Something about crying quietly to oneself in a section of a museum dedicated to a tragedy on my own home soil - in my country - is so frighteningly human. I felt more alive there than I had in years. I was crying for people who had not been alive in decades, perhaps even a century. I was crying for the innocents who didn't know what was happening and suffered anyway. I was crying for the man who saved hundreds and hundreds of lives, and the trains that came to aid the town's people because of him.
“Hold up the train. Ammunition ship afire in harbor making for Pier 6 and will explode. Guess this will be my last message. Good-bye boys.”
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he Halifax Explosion happened on December 6th, 1917 and it was the biggest man made explosion until the use of the atomic bomb in 1945. To understand why the tragedy happened it’s important to understand its history.
The city is the biggest Canadian city east of Quebec and is the capital of the province of Nova Scotia. The city has always had its roots in the military as it was initially founded in 1749 by the British to be a strategical settlement for future attacks against the French. Time went on and it was not surprising that in WWI Halifax was an essential city for the British, this is because Halifax has one of the biggest and deepest natural harbours in the world (making it one of the best) and geographically it lines up with Britain (not exactly but its pretty close) on the other side of the Atlantic. Here’s a map for reference:
Thus, by 1917 Halifax Harbour saw ships and convoys constantly coming and going transporting soldiers and goods to and from Europe. In fact, German submarines often sunk ships outside the harbour. Yet, besides the heavy nautical traffic in the harbour, there weren’t many rules and the process of entering and leaving the harbour was not very organized; it was an accident waiting to happen.
On the morning of December 6th 1917 a Belgian relief ship, the Imo, collided with the French ship, the Mont-Blanc and a small fire broke out on the French ship. This was because the Mont-Blanc was carrying over 3 million dollars in US money at the time in explosives. The crew immediately abandoned ship, but due to the language barrier between French and English they could not properly warn the citizens of Halifax of the dangers. Meanwhile the abandoned ship drifted to the docks where the fire spread to some of the buildings. The fire caught the attention of the people who were unaware of the danger, crowded near the docks to see the spectacle, others watched from the ship from their windows at home.
At 9:04 that morning the Mont-Blanc exploded, the ground shook and near every window for miles shattered. This was soon followed by a tsunami caused by the explosion which hit the areas closest to the harbour. Fires broke out all over the city, either directly caused by the explosion or by such things as fallen kerosene lamp or stoves that were being used at the time. Many people who were injured or trapped in their homes and in risk of fire were forced to be abandoned due to a rumour of a likely second explosion was to take place that there was a fire near an ammunition storage in the city. This turned out to be false and there was not a second explosion. Unfortunately, this caused a great deal more tragedy as those who might have been able to be saved were left for dead.
Immediately soldiers in the city took charge by starting rescue parties, and the cities hospitals began to fill. One of the most common injuries were caused by glass, specifically in the eyes as many had been watching the Mont-Blanc at the time of explosion and all the cities windows shattered. There were around 2000 dead, 9000 injured and 6000 homeless, this, all in a small city with a population of about 50 000.
Within the next hours, relief started flooding in coming in from other Nova Scotian towns and from towns of the neighbouring province of New Brunswick. Not as fast but just important all the same were from the rest of Canada and America. Most notably from the state of Massachusetts and actually, to this day Nova Scotia still sends a giant Christmas tree to Boston every year to show thanks for the aid they received.
That night the weather took a turn for the worst as blizzard hit the city making it difficult to find those who were injured and missing that hadn’t already received help. The blizzard continued through the night and the following day, it was yet another trial for the people of Halifax as many were homeless and no windows remained in the city.
It took years to rebuild and some communities that were destroyed never did. For example, the neighbourhood of Richmond which was utterly obliterated because it was the closest to explosion and thus the hardest hit. Nevertheless, Halifax healed and it continues to thrive today.
For the Conversation Hearts Exchange, I watched the five Heritage minutes you shared. What a charming little bit of vintage media! The Halifax explosion and the WWI ones were surprisingly intense--they really went all-in on the drama. (I need to learn more about the Halifax Explosion now. What happened??? Was the train okay???).
