keep the malnourished population fed.

The Channel Islands are not hurting for much now, as the economy is booming, thanks to the special status that allowed them to become a financial hub and tax haven - in 2008, Jersey's GDP per capita was the highest in the world. The islands, though, are still known for their cattle, and potatoes.

Our stop at Guernsey was brief - a mere four hours - but long enough to get a lot of history out of it. Next up, 'The Saddest Place in Ireland.'

The State of History in 2012

(From RealClearHistory)

Editor's note: In advance of President Obama's State of the Union address on Tuesday, RCP is rolling out daily "state of" reports to better frame the issues facing the nation. Today: The state of American history.

Over the Christmas holiday I took my family to Pearl Harbor, shortly after the 70th anniversary of the Japanese attack that plunged the United States into World War II. I figured that my daughter, now 6 and in first grade, should be old enough to get an up-close and personal experience with this key chapter in world history.

But I was soon consumed by a horrifying event.

While waiting for the boat to take us across the channel to the USS Arizona Memorial, I overheard a group of college students discussing history. Unable to help myself, I lingered to eavesdrop. And this is the gist of what I heard:

“The World War II [sic] started with a bunch of countries on one side and a bunch of countries on the other side,” a young man began, his companions listening with rapt attention as if it were a lecture, “and we didn’t know which side we wanted to be on and we had a hard time picking sides. But when the Japanese attacked us, that made it easy to go against their side.”

I didn’t know whether I should be enraged at or take pity on the young man’s ignorance. But what was most troubling was that he was the one dispensing “knowledge”! The others -- judging by the fact that no one disputed or challenged his account -- knew less than he did, even after apparently 12 years of compulsory education.

But suddenly I remembered that President Obama, born and raised in Hawaii, once mentioned that a single bomb had been dropped on Pearl Harbor (in the fashion of Hiroshima) ... then it all made sense.

We’re now a country led by a man who thought JFK talked Khrushchev out of the Cuban missile crisis (he didn’t); claimed that our country built the “Intercontinental Railroad” (must be from New York to Paris); and bragged that his uncle liberated Auschwitz (was he in the Soviet Red Army?).

And I’m not picking on just Obama. His political detractors are every bit as ignorant on history: Ask them about the American Revolution, and you’d find that Michele Bachmann thought the battles at Lexington and Concord were in New Hampshire; Rick Perry believed the war was fought in the 16th century; and Sarah Palin claimed it all began when Paul Revere warned the British.

It’s symptomatic of our times. The people who aspire to hold the highest office of our land actually know very little about the history of this nation, let alone the rest of the world.

If anything, this is a terrible indictment of our education system, from elementary schools to the institutions of higher learning, including even the most elite universities (after all, Obama attended Columbia and Harvard). It’s possible now to have 16-to-20 years’ worth of education and not come away with even a cursory grasp of history that actually matters.

But if you’re in California, where I live, your kids will get a healthy dose of history about Native Americans, African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Asian-Americans, and soon, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans, as mandated by state law. By the time they’re ready for college, they’ll know far more about Cesar Chavez, Huey Newton and Harvey Milk than George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

While there’s nothing wrong with learning a particular subset of history, doing so should not come before or at the expense of the core fundamentals, which are now badly neglected or perverted by political correctness. You shouldn’t try to learn about climate change if you don’t know what makes it rain.

A Marist College survey last year revealed just how clueless Americans are about history. Barely half of the respondents knew that the U.S. declared its independence in 1776 (Rick Perry sure wasn’t among them), and over a quarter thought the colonies revolted against a country other than Britain (some believed it was China). The percentage of correct answers was proportional to the respondents’ age -- which certainly is no surprise.

As our generations get more ignorant about history, it prompts the question: Does history still matter?

I hesitate to bring up George Santayana’s famous “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” warning, because “remember” implied that it was learned at one time and later forgotten. In these times, it’s rather more like “those who are ignorant of the past are destined to screw up because they think they’re doing something new.”

If you never learned a lick about the Habsburgs and the Thirty Years’ War and the Anschluss, then it would make sense to think folks in Austria speak “Austrian.” If you knew Churchill only as a caricature colonial master oppressor, of course it’d be easy to pack up his bust and send it back to the Queen. And if you believed Kennedy talked Khrushchev out of putting nuclear missiles in Cuba, then why wouldn’t you want to sit down and chat with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?

Sadly, things won’t be improving much even in an age of hyper-connectivity, where everything is at our fingertips. Teenagers are spending far more time Googling Lady Gaga than Lady Thatcher. Don’t look to the big screen for help, either. The recent biopics on the Iron Lady and the Tuskegee Airmen (“Red Tails”) are following the fine Hollywood tradition of “JFK” and “Pearl Harbor” -- at best, distortions and at worst, garbage.

So when it comes to the future of history ... you’re on your own. But thanks to that hyper-connectivity, there are ever more historical accounts and documents available to you, painstakingly written and prepared by lots of knowledgeable and dedicated people. The challenge, of course, is to sift through all that information.

That’s where we come in with our humble pitch: We launched RealClearHistory in September 2011 with the mission of delivering daily authoritative and informative history commentary and analysis.
There are also, of course, a number of established great sites, including the University of Houston’s Digital History, George Mason’s History News Network and The History Channel, just to name a few.

Of the many reasons why it’s important to develop a well-rounded understanding of history, we’ll mention just one in closing: To honor the sacrifices made in the past. In the case of Pearl Harbor, it’s so the sailors and Marines who gave their lives on Dec. 7, 1941, didn’t die in vain.