Sinking of S.S Leinster

[chrisharley9]

Phillip

thanks for your support - please pass details of the petition to any friends who are UK citizens

Chris

[clive_hughes]

Phillip,

thanks very much for your observations regarding the status of the CDSPCo employees travelling aboard the Leinster who were seemingly classified as civilian casualties by the CWGC.

This is more or less what I expected, and so unless Chris' petition bears fruit their commemoration at Holyhead will be their sole memorial. If you ever do follow the matter up with the CWGC I should be grateful to know the result. Maybe Terry Denham might be of help with this.

Chris, I signed your petition a little while back and I do wish you every success.

LST_164

[historydavid]

Chris, I am sorry but I don't think there can be any realistic hope of changing the status of these two individuals from passengers to war dead.

Oak states that they were passengers of the shipping company and the fact that one, or both, of them helped in the evacuation of the vessel does not change their status.

If their status was to be changed then every passenger that died during the war would have a legitimate claim to be re-classified.

Best wishes

David

[brhillier]

Pals might be interested in the site www.rmsleinster.com The site is a work in progress, compiled by Will Lockhart and myself. Will's relative Frank Higgerty was lost on the Leinster.

By the way, "British Vessels Lost at Sea" gives the death toll from the Leinster as 176. As the book itself says, casualties figures do not include any military who may have been on board the ships that were lost. Based on "British Vessels Lost at Sea," the 176 figure is often quoted for the Leinster sinking. This has had the unfortunate result of concealing the scale of the tragedy. Most of those who died on the Leinster were military personnel. According to the ship's owners 501 people were lost on the Leinster. After 7 years of research I came up with the names of 530 casualties. Within the last two weeks I have been told of a few more.

The Leinster sinking resulted in the highest ever loss of life in the Irish Sea. It was also the highest ever loss of life on an Irish owned ship.

Philip

Oak (Philip),

I have a family connection to the loss of the Leinster in that my wife's Grandfather, Evan Rowlands survived the sinking. According to my wife's father he was one of the Gunners on board.

Evan Rowlands was born in 1868 in Newborough, Anglesey but lived in 13 Well Street, Holyhead and had been at sea since he was fifteen. He is listed in the book "Holyhead and the Great War" as a member of the Royal Navy, but maybe this was RNR. I have checked with the listings contained in your book but cannot find a reference to him either as a crew member or as a Gunner. Indeed you seem to have accounted for all three Gunners originating from Edward Watson's figures. Do you have any information to offer from your researches to confirm Evan Rowlands as a survivor of the Leinster? Was Harnett actually a Gunner or was he an unlisted crew member? Were there four Gunners on duty that fateful day?

There is another family connection with the Leinster. Richard Williams (52) was one of the many Holyhead seamen lost. His son Richard was one of many who went down to Holyhead Harbour to wait for news. Whilst there he met up with Dorothy, the daughter of Evan Rowlands, who was also waiting to find out the fate of her father. Unfortunately only one of their fathers was to return home. Richard and Dorothy later married. Their daughter, Beryl, still has the "Widow's Penny".

Regards,

Barry Hillier

Holyhead

[Doug Johnson]

In an idle moment I was reading the correspondence at the AWM on the New Zealand Nurse Winifred Starling who was apparently drowned on the Leinster. It appears from this and the witness accounts that there was no passenger list. Certainly the ARC had difficulty in establishing the names of Australians on board though they eventually came up with a list of survivors, those whose bodies were recovered and those that were missing presumed drowned though whether this was the final count is not clear. Nurse Starling is not commemerated on the CWGC.

Doug

[michaeldr]

Doug,

See Appendix 4 of the book by Philip (oak) - Torpedoed! The RMS Leinster Disaster

The 3rd mail train was late in arriving and in the rush to embark by the scheduled sailing time some were not issued with embarkation cards.

quote "No doubt complete lists were in the possession of the officer i/c of embarkation. Unfortunately this officer was among the casualties and no records were found on his body." [from the Commandant of the Administrative Headquarters AIF London to the Secretary of the Department of Defence Melbourne]

Philip also has a paragraph on Nurse Starling in his text, including details from De Ruigney's Roll of Honour. She was an Australian, born and educated in Sydney, studied in London and Sydney, however she had been at the No.2 New Zealand General Hospital at Walton on Thames

regards

Michael

[wet255]

i am looking for a photograph of Coln Mosse who drown on this ship together with his wife. Can anybody help? Many thanks. NIGEL