Also, I need to mention that I've LOVED Home Free for years. I used to listen to them regularly as writing background music. They do such good acapella and their versions of songs can hold up to the originals. (I have a special fondness for "Flowers on the Wall" and the one they did with the Oak Ridge Boys).
Oh I’m so glad that you enjoyed the Heritage Minutes! They’re such a nostalgic part of my childhood. They were everywhere on Canadian TV channels during the commercial breaks from the late '90's to the early-mid 2000's and they actually still make new ones. There’s over 100 of them and I only chose some of my favourites. I didn’t even include one of the most icon and quotable ones. Which is about Wilder Penfield who was a brain surgeon who connected the fact that someone smelling burnt toast before an epileptic seizure, that something could be done about that. So "I smell burnt toast," is burnt into many a Canadians' memory. But yeah, some of the Heritage Minutes can be extremely intense. So they really run the gamut from extremely intense to fairly lighthearted. Victor Garber even acted in one. (The Canadian legend that he is).
It’s always nice to come across another Home Free fan. Honestly there’s a few versions of songs that I actually prefer Home Free's version to the original. But honestly most of the time their original music ends up being my favourites. But I definitely agree about Flowers on the Wall and Elvira. Those Home Free boys looked like they had such a blast with the Oak Ridge Boys.
The Halifax Explosion one definitely started my own fascination with that particular disaster. The largest man made explosion before the atomic bomb. Before I start my info dump, yes the trains (because there was more than one) were warned in time and stopped and thankfully they had been running a bit behind which was the real saving grace. So the warning itself didn’t necessarily save the trains but it did warn them of what they would be seeing and was the first of the outside world to know what was going on. Anyways onto my info dump.
The Halifax Explosion happened December 6 1917, in the morning. The Halifax Harbour was the busiest port in Canada (and still is a major port to this day). Because of WWI no ships were allowed through at night because anti-submarine nets that were in place to protect the harbour and that does play a part in this. There were two ships that caused this disaster the Norwegian ship the Imo; a Belgium relief ship and the French munitions ship the Mont Blanc. The Mont Blanc had tons of highly explosive material aboard; gun cotton, barrels of benzoyl, picric acid, and TNT. The Imo was in the harbour waiting to leave back to Europe, while the Mont Blanc was coming into harbour. The Imo had been delayed the day before because its coal load didn’t make it before the anti-sub nets went into place. While the Mont Blanc arrived to the harbour after the anti-sub nets were in place. So both ships were delayed which lead to poor decisions that morning of the sixth.
This was definitely one of those times where it was a lead up of events that then turned into disaster. Which was then made worse with the subsequent events that happened afterwards. One of those things was that because of the war, the navy was letting munitions into the harbour when in non war years it wasn’t allowed.
When the Imo was leaving the Harbour, it had passed two incoming ships on the opposite side of what was standard for the harbour, leaving the Imo on the wrong side of the passage into and out of the harbour. So when the Mont Blanc and the Imo came across each other, they both were in the same lane more or less. And when the two ships came across each other they exchanged a series of whistles for communication which there were misunderstandings about. One of them thought that they should have the right away in comparison to the other. Then when they did try and move past each other they collided, which was more like they scraped against each other and sent sparks flying, setting the Mont Blanc's cargo alight. Which is where the real damage comes from. The collision happened at about 8:45 a.m.
The Mont Blanc's crew abandoned ship, knowing what their cargo was. The ship burned for about 20 minutes as it drifted closer to shore and local firefighters tried putting out the fire. Then, at about 9:05 the ship exploded. Killing about 1600 immediately, leaving about 9000 injured and about 6000 homeless. Because the explosion occurred on the water, it also created a tsunami that pulled people into the water. The explosion had left fires throughout the city and about 2.5kms (a mile) of the surrounding area was completely destroyed. It completely wiped out some communities. It’s said that the explosion had shattered windows over 100km away and could be heard as far away as Charlottetown in Prince Edward Island. To make things worse, the next day there was a blizzard and the temperatures dropped. In total it’s believed that nearly 2000 people died during the explosion and in the subsequent days after due to injuries and the hazards that followed after.
