Mary Amelia Crowther was born in Ontario, Canada, probably on the 21st of October 1856 (although many accounts state she was born in 1862), the daughter of James T. and Elizabeth Crowther (née Torrance). Her father was a prominent Toronto lawyer, and Mary was one of five children.
On the 14th November 1882, she married Dr. George Ansel Sterling Ryerson, a physician, in Toronto, and they had four sons and one daughter - George Crowther, born in 1883, Yoris Sterling, born in 1886, Eric Egerton, born in 1888, Arthur Connaught, born in 1890, and Laura Mary, born in 1892. The family home was at 66.
College Street, Toronto, Ontario.
Her husband had founded the Canadian Red Cross in 1896, and in March 1915, he was sent to Europe to assess the needs of the Red Cross in Flanders. Accordingly, he sailed from New York on the Lusitania on April 3rd, arriving in Liverpool a week later.
By this time, both George and Arthur Ryerson were serving in Flanders, serving as officers in the Canadian Expeditionary Force and having arrived in London, their father learned of the furious battle near Ypres which had begun on 22nd April, in which the Germans had used poison gas for the first time. The line around Ypres had only held because of the heroism of the Canadians.
Unfortunately, George Ryerson senior also learned bad news concerning his sons. Captain George Crowther Ryerson, of the 2nd Canadian Infantry Battalion, had been killed in action on 23rd April, and Lieutenant Arthur Connaught Ryerson had been severely wounded more or less at the same time. As a result, their father made haste across the Channel and found Arthur, with shrapnel wounds to the abdomen, in a military hospital in Boulogne. It transpired that whilst taking ammunition to the front line, Arthur Ryerson, quite by chance, had come across the dead body of his brother by the roadside and as he had been loading it onto his empty ammunition limber, both he and his horse had been hit by a German shell burst!
Despite the fact that Arthur Ryerson, was wounded whilst trying to recover the body of his brother George, Captain G.C. Ryerson’s body, could not be found and identified after the war it and as a result, he is commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing of the Salient, at Ypres.
Once he had seen his wounded son safely onto a hospital ship bound for England, Dr. Ryerson cabled Mary Ryerson in Toronto to come to England as quickly as she could, to comfort her son and as he had crossed the Atlantic successfully on the Lusitania, he advised his wife to join that ship.
The next available sailing on the liner was on 1st May 1915, so at the end of April, Mary Ryerson, with her daughter Laura as a companion, set off from Toronto and joined the vessel at New York, in time for the sailing, which left the harbour there, just after mid-day. Once on board, (with ticket number 446106), mother and daughter were allocated saloon room D55, which was under the personal supervision of First Class Bedroom Steward Edwin Huther, who came from Liverpool.
Six days later, when the liner was torpedoed and sunk, further tragedy hit the family for although Laura Ryerson was saved, her mother perished. After her rescue, Laura Ryerson gave her account of her mother’s fate: -
My mother and myself had finished lunch and were taking coffee when there was a jarring noise - not loud. Almost immediately, the ship began to list. We went to the upper deck but several boats could not be lowered because of the list of the ship. Mother and I got into the last boat which was lowered safely, but just then, the ship went down and our boat was overturned.
Despite one early erroneous report that her body had been recovered, Mary Ryerson was never seen again, alive or dead, and as a consequence, she has no known grave.
She was aged 58 years. The Toronto Globe, commenting on her loss, was to remark, on her loss: -
She died as much for the British Empire as her noble son died fighting in Flanders.
Her husband, still on the Continent, did not hear of the sinking until the evening of May 8th and it was first reported that both his wife and his daughter had been killed. Numbed by this further crippling family news, he hurried back to London, and eventually learning that Laura had been saved, he despatched a family friend to Queenstown to bring her to England.
Bedroom Steward Edwin Huther, who had looked after Mary Ryerson and her daughter in room D55, also perished in the sinking.
Extraordinarily, sea tragedy was no stranger to the Ryerson family. In 1912, William Edwy Ryerson, one of Mary Ryerson’s nephews, was serving on the White Star liner R.M.S. Titanic as a second class saloon steward when she hit an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic on her maiden voyage on 15th April 1912. He only survived because he was ordered to row a lifeboat - Lifeboat No. 9 - away from the sinking ship. Another nephew, first class passenger Arthur Larned Ryerson was not so lucky, however, and perished when the liner sank, having first made sure that his wife, his son, his two daughters, their governess and the family maid had got into lifeboat No. 4! They all survived.
After Mary Amelia Ryerson’s death, her husband married again in 1916 and died himself in May 1925.
Ontario Canada Deaths and Deaths Overseas 1869 – 1948, 1961 Census of Canada, 1871 Census of Canada, 1881 Census of Canada, 1891 Census of Canada, 1901 Census of Canada, Cunard Records, American Medical Association Journal, Toronto Globe, Toronto Daily World, PRO 22/71, PRO BT 100/345, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, James Maggs, Phyllis Ann Ryerse, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.