The Titanic sank on its maiden voyage to New York

Lord Mayor Wallace Browne and members of the Belfast Titanic Society sailed to the spot in Belfast Lough from which the ship was launched.

They took part in a simple ceremony marking the occasion.

More than 1,500 people died when the ship's maiden voyage ended in tragedy after it sank in the Atlantic on its way to New York.

At the end of No 3 slipway at Harland and Wolff at 1215 BST - 95 years to the minute after Titanic slipped into the water for the first time - a whistle was blown.

A minute's silence was then held, to remember all those who worked on the construction of Titanic - and those who subsequently lost their lives less than one year later.

A memorial to one of the men behind the liner is also being unveiled in the grounds of Belfast City Hall.

Boom city

William James Pirrie, First Viscount of Belfast and first chairman of the Harland and Wolff Shipyard rose to the top of the shipbuilding industry.

The memorial is a plinth which formerly was the headstone of Lord and Lady Pirrie's grave in the City Cemetery, which has now been renovated and relocated to the grounds of the City Hall.

Born in Quebec, Canada, on 31 May 1847, Pirrie returned to Ireland with his mother when his father died.

Educated at Royal Belfast Academical Institution he soon decided that academia was not for him and, at the age of 15, enrolled as an apprentice at Harland and Wolff.

Sir Edward Harland took the teenager under his wing and he had a meteoric rise through the company.

Chairman

By the time the White Star Line commissioned the Oceanic - the first of its liners to be built at Queen's Island - in 1869, Pirrie was chief draughtsman, at just 22.

Five years later, he was made a partner in the company, and in a few years he became chairman of the board.

The shipyard boomed - and alongside it, the city of Belfast.

Pirrie became Lord Mayor in 1896 and played a key role in the drawing up of the plans for the magnificent City Hall, which was completed in 1906.