People were blinded by shattered glass, deafened by the explosion, hit with shrapnel. The anchor from the Mont Blanc was thrown nearly 3kms away from the blast site. The military forces that were in the area helped with the devastation. Schools and curling rinks were turned into morgues to help with the mass casualties. Nearby towns and ships entering the harbour after the explosion helped with housing those who had lost their homes.
People from Boston sent aid. They were a huge part of Halifax's initial aid. As such, each year Nova Scotia sends Boston a large Christmas tree as a thank-you. This disaster had made world news and relief funds came in from as far away as Australia.
At first people had thought that the explosion had been caused by Germans, due to the war and the fear of that happening. But it wasn’t. After an investigation was held, it was determined that both those on the Imo and those on the Mont Blanc were at fault. Though only crew members of the Mont Blanc had survived.
On one of the shows that we watched about different historical events or interesting places around the world, my parents and I had watched one about a place in The States (I don’t remember exactly where) where there’s this one place that stored munitions that had at least a mile diameter around it where nothing could be built because they knew how dangerous it would be if anything set those munitions off because of the Halifax explosion. Also for a long time the Halifax explosion had become the example/comparison for all other explosions were compared to. Including the atomic bomb, which the one was said to be seven times greater than the Halifax explosion. So while it’s not as well known as some disasters, it has had a lasting impact and influence on the world.
There’s so much more that could be said about this disaster, but this gives you the most basic run down of what exactly happened. I would definitely recommend reading more about it because I didn’t get into more of the intricacies of the disaster or name any of the people actually involved.
Halifax before the explosion.
The smoke cloud.
After the explosion.
Canadian Encyclopedia has a good article about it. Also the Nova Scotia Archives has some interesting links to videos with survivors accounts and other information. And The Longest Johns wrote a song about it, but there’s parts of the song that I don’t quite agree with, just from my own research and understanding of the disaster. (My particular beef in this song is that there was "a fault with the Imo’s gears", but from my own understanding was that this particular ship just didn’t navigate as easily when it didn’t have cargo in it, not that there was anything mechanically wrong.)
There was also a children’s book called Irish Chain by Barbara Haworth-Attard which is about a young girl named Rose (who has dyslexia but is referred to as slow due to the time period) who survives the Halifax Explosion, which I read yearly in the later years of elementary school. (Also did a book report on it in grade 6, where we had to make a diorama for. With help from my parents we took some 2x4 and made a "house" with it and burned the wood a bit to make it seared). And even though I haven’t read it since elementary school, it has always stuck with me.
In high school, one of our big history projects for grade 12 was to be done on an event in Canadian history. I chose the Halifax Explosion. It was one of those projects where we had to put together a slideshow and give a presentation on our topic. One of the things that we had to due as a part of our slide show was include a link to a video. I of course decided that the Vincent Coleman Heritage Minute was the one that I was going to use.
Two groups in the class could use the same topic, and one of the other pairs in the class did also choose the Halifax Explosion, and now I do have to admit that this might be personal bias, but I think that my friend and I had done a much better job with our project. My history teacher had even asked my friend and I if he could save a copy so that he could use it as a sample for when he did the assignment again.
So there’s my little (not so little) info dump about the Halifax Explosion with the bonus of some of my personal experiences in regards to the event. One day I would love to go to Halifax and see some of the spots that commemorate the event as well as some of the Titanic related sites that are also in Halifax.
The Halifax Explosion, fleetingly mentioned in the Oppenheimer movie, was studied by J. Robert Oppenheimer to predict the effects of the ato
Sorry I saw mention of the Halifax Explosion and blacked out.
The Halifax Explosion was the biggest man made explosion before the atomic bomb. During WW1 the Mont Blanc a french munitions ship and the Imo a Norwegian relief(i think) ship collided and levelled the city of Halifax on Dec 6 1917.
The Dear Canada book No Safe Harbour is a great historical fiction book for giving you a first person perspective of what it was like leading up to during and the aftermath of the explosion.
And there's a nonfiction book I have called The Halifax Explosion by Ken Cuthbertson that is so well researched and such a good read. There's so much information packed into it and he makes it so easy to read.
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