Click of a mouse will tell history of Iolaire disaster

People all over the world will now be able to learn about one of the worst disasters in Scottish history at the click of a mouse.

Newly digitised material is being made available for the first time to tell the story of the Iolaire.

The story of the worst peacetime shipping disaster since the Titanic – when 205 soldiers returning from WWI died within sight of Stornoway Harbour – is being remembered at the National Library of Scotland.

A website has been created to raise awareness of the tragic events of New Year’s Day in 1919, ahead of the 100th anniversary of the disaster.

The men were aboard the HMY Iolaire and looking forward to being reunited with loved ones when the ship struck rocks called the Beasts of Holm, at the entrance to Stornoway Harbour.

There were only 79 survivors. Scarcely a family was left untouched in the close-knit communities of Lewis and Harris.

“The homes of the island are full of lamentation – grief that cannot be comforted,” reported The Scotsman on January 6, 1919. “Carts in little processions of twos and threes, each bearing its coffin from the mortuary, pass through the streets of Stornoway on their way to some rural village, and all heads are bared as they pass.”

So many people died that the island ran out of coffins and they had to be brought in from elsewhere.

The dual language Gaelic/English website features reflections on the disaster from descendants of both survivors and those who perished.

Alice Heywood, learning officer at the National library of Scotland who has worked on the website, said: “The site aims to look at the impact the tragedy had on both the community of the time and what we learn from it today.

“It includes contributions from the community on the Isle of Lewis and related items in the library’s collection to provide an overview of events on that fateful day.”

“Soldiers died within sight of Stornoway”