‘Yorkshire Connections to the ’

Beverley U3A Local History Group talk by Sheila Dixon.

March 29th 2018

Sheila told us she has been interested in the story of the Titanic since she was 11, and as a local and family history researcher has been looking into Yorkshire connections to the ship for 10 years. She is writing a book on people connected to the Titanic who were either born or lived in Yorkshire. For her talk to us she planned to cover 3 crew and 3 passengers who had links to East Yorkshire.

There was no one from Beverley on the Titanic which is a shame for our historical interest but good for the citizens of the town!

Sheila rightly assumed we all knew the story of the ship which at the time was the largest moving object on earth, but she showed us some photographs which had been colourised and made it seem more real and also an animated video of the ship sailing.

Joseph Boxhall (28) Fourth Officer

There is a blue plaque on 27 Westbourne Avenue in Hull commemorating that it was the home of Joseph Boxhall who sailed on the Titanic. They were a seagoing family, his father was a respected Captain for the Wilson Line and Joseph had gone to sea at 14 and was well qualified for his position as 4th Officer on the Titanic. Sheila showed us a plan of the officers’ cabins around the first funnel just behind the bridge which made it easier to imagine the situation at 11.40pm on 14th April 1912 when Joseph heard the lookout’s bell ring 3 times for something sighted dead ahead. He felt the impact with the iceberg as he walked to the wheelhouse but not enough to break his stride. The Captain sent him round the ship to look for damage and he found that the Mail room was flooded. He saw the lights of another ship and fired off rockets to attract their attention. He then helped to uncover the lifeboats and as a skilled seafarer was sent off in charge of one. He was in the lifeboat when the Carpathia arrived in the morning and picked up survivors. Joseph joined the Royal Navy in 1914, married in 1919 and moved south. He re-joined the but though he had commanded ships during the war no Titanic Officers got their own ships in the company which had owned her. He was said to dislike talking about the disaster but did act as technical advisor to the 1958 film ‘A Night to Remember’. When he died at the age of 83 in 1967 his ashes were scattered at the site of the Titanic’s sinking.

George Alfred Hogg (29) Lookout

George was born at 122 Hedon Road in Hull, but his family moved to Wales when he was a baby. They moved again to Scotland and then from where he went to sea and joined the Titanic as a lookout. Lookouts were only on watch for 2 hours at a time and George was asleep in bed when the Titanic struck the iceberg at 11.40pm but went on watch at midnight. When he realised the ship wasn’t moving he went down to help with the lifeboats, as an able seaman he was put onto a lifeboat and helped to row until the Carpathia arrived and took them to New York. He gave evidence at both the American and British enquiries and then went back to sea.

John Reginald Rice (25) Purser’s Clerk

John Reginald was born in Hull but the family later moved to where he joined the Titanic as a clerk in the Purser’s office, part of the hospitality section of the Titanic’s crew. The Purser’s office was very busy after the iceberg struck as first class passengers rushed to retrieve valuables they had stored in the ship’s safe. Eventually the staff closed the office and put all the remaining valuables into leather bags to be put onto lifeboats. When the wreck was found the safes were found as were the leather bags still containing jewellery.

The purser’s staff had no seamen’s skills to be of use on a lifeboat so none of them survived. John’s body was identified among those collected later wearing a ring engraved ‘Elsie’, he was buried in Halifax in Canada. His father died 6 months later and his mother moved back to Hull.

Having told us 3 quite contrasting stories about members of Titanic’s crew Sheila moved on to show us a picture of a first class passenger from Hessle.

Algernon Henry Barkworth (47) First Class passenger

Algy went to Eton and then studied law but he didn’t need to work. His great grandfather had made the family’s fortune in timber and shipping and built Tranby House (now part of Hessle High School) where Algy lived with his mother and sister. He loved mechanical things and had bought a first class ticket for £30 to go on a motoring holiday in America. When the iceberg struck Algy was up in the smoking room, he returned to his cabin to collect his lifejacket, money and a fur coat before going up on deck. He had learnt to swim at Eton so as the ship went down he stepped into the water and swam away. He was struck by a plank of wood and hung onto that until he came across an upturned canvas lifeboat, several men balanced on this until another lifeboat came at dawn and took them to the Carpathia. On his return to Yorkshire he served on the East Riding County Council and as a JP until his death in 1945. The 1958 film features a man in a fur coat amongst those standing on the collapsed lifeboat so his place in the history of the disaster was recorded.

Benjamin Hart (43) Second class passenger

Benjamin was born in Hull to a Jewish immigrant family from Poland and his father was a seaman. The family moved to Essex when Ben was a teenager and he became a carpenter. He married Esther, a widow and they had a daughter named Eva in 1905. Friends persuaded Ben that they would be better off in Canada and so they purchased tickets to travel on a ship called the Philadelphia. This voyage was cancelled due to a coal strike and they were transferred to the Titanic. Esther didn’t want to go; she had a bad feeling about the journey but was persuaded to travel to give her daughter a better future. Esther stayed awake every night as she was sure that was when something would happen. She felt the iceberg hit and woke Ben to go on deck. Esther and Eva got into a lifeboat but as a man Ben had to stay on the ship and he did not survive. Eva suffered nightmares until as an adult she booked herself onto a ship to cure herself of them. She spoke at Titanic memorial events until she died in 1996.

At this point time had beaten Sheila and we did not get to hear the story of the third passenger she had planned to tell us. Sheila had brought some Titanic memorabilia for us to look at while we had our tea and these as well as the personal details in the stories she told us served to make real the tragedy of the lives lost in the disaster. We will have to wait for the publication of her book to hear more stories of Yorkshire connections to the Titanic.