Last Titanic Survivor Dies at 97

The last survivor of the sinking of the Titanic has died aged 97. Millvina Dean was nine weeks old when the liner sank after hitting an iceberg in the early hours of 15 April 1912, on its maiden voyage from Southampton.

Her family had been traveling to America, where they hoped to start a new life and open a tobacconist's shop in Kansas. They traveled third class.

Miss Dean's mother, Georgetta, and two-year-old brother, Bert, also survived, but her father, Bertram, was among those who perished when the vessel sank.

Miss Dean, who remembered nothing of the fateful journey, died on Sunday at the care home in Hampshire, England where she lived.

Comments

[Jan Murphy]

Dick, you and your readers may be especially interested in this writeup of the family's story which I found on Yahoo News:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090531/ap_on_re_eu/eu_obit_last_titanic_survivor

It says that while Millvina is the name she was known by, her given names are Elizabeth Gladys. It also says that that family was picked up by the Carpathia and taken to New York, and later returned to England on the Adriatic, which had also been involved in the rescue efforts.

With so many clues, it didn't take long to find the family in the UK Incoming Passenger lists, returning to England in May on the Adriatic. Finding them in the New York Passenger lists on the Carpathia was a bit trickier, but with the help of Steve Morse's One Step Web Pages, and by searching for any arrival of the Carpathia in 1912, I was able to find them on a manifest that was indexed as an arrival in June 1912. (Hint: if you search by first name, it is easier to look for Bert, since his mother is listed as "Etta" and Millvina is listed as "Eliza".)

The link to Bert's entry sent me to the right-hand page of the manifest. Clicking "previous" takes you the instructions to the master for filling out the list, so I clicked "next" to see if I could get to the left-hand page, and that worked. If the manifest was microfilmed backwards, this may explain the June index date -- it has been attached to and microfilmed with a different arrival.

Looking at the images, it is easy to see how this could have happened. The headers for the page the Dean family appears on are blank -- there is no information for departure or arrival port, no sailing date or arrival date.

The information about the family's destination has been lined out and a note has been added that says that they plan to return to England.

My husband's family came from England, also traveling in steerage, but like many people, they did not make a single 'emigration' -- they traveled back and forth multiple times. Until I read this story, I had not thought about the fact that they had sailed both before and after 1912. Imagine what that trip back to England must have been like for people sailing after April 1912, and especially for the survivors. (I suppose it was not much different than flying today after a horrific air crash has been in the news, but in our case, any anxiety one might have during the journey doesn't last as long.)

RIP, Dean family.