Elizabeth Campbell Ritchie, known as “Bessie”, was born in Dumbarton, Dunbartonshire, Scotland, on the 23rd November 1881, the daughter of William and Mary Scott Ritchie (née Carrick). Her father was a baker, and the family home was at 129. High Street, Dumbarton. Bessie was the eldest of nine children.
Bessie trained as a school teacher, and on the 11th April 1907, she married Daniel McCorkindale in Dumbarton. Her husband was a machinist, and in 1908, their son, Duncan, was born in Clydebank, Dunbartonshire.
In April 1911, the family had emigrated to the United States of America and settled in Chrome, Middlesex County, New Jersey. In late 1914, Bessie gave birth to her second child, a daughter named Mary.
Daniel McCorkindale worked as a watchman at the Liebig plant of the American Agricultural and Chemical Company for a number of years, and then decided to try his hand at farming in Saskatchewan, Canada. In the spring of 1915, he decided to move to Saskatchewan and prepare a home for his family, and in the meantime, his wife would bring their two children on a month-long holiday to Scotland, thereafter joining him in Saskatchewan.
As a consequence, Daniel McCorkindale purchased second cabin passage on the May sailing of the Lusitania for his wife and children, and accompanied them to the Cunard berth at Pier 54 in New York, in time for her scheduled 10 00 a.m. departure for Liverpool on the morning of the 1st May. After seeing them board the Lusitania, and no doubt cheering and waving them on their way, he began his long journey to Saskatchewan as the liner departed, on what proved to be her final voyage.
The liner’s sailing had been delayed until the afternoon as she had to embark passengers, crew, and cargo from the Anchor Liner Cameronia, which had been requisitioned by the British Admiralty for war service as a troop ship, at the end of April. The Lusitania finally left port at 12.27 p.m., and just six days later, on the afternoon of 7th May, she was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-20. At that point, she was steaming past The Old Head of Kinsale in southern Ireland and only about 250 miles hours away from her home port and destination.
All three members of the McCorkindale family were killed as a result of this action and as none of their bodies was recovered and identified afterwards, none has a known grave. Elizabeth McCorkindale was aged 33 years.
Coincidentally, her mother-in-law, Mrs. Helen McCorkindale, lived in Main Street, Renton, Dumbarton, the same street as a Lusitania second cabin survivor, Miss Grace French.
On 28th August 1915, her husband Daniel took possession of a money draft for £14-8s-0d., (£14.40p.), which represented the sum of all monies and orders found on his wife’s body. At the time, he gave his address as 4, Queen Street, Renton, so he must have crossed the Atlantic to sort out family affairs following the tragedy.
Scotland Select Births and Baptisms 1564 – 1950, 1891 Census of Scotland, 1901 Census of Scotland, New York Passenger Lists 1820 – 1957, Cunard Records, The Central New Jersey Home News, Evening Telegraph, Perth Amboy Evening News, PRO BT 100/345, UniLiv.D92/1/8-10, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.