Nina Elizabeth Nadin was born in London, Middlesex, England, on the 18th August 1880, according to information she supplied when applying for a passport in 1915; however, no official record of her birth can be found. It could be that this was not her birth name at all, and that she was adopted, formally or informally, by John George and Essie Nadin (née Cranstone). John Nadin had been a Sergeant Major with the 60th Regiment of Foot, also known as the King’s Royal Rifle Corps, and is known to have served in Ireland and England with his regiment. He was born in Dublin, Ireland, and on retiring from the army, became a gymnastics instructor. He had first married in 1872, his first wife dying in 1876, and he had married again in 1878 in Fermoy, County Cork, Ireland.
She was a children’s nurse by profession and in 1909, she is believed to have emigrated to the United States of America, settling in New York City.
In 1911, she married Hedley L. Holland, an Irishman. who had emigrated to the United States of America in 1894, and became a naturalised U.S. citizen in 1899. In 1915, their home was at 220. Lennox Avenue, New York, N.Y.. In the spring of that year, however, Nina booked a second cabin passage on the May sailing of the Lusitania
from there to Liverpool. She was pregnant with her first child at this time.
She boarded the liner at the Cunard berth at Pier 54 in New York port, on the morning of 1st May 1915, in time for her scheduled 10 o’clock departure. This was then postponed until just before 12.30 p.m., as the liner had to embark passengers, crew and cargo from the liner S.S. Cameronia which the British Admiralty had requisitioned for war service as a troop ship, at the end of April.
Then, six days out of New York, on the afternoon of 7th May, the Lusitania
was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-20, within sight of the coast of southern Ireland and within 250 miles of her home port.
Nina Holland survived this action, although nearly two thirds of her fellow third class passenger companions perished, and having been rescued from the sea, she was landed at Queenstown, from where she eventually made it to 25. Lisbon Lane, Liverpool, which may have been her original intended destination, although she had a brother, Sydney, residing at 14. Parliament Place in Liverpool with his wife and young family.
On the 31st July 1915, while staying in Liverpool, Nina gave birth to a daughter, Eileen Elizabeth. Both mother and daughter returned to New York on board the
S.S. California, arriving on the 22nd December 1915.
Her marriage to Hedley Holland ended in divorce, and on the 18th April 1918, she married Franz “Frank” John Musil, an Austrian emigrant, who at the time of their marriage was working as a steward in a hospital, but later became the proprietor of a hotel.
She continued to reside in New York City with her second husband and daughter until her death on the 14th September 1938, aged 58 years. Her remains were interred in Kensico Cemetery, Westchester County, New York.
Register of Births, Marriages and Deaths, Philadelphia Pennsylvania Marriage Index 1885 – 1951, New York Extracted Marriage Index 1866 – 1937, New York Extracted Death Index 1862 – 1948, 1911 Census of England & Wales, 1920 U.S. Federal Census, 1925 New York State Census, 1930 U.S. Federal Census, New York Passenger Lists 1820 – 1957. U.S. Passport Applications 1795 – 1925, Cunard Records, Graham Maddocks, Stuart Williamson, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.