Charles Emilius Lauriat Junior was born in Swampscott, Essex County, Massachusetts, in the United States of America, on 4th of August 1874, the son of Charles Emilius and Harriet Fidelia Lauriat, (née Page). The name Emilius came from Charles Junior’s grandfather, Emilius Anselm Lauriat. Charles had two sisters, one older, and one younger than him. His father was a book seller, and on completion of his education, Charles joined his father in the business, Charles E. Lauriat & Co., which was located in Boston.
On the 20th March 1912, he married Marian Isabel Bullard in Brookline, Massachusetts, and they made their home in Boston. As well as their business premises in Boston, the company also maintained an office in London, which Charles Junior frequently visited. In the spring of 1915, he found it necessary to make such a visit.
Consequently, he booked saloon passage on the Lusitania which was due to leave New York on 1st May 1915. He chose her, because she was considered to be a fast ship, even though, because of war economies at that time, she was not steaming with all her boilers fired. Lauriat was no stranger to trans-Atlantic travel and had made 22 previous crossings, often on slower vessels, but never on a Cunard vessel, and he wanted this business trip to be as speedy as possible and therefore booked passage on the Cunarder on this occasion!
Thus, having travelled from Boston at the end of April, he joined the liner at her berth at Pier 54 in New York harbour on the morning of 1st May. Once he had boarded her, (with ticket number 1297), he was escorted to his room which was number 5, on ‘B’ Deck, which was under the personal supervision of First Class Bedroom Steward Robert Morse, who came from Rock Ferry, a suburb of Birkenhead, on the opposite bank of the River Mersey from Liverpool. One of the other saloon class passengers was another Bostonian, Lothrop Withington, whose cabin was A29. Both men were known to one another through Boston society, and enjoyed one another’s company during the crossing.
The Cunarder finally left New York harbour after a delayed start at 12.27 p.m., and set off for what would become her final voyage across the Atlantic, for six days out of New York, on the afternoon of 7th May, she was struck by a single torpedo fired from the German submarine U-20. At that time, she was within sight of the coast of southern Ireland.
Lauriat was walking on the promenade deck when the torpedo struck and was conscious of the explosion being muffled and not very loud. He then heard a second explosion which seemed to him as if a boiler had exploded. He also witnessed a great shower of coal, debris, and escaping steam, which rapidly fell back onto the deck. His white shirt
was speckled with soot when this happened. He realised immediately that the liner was seriously damaged and was likely to sink, as she took on an abrupt list to starboard, but as she then righted herself slightly, he thought it might be possible to save her after all.
At about this time, he came across fellow saloon passengers Elbert and Alice Hubbard on the port side of the sinking vessel. Seemingly paralysed by the situation, they were standing on ‘B’ Deck without trying to save themselves. Lauriat advised them to go to their room, which was also situated on ‘B’ Deck and get hold of lifejackets and when they remained unmoved by this suggestion, Lauriat volunteered to go to his room and get a spare one for each of them.
This he did, but on his return, wearing one jacket and carrying two more, there was no sign of the Hubbards, who were subsequently killed. He then noticed that most of the passengers he saw wearing lifejackets were wearing them incorrectly and having given his two spares away, he busied himself by re-adjusting some of them, but other passengers ran away from him, no doubt fearing that he might try to take theirs from them! He also went forward many times to look again and again for the Hubbards but could not find them. At this stage, he heard Captain Turner and Staff Captain Anderson order that the lowering of the lifeboats should cease, on the grounds that there was no danger!
What happened next is described by Adolf and Mary Hoehling in their book The Last Voyage of the Lusitania, in which they state: -
Lauriat returned to his cabin for a few personal possessions that he wanted with him even if he was to perish. ….. He groped his way to his cabin through the dark, tilted passageways. By the flickering light of a match he searched quickly through the jumble while the Lusitania groaned and rumbled ominously, then swayed over still farther.
With his passport and other papers stuffed in his pockets, he left his state-room and moved back through the passage; one foot on the bulkhead, one on the deck. As he glanced down access passageways which ended with portholes, he saw that the portholes were open. The water could not have been more than a few feet below them. He wondered why these ports had not been closed. He continued on.
When he passed the First Class lounge he noticed that the chairs had fallen over. A few were upturned, with legs straight in the air like dead, rigid horses. The painting over the marble-mantled fireplace hung askew, while the velvet curtains hung half-way out into the lounge like starched collars strangely out of shape.
On deck, he spied a boat, filled with women and children, hanging securely to its davits. If it were not freed at once, the Lusitania would drag it down with her if she sank. Lauriat jumped into the stern, then realised it was already afloat - the water was flush with the rail of B Deck! The sinking had gained that much momentum in the last few minutes. He freed one end, as a steward at the other hacked futilely at the thick ropes with a pocket knife. Lauriat started forward but could make no progress over the obstructing maze of oars, boat hooks, kegs of water, “and God knows what”.
As the Lusitania continued to tilt farther, her funnels overhung the lifeboat
with increasing menace. The people looked up at the four monstrous black and red spectres, and blanched anew in terror. Some covered their eyes.
Lauriat may have been mistaken in his description of the funnels which had been painted all black as a wartime measure.
Lauriat, caught by the swinging aft davit, was knocked into the sprawling, clawing mass of people in the bottom of the boat. He could feel a chill of panic as he struggled to an upright position and advised the others to jump for it. “It's your only chance!”
