Margaret “Maggie” MacGregor was born in Fyvie, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, on the 12th April 1876, the daughter of James and Elspet Helen Urquhart MacGregor (née Castle). Her father was an agricultural labourer at the time of her birth, but later found work in a paper mill.
As a young teenager, Maggie went to work as a domestic servant, but later returned to her family, where she also found work in a paper mill, probably the same one that her father and some of her siblings worked in. At some stage, she met George Hardie Hunter, a cabinet maker from Aberdeen, and they became engaged to be married.
In January 1906, George Hunter immigrated to Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States of America, and once he found work and somewhere for them to live, Maggie followed him. She arrived in New York City in September 1906, and on reaching Atlanta, she and George were married there on the 2nd October. They established their home at 319. East Georgia Avenue, in the city. Her husband worked as a cabinet maker at the Colcord Lumber Company in Atlanta.
Family lore states that in early 1915, Maggie was found to be terminally ill, and wanted to return home to live out her final days. As a result the couple booked second cabin passage on the Anchor Liner S.S. Cameronia. The couple left Atlanta and travelled by rail to New York City where they discovered that, the British Admiralty had requisitioned the
Cameronia for war service as a troop ship, and transferred her passengers, some crew and cargo to the
Lusitania. George and Maggie Hunter therefore joined this vessel as second cabin passengers on the morning of 1st May 1915 at the Cunard berth at Pier 54 in New York. The
Lusitania then 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 off the southern coast of Ireland and only hours away from her Liverpool home.
Six days out of New York, on the afternoon of 7th May, both of the Hunters were killed after the liner had been torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine
U-20. At that time, the Lusitania was about twelve miles off The Old Head of Kinsale in southern Ireland and about 250 miles from her home port!
As neither of the Hunters’ bodies were recovered from the sea and identified, neither has a known grave. Maggie Hunter was aged 39 years.
Maggie’s parents were living at Fernbank, Bucksburn, Aberdeenshire, at the time of her death.
Georgia Marriage Records from Select Counties 1828 – 1978, 1881 Census of Scotland, 1891 Census of Scotland, 1901 Census of Scotland, 1910 U.S. Federal Census, New York Passenger Lists 1820 – 1957, Cunard Records, Aberdeen Press and Journal, The Atlanta Constitution, PRO BT 100/345, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1968, Graham Maddocks, Lawrence Evans, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.