Mary McCorkindale was probably born in Chrome, Middlesex County, New Jersey, in the United States of America. in September 1914, the daughter of Daniel and Elizabeth Campbell “Bessie” McCorkindale (née Ritchie).
The family had originally come from Dumbarton, Dunbartonshire, in Scotland and had immigrated to America in April 1911, settling in Chrome, New Jersey. Mary McCorkindale had a brother named Duncan, who had been born in Scotland in 1908.
Her father had 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. As a result, in the spring of 1915, her father 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 departure for Liverpool had been delayed until the early afternoon, so that she could take on board passengers, cargo, and crew from the Anchor Liner Cameronia, which had been requisitioned by the British Admiralty for war work as a troop ship.
Six days later, on the afternoon of 7th May, the Lusitania was torpedoed by the German submarine U-20, twelve miles off The Old Head of Kinsale in southern Ireland and sank only eighteen minutes later. At that stage of her voyage, she was a mere twelve or fourteen hours away from her Liverpool destination.
Mary McCorkindale and her brother and mother all perished as a result of this enemy action and as none of their bodies was ever recovered and identified afterwards, none has a known grave. Mary McCorkindale was only eight months old!
Her father’s family home was at Main Street, Renton, Dumbarton, where her grandmother, Mrs. Helen McCorkindale, still lived. Fellow second cabin passenger, Miss Grace French, who survived the sinking, also originally lived in Main Street at no. 184.
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.