In 1853 Robert Hickson opened a shipyard on Queen's island, Belfast, County Antrim, Northern Ireland. The following year Edward Harland became the manager of this yard. Four years later, in 1858, Edward Harland took the business over. Gustav Wilhelm Wolff was put in charge of the drawing office and was admitted as a partner in 1861 . The business opened its own works in 1880 . Queen's Island Shipbuilding & Engineering Co Ltd was incorporated as a limited liability company in 1885, changing its name three years later to Harland & Wolff Ltd . The development of the company saw the establishment of repair facilities at Southampton, England, in 1907, and at Liverpool, England, in 1912 . In order to achieve further expansion a number of shipyards on the river Clyde were acquired: London & Glasgow Engineering & Iron Shipbuilding Co Ltd, Govan, Glasgow, in 1912 ; Caird & Co Ltd, Greenock, Inverclyde, in 1916 ; the management of Ardrossan Dry Dock & Shipbuilding Co Ltd , Ardrosson, North Ayrshire, and Archibald Macmillan & Sons Ltd, Dumbarton, West Dunbartonshire, in 1918 ; and of David & William Henderson & Co, Meadowside, Glasgow, and J & A Inglis Ltd, Glasgow, in 1919 . In 1962 the yards of A & J Inglis Ltd and D & W Henderson Ltd were closed. The Govan shipyard was closed in the following year and the run down of the company's other operations in Glasgow commenced. Activity was then concentrated on Belfast, and the London, Liverpool and Southampton repair facilities were abandoned. Harland & Wolff plc, although state owned remained outside the British Shipbuilders when it was set up in 1977 . The yard was privatised in 1989 after a management buy out in which the principal shareholder was the shipping magnate, Fred Olsen. In 2002, the company continued to trade.
From the guide to the Records of Harland & Wolff plc, shipbuilders, Govan, Glasgow and Belfast, Northern Ireland, 1923-1962, (Glasgow University Archive Services)
