Fadej Losevicz was born in Imperial Russia in 1883. Some time, before the Great War, he had left there and crossed the Atlantic Ocean to the United States of America. He then settled in Woodhaven, New York, where he found employment, as a labourer.
In the spring of 1915, however, he decided to return home, possibly to enlist in the Imperial Russian forces, maybe mindful of their poor showing against the forces of the Central Powers on the eastern front at that time.
Consequently, he booked third class passage on the May sailing of the Lusitania from New York to Liverpool for the first part of his journey home. He boarded the liner at the Cunard berth at Pier 54 in New York, on the morning of 1st May 1915, in time for the liner’s scheduled 10.00 a.m. departure and this was then delayed until the early afternoon of that day as she had to load cargo and embark passengers and crew from the Anchor Lines ship the S.S. Cameronia which the British Admiralty had requisitioned for war service as a troop ship.
Six days later, in the afternoon of 7th May, the Lusitania was torpedoed off the coast of southern Ireland, by the German submarine U-20 and sank in just 18 minutes. At that
stage of her voyage, she was only about 250 miles away from the safety of her home port.
Altogether there were 68 Russian nationals on board the Lusitania when she left New York. Of these, 39 were killed and 29 survived the sinking and Fadej Losevicz was unfortunately one of those who lost their lives. As his body was not recovered from the sea and identified afterwards, he has no known grave. He was 32 years of age at the time of the sinking.
Cunard Records, PRO BT 100/345, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.