Caroline “Carrie” Milne was born in Birkenhead, Cheshire, England, in 1875, the daughter of William Edward and Mary Milne (née Brown). Her father was a fisherman, specialising in fishing for shrimp, and Carrie was the middle child of nine known children.
Her mother died in 1887, followed by her father in 1890, so in her later teenage years; she lived with her married sister, Mrs. Laura Ellis in Birkenhead, before she entered domestic service as a cook with the Cooke family at 21. Gerald Road, Oxton, Birkenhead.
Sometime after 1901, she immigrated to North America, and by 1914, was living in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, where she found employment as a nurse to Master John Stephens, who was the infant son of Lieutenant and Mrs. Chattan Stephens.
Lieutenant Chattan Stephens had left Canada with the Canadian Expeditionary Force, and serving with Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, he had been wounded in
the fighting around Ypres, Belgium, on the Western Front, probably in April 1915. Having been evacuated from the battlefield, he was taken to a London hospital to recover and his mother, Mrs. Frances Stephens, decided to travel there to see him, accompanied by baby John, Miss Milne and her own maid Miss Elise Oberlin.
Consequently, she booked saloon passage for all four of them through Montreal agents W. H. Henry, on the May sailing of the Lusitania from New York to Liverpool and the quartet travelled from Montreal, probably by rail, to take this sailing.
Having arrived at the Cunard berth at Pier 54 in New York harbour on the morning of 1st May 1915, in time for the liner’s scheduled 10.00 a.m. departure, the party boarded, (with ticket number 13170), and Mrs. Stephens and Miss Oberlin were allocated room D5, whilst Miss Milne and baby John were allocated room D9.
Both of these rooms were under the personal supervision of First Class Bedroom Steward William ‘Will’ McLeod, who came from Bebington, a district of Birkenhead, Cheshire, on the opposite bank of the River Mersey from Liverpool. McLeod was a long serving employee of The Cunard Steam Ship Company and had reached the status of Chief First Class Bedroom Steward, but on the Lusitania‘s last ever voyage, he was serving as an ordinary first class steward.
The liner’s sailing was delayed until the afternoon as she had to embark passengers, crew, and cargo from the Anchor Liner Cameronia, which had been requisitioned by the British Admiralty for war service as a troop ship, at the end of April. The Lusitania finally left port just after mid-day and six days later, on the afternoon of 7th May, she was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-20. At that point, she was sailing past The Old Head of Kinsale in southern Ireland, only 250 miles away from the safety of her Liverpool home port.
All four of the Stephens party were killed as a result of this action and Miss Milne's body was not amongst those which were later recovered and identified, although that of Mrs. Stephens was. Caroline Milne was aged 39 years at the time of her death.
Following the sinking, Carrie’s sister, Mrs. Laura Ellis, 197. Old Chester Road, Tranmere, Birkenhead, wrote enquiring about her fate, but, presumably received little or no information. For many years afterwards, Carrie’s family placed an advertisement in the local press on the anniversary of the disaster in remembrance of her.
Bedroom Steward McLeod also perished in the sinking and never saw his Bebington home again.
Register of Births, Marriages and Deaths, 1881 Census of England & Wales, 1891 Census of England & Wales, 1901 Census of England & Wales, Cunard Records, Birkenhead News, Birkenhead News and Advertiser, PRO 22/71, PRO BT 100/345, UniLiv D92/2/22, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.