Date Published:

L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

Empress of Ireland

Empress of Ireland, a Canadian Pacific Railway steamship sunk on May 29, 1914, in the St. Lawrence river, 10 miles east of Father Point. It was rammed by the Norwegian collier Storstad in a fog, and sank in 14 minutes with a loss of over 1,000 lives. A board of inquiry acquitted the captain of the Empress of Ireland of blame, and placed the responsibility for the disaster on the first mate of the Slorstad.

[For further information on this disaster, consult the PBS page devoted to it; le Musée de la Mer de Rimouski offre des informations intéressantes sur ce désastre maritime.]

Source  : W. Stewart WALLACE, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada, Vol. II, Toronto, University Associates of Canada, 1948, 411p., p. 293.