Anyone who knows much about the Titanic (or who ever saw a cinematic or television portrayal) probably knows there were quite a few Irish immigrants. The ship’s last port of call before heading to New York was Queenstown, Ireland (now Cobh). Titanicstories on YouTube has a nice (though sad) video showing some of the sights the immigrants must have seen.

In the novel I’m working on, a character sailed to Ireland to visit her family before embarking on the Titanic for the journey home. Of course she didn’t sail on the Titanic to Ireland, since its first voyage was departing from Europe. I didn’t think she would have sailed to Ireland on the Titanic‘s sister ship Olympic in large part because that would have been kind of boring, since the ships were extremely similar. But I figured all I had to do was find a ship that sailed from New York to England and I’d be set, right? Surely they all stopped in Ireland on the way to Southampton or wherever?

Nah.

Here’s an advertisement from page 50 of the February 4, 1912 issue of the New York Tribune. It shows several ships sailing from New York, but note that the Olympic and Titanic are both scheduled to stop at Plymouth instead of Queenstown! I hadn’t thought about it, but with so many Irish people emigrating to the US, it makes sense that there wouldn’t be nearly so many people traveling from the US to Ireland, so stopping at Queenstown wouldn’t make sense.

So in this ad, out of the White Star Line, the Red Star Line, and the American Line, the only vessels heading to Queenstown were the White Star Line’s Baltic and Celtic. The Baltic fits my timeline better, I think.

Just from the size of the fonts used, the Titanic appears to much more renowned than the Baltic. (Although interestingly enough, the Baltic was the first ship to heed a wireless distress call in 1909, leading to them rescuing many hundreds of passengers from a sinking White Star Line vessel…!)

Per the same newspaper page, Cunard had a similar situation with getting passengers to Queenstown. Their Campania (maiden voyage: 1893) stopped in Queenstown on eastbound trips, but the newer, nicer, and more famous Lusitania and Mauretania only stopped there when heading to the US. Although, the Campania could do 22 knots, so it might be a better pick than the Baltic after all…

I’m a night owl, but I’m not sure I envy the Cunard Line’s passengers potentially sailing at 1 a.m. on Wednesdays! Though having a buffet supper up until midnight does sound like the kind of thing a cruise might offer even in more modern times.