Titanic voyager list goes digital

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/6554169.stm

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The original handwritten list of passengers on the ill-fated Titanic has been put on the internet, 95 years after it sank on its maiden voyage.

The list has details of their job, nationality, age and the class of ticket on which they were travelling.

The 34-page document had previously been kept under wraps at the National Archives in Kew, and could only be viewed under supervision.

Ancestorsonboard.com lists thousands of ship passengers between 1890 and 1919.

Built in Belfast, the Titanic set sail for New York from Southampton in April 1912.

It struck an iceberg in the north Atlantic, and in the early hours of 15 April, she sank with the loss of 1,503 passengers and crew.

Lucky escapes

Among those named on the list are a number of passengers who had lucky escapes, including the Conyngham family who only travelled on the first leg of the voyage to Cherbourg, France.

And some people had bought tickets to embark at Queenstown (now Cobh) in County Cork, but never got onboard.

The Titanic was built at Harland and Wolff shipyard in BelfastDan Jones of the National Archives said the website made fascinating historical material available to the widest possible audience.

"This launch provides a fascinating snapshot into the birth of long distance and affordable travel," he said.

The website currently has records of passengers on all long-distance ships leaving England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales between 1890 and 1919.

When the archive project is finished, it will have more than 1.5 million pages of passenger records, listing the 30 million passengers who travelled on long-distance boat journeys between 1890 and 1960.