Linen Mills and Shipyards

Timeline

• 1800 — Belfast is a port with a population of 20,000, one-sixth of whom are Catholic.
• 1828 — Mulholland’s cotton mill is burnt down and rebuilt as Belfast’s first outlet for factory-produced cotton.
• 1831 — Serious cholera epidemic in Belfast.
• 1832 — First serious sectarian violence in the city.
• 1837 — 2,724 ships use Belfast docks.
• 1848 — Both cholera and typhus spread rapidly in the city.
• 1849 — A deep water channel is completed, enabling Belfast to grow as a port.
• 1850 — Belfast has 29 spinning mills. The population has risen to 100,000.
• 1851 — The Harland and Wolff shipyard founded.
• 1861 — Belfast has 32 linen mills and is the world’s leading producer of linen. The population has risen to 127,000, a third of whom are Catholic.
• 1867 — 7,817 ships use Belfast docks. The Fenian Rising is put down.
• 1870 — Home Rule Movement launched by Isaac Butt.
• 1877 — Michael Davitt begins organising the Land League to protect tenants’ rights.
• 1879 — ‘New Departure’ formed: an alliance of revolutionary nationalists, Land Leaguers and Home Rulers under the leadership of Charles Stewart Parnell.
• 1885 — Gladstone introduces the First Home Rule Bill to Parliament. It is defeated by strong organised opposition in Ulster and sectarian violence in Belfast.
• 1901 — Belfast’s population reaches 350,000.