‘I died!’ whooped my nine year old. ‘Drown-ed.’ We were at the Titanic exhibition at London’s 02. We’d each been given a White Star line boarding card, carrying the name of one of the doomed liner’s passengers. At the end was a list of survivors. My son’s name wasn’t on it.

You can go to the exhibition as part of a Superbreak weekend package on a London city break. My son particularly enjoyed touching the real model iceberg, freezing his fingers, to demonstrate how cold it was for those in the lifeboats. More people died from hypothermia than drowning. We had such fun.

Tourism and tragedy are an odd mix, especially when kids are involved. I still can’t calculate how my youngest children are going to respond to historical events that are gut-wrenching, horrible, inhumane. The powerful and important Holocaust exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London recommends not to enter if you’re under 14. I know why. I’d be worried the large table top model of the concentration camp, complete with little cars, carriages and people, would be treated by my nine year old as another train set like the one on his bedroom floor. The gas chambers would be just a place to park the engine, making Toot! Toot! noises as he did so. I don’t think my son is particularly callous or lacking in understanding. I just think there are some things a nine year old has yet to grasp.

So taking him to the Titanic exhibition at London’s 02 was another challenge. I know it’s become an iconic tale and that much of the sadness has been washed out of it. But it is, at heart, a story of loss of life. Thankfully the 02 exhibition doesn’t shirk from this. The most moving moments are towards the end, where in a series of small glass cases the few surviving possession of passengers are displayed. A toothbrush, a perfume bottle, a pen, one shoe. Like most of their fellow travellers, the owner perished. But his one shoe survives.

The Titanic is inextricably linked with Belfast, where you can go on guided tours of the Harland and Wolff shipyard where the doomed vessel was built. Of course, Belfast itself has a troubled history. Yet I’ve taken my kids there on a city break, one of the best we’ve ever had. Belfast also has one of the world’s finest children’s festival – the next one will be in 2012.

If I have any conclusions from all of these experiences, it’s that we shouldn’t always shield our children from sadness – even on holiday. But I do think it’s tricky to decide when a child is ready for tragedy. I’m not sure my nine year old is yet.