Nova Scotia National Historic Site #5: CSS Acadia

CSS Acadia is a former hydrographic surveying and oceanographic research ship once used by Canada to map its coastal waters. Launched in 1913 and named after the original name for Nova Scotia under French colonial rule, Acadia provided landmark surveys of Sable Island, the Bay of Fundy, and provided information instrumental in the establishment of the port of Churchill, Manitoba.

Later, the prefix CSS was changed to HMCS when Acadia spent two years from 1917 to 1919 on anti-submarine patrol in the Bay of Fundy and Gulf of St. Lawrence. During WWII, HMCS Acadia patrolled the waters at the entrance to Halifax Harbour, and also saw extensive action as a training ship. After the war, Acadia resumed work as a survey vessel for the third time, and in 1962 rescued hundreds of people from forest fires in Newfoundland. By the end of its career, CSS Acadia had charted nearly every metre of water in Atlantic Canada as well as a great percentage of the Eastern Arctic Coast.

Currently CSS Acadia belongs to the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Halifax where it is moored, and is open to the public every year from May to October. CSS Acadia is the only known ship still afloat to have survived the Halifax Explosion, and is also the only ship still afloat to have served the Royal Canadian Navy in both World Wars.

HRM Monument #19: Halifax Explosion Memorial Bell Tower

On December 6, 1917, the French munitions ship, S.S. Mont Blanc, collided with the S.S. Imo, a Norwegian ship carrying war supplies, near Pier 6 in Halifax Harbour. The resulting explosion killed 2 000 people, as well as leaving many more injured and/or homeless. The Halifax Relief Commission supplied funds to create Fort Needham Memorial Park, overlooking Richmond Street which leads to Pier 6.

Today the park is still a popular recreation area, and contains this memorial bell tower, designed and dedicated in 1985 to look like the jagged ruins left after the explosion. The tower includes a distinctive upward thrust which represents hope for the future, and contains a set of church bells that formerly hung in the United Memorial Church - once shared by both Methodists and Presbyterian congregations after both of their churches were destroyed in the Explosion. The Halifax Explosion Memorial Bell Tower stands as memorial to all those who lost their lives or suffered injuries in the Halifax Explosion, and to the survivors who helped rebuild the city.

HRM Monument #18: Halifax Explosion Unidentified Dead Monument

This monument to those who died in the Halifax Explosion, is on display in Fairview Cemetery. The inscription on the top of the monument says: "To the memory of the unidentified dead. Victims of the Great Disaster, December 6, 1917."

HRM Monument #14: S.S. Mont Blanc Anchor Shaft

On December 6, 1917 one of the most horrific disasters in Canadian history took place when the French munitions ship, the Mont Blanc, collided with the Belgium relief ship, the Imo, just outside of Halifax Harbour. The spark from that collision caused an explosion, the equivalent of 3 kilotons of TNT, inside of the Mont Blanc blew it apart and destroyed a good portion of Halifax too.

This event that killed 2 000 people, left 6 000 completely homeless and 25 000 without adequate shelter, would come to be known as the Halifax Explosion. As a result of the magnitude of this explosion, a piece of an anchor shaft from the SS Mont Blanc, weighing 1140 lbs, flew 2.35 miles over Halifax and the Northwest Arm to a small park just behind Regatta Point Trail. It was relocated 200 metres and set in stone as the monument you see here.