Michael Stachula was born in Poland, which was then part of Imperial Russia, in 1884. In 1909, he had emigrated to the United States of America and settled in Buffalo, New York, where he found work as a labourer.
By the spring of 1915, however, he had decided to return to his native home, perhaps to enlist in the Imperial Russian Army and booked third class passage on the May sailing of the Lusitania on the first part of his journey home.
He boarded the vessel at Pier 54 in New York harbour on the morning of 1st May. The liner’s departure was delayed until the early afternoon to embark crew, passengers and cargo from the requisitioned liner Cameronia and just before 12.30 p.m. she slipped into the North River and out into the Atlantic Ocean.
Six days later the liner was torpedoed and sunk by Kapitänleutnant Schwieger’s submarine U-20, within sight of the southern Irish coast and only hours away from her Liverpool destination.
Michael Stachula was killed as a result of the sinking and if his body was recovered, it remained unidentified, and therefore he has no known grave. He was aged 30 years when he was killed.
New York Passenger Lists 1820 – 1957, 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.