Joan Elizabeth Fish was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in late 1914, the daughter of Joseph and Sarah Mary Fish (née Rogers). The family had originally come from Bristol, Gloucestershire, England. Joan had two sisters, Eileen, born in 1905 and Marion, born in 1907. The family home was at 441. Sackville Street, Toronto, and her father worked as an automobile salesman.
By the spring of 1915, her father had volunteered for the Canadian Expeditionary Force to fight against the forces of The Central Powers and probably as a result of this and also because of the war in France and Flanders, Joan Fish’s mother decided to take the family back to Bristol. As a consequence they booked second cabin passage on the Lusitania and having left Toronto at the end of April they joined her at her berth in New York harbour, on the morning of 1st May. Also in their party for the voyage to England were Joan’s uncle Richard Rogers and her aunt Elizabeth Rogers.
Six days later, on the afternoon of 7th May, when the liner was within sight of the coast of southern Ireland, Joan Fish was being carried around the deck, by her aunt Elizabeth when the U-20's torpedo struck the ship. At that time, Elizabeth Rogers was in the company of another former resident of Bristol, fellow second cabin passenger Edward Lander.
Later, once he was safely back in Bristol, Lander described what happened to him and baby Joan, to a reporter from local newspaper The Western Daily Press: -
Mr. Lander explained that just before the submarine attack, he was on the port side of the deck, and close to him a young lady, Miss Rogers, holding a baby belonging to Mrs. Fish. Continuing, he said he saw no submarine, and when his attention was turned to the wake of the torpedo rushing below the surface of the water, it was close to the ship - perhaps not more than an eighth of a mile. The missile was heading straight for the Lusitania, and hit her about mid-ships.
“Someone cried out ’It’s got us,’ and upon contact with the vessel the torpedo exploded with a dull sound, without making a big racket. We saw a big cloud of smoke; the engines of the Lusitania stopped and the vessel took a list to starboard. We crawled on to the first cabin deck, and many others with us and there was a lot of water on part of the deck. I grabbed the baby and held the young lady by the wrist and we managed to scramble to the top deck where the boats were. That deck seemed pretty clear.
The lady and I found a lifeboat into which we got and I kept the baby in my arms. The boat was crowded with members of the crew, so that there was not room to turn round in her. Then somebody came alongside and said ‘It’s all right, she’s on the bottom.’ Thinking it safe to return to ship, we all got off our boat and again went aboard the Lusitania. Doubt arose as to the safety of the ship, and people began to get into the boat again.
Suddenly, the Lusitania sank. Our boat was attached to her by a rope and we went down with the steamship. The baby was wrenched from my arms and it seemed, in going down into the sea, as if I turned over and over again.”
Joan Fish was never seen again, alive or dead and perished in the seas off The Old Head of Kinsale. She was the only member of her immediate family to die that day, although her uncle Richard was also killed!
Cunard Records, PRO BT 100/345, Western Daily Press, Bristol Press, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.