A model of the ocean liner RMS Oceanic at the Science Museum, South Kensington, 14 April 2007.

Such was the speed of ocean liner development in the late 19th Century that the White Star’s prestige 10,000 ton liners RMS Majestic and Teutonic of 1889 were soon looking decidedly old fashioned compared to the rival Cunard Line’s RMS Campania and Lucania of 1892-93 and the four North German Lloyd’s ‘Kaiser’ Class liners of 1897-1907. White Star therefore decided they needed a new flagship.

The result was the beautiful RMS Oceanic, built by Harland & Wolff, Belfast and completed in 1899. The ship measured 704 ft x 68.4 ft x ? ft and weighed 17,272 tons gross. She was the first ship to exceed 700 ft in length and the first to exceed the size of Brunel’s SS Great Eastern, thus being the largest ship in the world on completion. Her 28,000 ihp reciprocating engines gave her a maximum speed of 21 kts. White Star placed a greater emphasis on luxury rather than speed, so their ships were never as fast as the rival liners of the Cunard and Inman Lines.

A sister ship, the Olympic, was cancelled to be replaced by even larger 21,000-24,000 ton ships in 1901-06 (‘The Big Four’), such was the rapid increase in the size of ocean liners at that time. The Oceanic was used on the ‘express’ service to New York, initially from Liverpool but in 1907 from Southampton.