SMITH, GEORGE [3]

Belfast harbour engineer from 1839 until 1863. George Smith, an Englishman, was born circa 1792. Before coming to Ireland, he was engineer to the Leeds & Selby Railway. In 1839 he was appointed Belfast harbour engineer on the recommendation of the engineers Walker & Burges, who had designed some improvements to the harbour. During the twenty-four years he held the position, he was responsible for the new Queen's Island cut and the channel between the twin islands, the Queen's Quay, Clarendon Dock and all the timber wharves which lined the Lagan.(1) He was the architect of the harbour office and the lighthouse on the Holywood bank. A fifty-ton rolling crane at the harbour, which was built to his design, was described by GEORGE H. STRYPE  GEORGE H. STRYPE in a paper delivered to the Institution of Civil Engineers of Ireland in April 1862.(2)

In 1863 Smith retired from the active post on account of failing health and instead was appointed consulting engineer to the Harbour Board. He died on 3 December 1869 at the age of seventy-seven. He was presumably the father of GEORGE SMITH [4]. GEORGE SMITH [4].

Address: Home: Cliftonville, Antrim Road, Belfast, 1852.(3)

See WORKS.

References

All information in this entry not otherwise accounted for is from the obituary of Smith in B 27, 18 Dec 1869, 1015.

(1) The article on Belfast in APSD Vol. I, B, 56,, mentions Smith's quays and harbour improvements, citing Illustrated News XV, 45.
(2) TICEI 7 (1861-62), 67-76; also DB 4, 15 Apr 1862, 90-91.
(3) The Belfast and Province of Ulster Directory for 1852, 75.

3 work entries listed in chronological order for SMITH, GEORGE [3]

Sort by date | Sort alphabetically

Building:	CO. ANTRIM, BELFAST, CORPORATION SQUARE, HARBOUR COMMISSIONERS' OFFICE
Date:	1852-54
Nature:	Italianate, with clock tower. Cost £7,000.(Later adds. by W.H. Lynn)
Refs:	B 10, 17 Jan,17 Apr,20 Oct 1852, 46,245,693 (attr. to Charles Lanyon in 17 Apr issue); APSD,Vol. I, B, 57; C.E.B. Brett, Buildings of Belfast (2nd ed., 1985), 35,33(illus.); Paul Larmour, Belfast: an illustrated architectural guide (1987), 55 (no. 127, illus.); Marcus Patton, Central Belfast: an historical gazetteer (UAHS, 1993), 85

Building:	CO. ANTRIM, BELFAST, ALBERT SQUARE, CALDER FOUNTAIN
Date:	1859
Nature:	Fountain in memory of late Commander Calder, founder of Belfast Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, with 'a drinking fountain for the use of bipeds, and a trough for the use of quadrupeds'. Cost defrayed by Harbour Commissioners.
Refs:	DB 1, 1 May 1859, 62; Paul Larmour, Belfast: an illustrated architectural guide (1987), 21 (no. 37, illus.)

Building:	CO. DOWN, HOLYWOOD BANK, LIGHTHOUSE
Date:	?
Nature:	Designed by GS for Belfast Harbour Corporation.
Refs:	Obituary of GS inB 27, 18 Dec 1869, 1015

Author	Title	Date	Details
Strype, George H.	'Design of a fifty-ton Crane erected at Belfast'	1862	DB 4, 15 Apr 1862, 90, and TICEI 7 (1862), 67.