Lauriat went into the 50-degree waters of the Atlantic, pushing several people ahead of him. In the water he urged them to put their hands on each others shoulders to keep in a group. When he had swum about a hundred feet from the ship he blinked the cold salt water from his eyes and looked back.
The decks of the big Cunarder were still filled with people, bunched together and hanging on to stationary objects to keep their balance. As the water inched up they released their holds and clawed for upper parts of stanchions. Many clung to the forlorn hope that they still should stay with the ship.
Having swum as far away as he could from the rapidly sinking vessel he stopped and turned round to look at her and saw the lifeboat, still attached to the falls at the bow end, being dragged down with the ship!
When the vessel finally sank, Lauriat became entangled with the radio aerial which was slung between the Lusitania’s two masts and dragged under. He was able to struggle free, however, and rise to the surface where he saw the final plunge of the great liner and heard the desperate moans of those who were taken down with her!
After floating around in the sea for a while, he noticed a collapsible boat which had floated clear when the liner sank. There were three people in it, two of whom were Able Seaman Leslie Morton, and saloon passenger Fred Gauntlett, a shipbuilder, who knew Lauriat well and recognised him. They were trying to erect the collapsible boat’s canvas sides to make it seaworthy. Lauriat swam towards the boat and was hauled in and then commenced to help them with their task.
The third man already on board, was saloon passenger James H. ‘Jay’ Brooks who came from Bridgeport, Connecticut, and he later gave his own account of the sinking to a representative of the Press Association. This was later syndicated around the world's newspapers and in part of it he mentions Charles Lauriat, although he mistakenly names him James: -
The rush of water over the steamer's decks swept away a collapsible boat, and I swam towards it. Another man reached it shortly after, and after we were rescued, I found him to be Mr. James Lauriat Junior, of Boston.
Fellow saloon passenger Henry Burgess from Shipley in Yorkshire also survived the sinking, only because he was picked up by the same collapsible boat which was by this time under the control of Charles Lauriat, who was an amateur sailor and was used to small boats. Upon his return home, he related the circumstances of his survival to a reporter of his local newspaper, The Shipley Times and Observer, which stated: -
It must have taken us half an hour to get the boat properly fixed. By pulling up the seats the sides are brought into place, and we found this a difficult job. We managed, however, in the end, and I found that altogether there were thirty-one of us in the boat. All round us were overturned boats, with many people clinging to them. These were afraid to approach lest they should swamp us, but Mr. Charles E. Lauriat of Boston, whom we had appointed captain of our boat decided that another man who was near, with only a lifebuoy for his protection, should be taken in and then we would row for the shore.
Among the survivors plucked from the sea by Lauriat's collapsible boat was minister’s wife Margaret Gwyer, who was blackened with soot, having been sucked down one of the giant liner’s funnel’s and then blown out again, as sea water reached the boilers!
After four hours in the sea, the occupants of the collapsible were finally spotted by a fishing vessel, the Peel 12, of Douglas, in the Isle of Man, who took them on board until she could transfer them to the Queenstown harbour tender The Flying Fish which then landed them at that port. By this time, Lauriat had given his sweater to a naked male survivor and his jacket to a lady who had been wearing only a night-gown!
After being landed at Queenstown, he made his way to London and having concluded his business there, he eventually returned to Boston where he became president of one of the largest book importing firms in New England. He was also, in due course, paid $1,000 compensation for his baggage lost on the Lusitania.
On his return to Boston, Charles Lauriat wrote his own account of his experiences, The Lusitania’s Last Voyage, which was published by Houghton, Mifflin & Co., copies of which can still be found in second-hand bookshops and auction websites today.
Charles Lauriat wrote a number of letters to the Cunard Steam Ship Company requesting hat ribbons from a number of their vessels, including the Lusitania, Saxonia, and Ivernia. The company facilitated him in every way; however, they had some difficulty in acquiring one from the Lusitania but eventually managed to obtain one from the firm that manufactured them for the company.
Bedroom Steward Morse, who had looked after Charles Lauriat in room B5, also survived the sinking and eventually made it back to his Rock Ferry home.
Charles Emilius Lauriat Junior continued to work in the family business, and made a number of further trans-Atlantic voyages in the years after his Lusitania experience. He resided with his family in Brookline, Massachussetts, until December 1937, when he was taken ill and admitted to Cambridge Hospital, where he died on the 28th December 1937, aged 63 years. He was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The Charles E. Lauriat & Co. business continued to trade in a number of north eastern U.S. states until 1999, when if filed for bankruptcy after existing for 127 years. Competition from large bookstore chains and the growing business of Internet booksellers were blamed for the decline of the business.
Massachusetts Birth Records 1840 – 1915, Massachusetts Town and Vital Records 1620 – 1988, 1880 U.S. Federal Census, 1900 U.S. Federal Census, 1910 U.S. Federal Census, 1920 U.S. Federal Census, 1930 U.S. Federal Census, New York Passenger Lists 1820 – 1957, Cunard Records, Burlington Free Press, New York Times, Last Voyage of the Lusitania, Seven Days to Disaster, The Lusitania’s Last Voyage, PRO 22/71, UniLiv D92/2/165, Graham Maddocks, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.