Henry Peirson Harland (c1876-1945)
1945 Obituary [1]
1946 Obituary [2]
HENRY PEIRSON HARLAND, whose death occurred on 10th August 1945, in his sixty-ninth year, was a director of Messrs. Harland and Wolff, Ltd., Belfast, and a prominent figure in shipbuilding circles. He was a nephew of the late Sir Edward Harland, the founder of the firm.
On the completion of his education at Rugby in 1893 he began a seven years' apprenticeship in the shipyards and engine works. Subsequently he was made assistant manager, a position he retained for ten years when he joined the staff of the Chinese Engineering Company, in Tientsin, as assistant agent. Returning from the East in 1910 he rejoined Messrs. Harland and Wolff at Belfast, but four years later he was transferred to their Govan works.
During the war of 1914-18 he served on the staff of Lord Pirrie, Controller of Merchant Shipbuilding. Later he was responsible as chairman of the committee of technical advisers for the completion of the ex-German liner Bismarck (renamed Majestic) and spent eighteen months in Hamburg superintending the work. In 1929 he was appointed a director of Messrs. Harland and Wolff. He was also a director of Messrs. Short and Harland, Ltd., and chairman of Messrs. Heaton Tabb and Company, Ltd.
Mr. Harland was elected a Member of the Institution in 1909 and was also a Member of the Institution of Civil Engineers and of the Institution of Naval Architects and a member of the General Committee of Lloyd's Register. In addition he was a member of the court of the Company of Shipwrights, and served on the consultative committee of shipbuilders and engineers appointed to confer with the marine department of the Board of Trade.
In January 1940, Mr. Harland was returned unopposed as Unionist member for East Belfast in the Imperial House of Commons.