A Titanic Tour
A Tour of Titanic-related Sites in Montreal
(By Alan Hustak, author of Titanic: The Canadian Story)


As the result of James Cameron's blockbuster movie, Titanic, people have been attracted in increasing numbers to anything associated with the luxury liner that sank on its maiden voyage in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912. Few people know that Montreal has a significant number of Titanic-related sites. "Outside of Halifax, Montreal has the greatest number of Titanic-related graves in the world," said Jack Eaton, a founder of Titanic International and co-author of The Triumph and the Tragedy. Six of them are in Mount Royal Cemetery, five in Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery, and one in the Baron de Hirsch Cemetery.

The Montreal passenger office of the Allan Steamship Line was where the world first learned of the tragedy that was evolving that night 1,500 hundred miles away in the North Atlantic.

You can tour the following sites in Montreal that are connected to the disaster.

The Allan Building
The Allan Building
333 rue de la Commune
The Allan Company's steamship Virginian picked up the Titanic's first distress signal and wired head office in Montreal for permission to alter course to go to the ship's rescue. This is where the message that the Titanic had hit an iceberg and was sinking was received in Montreal. The information was immediately passed on to The Gazette's marine reporter. It was the first newspaper in the world to learn of the disaster.
The Gérald Godin Building
The Gérald Godin Building
360 McGill Street
This building was originally built by Titanic passenger Charles Hays, president of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railroad, as the company's corporate headquarters. His office was in the building. Hays was aboard the ship with his wife, Clara, daughter Orian and son-in-law Thornton Davidson. They were coming back to Canada for the official opening in Ottawa of a new hotel Hays had built--the Château Laurier.

Charles Hays
The Molson Bank Building
Molson Bank
288 St. Jacques St reet. W.
The Molson Bank was owned by Harry Markland Molson, another passenger from Montreal who died in the sinking. Molson was the first mayor of Dorval, Quebec and the richest Canadian aboard.
Harry Markland Molson
Christ Church Cathedral
Christ Church Cathedral
1444 Union Street
A memorial tablet to Hays's 23-year-old private secretary, Vivan Arthur Ponsonby Payne, "erected by 125 of his associates" is in the Chapel of St. John of Jerusalem, to the left side of the main altar. It is also the church where Harry Markland Molson, worshipped. 
Bronze statue of Marianne
Union Française
429 Viger Street E.
The bronze statue of Marianne to the left of the front door is the work of sculptor Paul Romain Chevré, who survived the sinking. Chevré was with the Hays entourage. He had carved the statue of Prime Minister Sir Wilfrid Laurier that is in the lobby of the Château Laurier in Ottawa and was going to be present at its unveiling. 

Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce Building
265 St. Jacques Street W.
The Montreal offices of the White Star Line were in the building from 1909 to 1939. It is where the tickets for the Titanic were sold.
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, 1912
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
1379 Sherbrooke Street W.
The frieze on the exterior of the building is the work of second class passenger Leopold Weisz, 33, who drowned in the disaster. A Hungarian-born Jewish stone carver, Weisz got the job in Canada carving the frieze for the Montreal Museum of Arts building in 1911. He was then contracted to do the stone shields which decorate the Dominion Express Building at 201 St. Jacques Street W. He had gone back to England to fetch his wife, Mathilde, and they were sailing home together on the Titanic. 

The Dominion Express Building
Hélène Baxter and daughter Zette
Baxter Block
3660-3712 St. Laurent Blvd.
One of the first shopping malls to be built in North America, it was owned by Hélène de Lanaudière Chaput-Baxter, who was coming back to Montreal from France on Titanic with her son, Quigg, and daughter Zette. 
1201 Sherbrooke Street W.
1201 Sherbrooke Street W.
The Baxters lived in the Square Mile at this address. It was for many years the headquarters of Corby Distillers.
Hudson and Bess Allison
464 Rosyln Avenue
Westmount
This is where the Allison family lived. Hudson Allison was a business partner of J. W. McConnell, who would later own the Montreal Star. Allison was returning from a business trip to Europe with his wife, Bess, three-year-old daughter Loraine and infant son, Trevor. Bess refused to leave the sinking ship without her baby, not knowing that a maid had already spirited the boy away in a lifeboat. By the time she found out, there were no lifeboats left. She, her husband and their little girl all perished. The baby boy survived.

The Allisons figure prominently in Danielle Steel's 1991 best selling novel, No Greater Love.
Mount Royal Cemetery
1297 Chemin de la Forêt
You'll find the graves of Joseph J. Fynney, (Section G- 1701A) Charles Hays, his wife, Clara and daughter, Orian, who were all aboard the Titanic, and memorial stones to Thornton Davidson (Pine Hill Side, 246) and and Henry Markland Molson (Section F-1), whose bodies were never recovered. 
Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery
4601 Chemin Côte-des-Neiges
This cemetery contains the graves of Vancouver banker Thomas McCaffrey (Section B2139), Matilde Weisz (Section TR7532), Hélène Baxter, and a memorial to her son, Quigg, who drowned (Section T469).  It also contains the grave of Paul Achille Maugé, who was a kitchen clerk aboard Titanic's à la carte restaurant and survived the sinking (Plot V5123).

Baron de Hirsch Cemetery
5015 de la Savanne
Leopold Weisz is buried in Section One of this Jewish cemetery, but the exact location of the grave isn't known.