George Henry Benjamin Fletcher was born in Seaforth, Lancashire, England, on the 28th January 1885, the son of John and Margaret Fletcher (née Long). His father was a labourer and George was the second oldest of six known children in the family.
On completing his education, George worked as a barman in The Peacock, a pub situated at 355. Westminster Road, Kirkdale, Liverpool, an establishment still operating as a pub today before he decided to join the Mercantile Marine as a waiter and steward on passenger liners operating out of Liverpool.
In the summer of 1905, he married Anieta Bertha Ellen Longworth in Birkenhead, Cheshire. Anieta had an illegitimate son named Wilson George at the time of their marriage, and the couple had four children themselves – Daisy, May Minnie, John Harry, and Anieta.
He signed on at Liverpool as a first class waiter in the Steward’s Department for what proved to be the Lusitania’s final voyage to America and reported for duty at 8. a.m. on the 17th April before she left the River Mersey for the last time.
Following a safe and uneventful voyage to New York, he was still on board for the return voyage on the 1st May and was lucky to be counted among the survivors when the Lusitania sank on the afternoon of the 7th May, having been torpedoed by the German submarine, U-20, while off the s
away from Liverpool.
Having been rescued from the sea and landed at Queenstown, he eventually made his way back to Liverpool.
George Fletcher continued to serve as a waiter and steward on liners following his survival, and in 1917, while in Boston, Massachusetts, in the United States of America, he applied to become a naturalized U.S. citizen; however, he never completed the process.
In the 1920’s the family moved to Kent, and later, Southampton, Hampshire, presumably as the trans-Atlantic liners had moved to there from Liverpool.
George Fletcher died in Grimsby Hospital, Grimsby, Lincolnshire, on the 29th July 1932 because of a fractured skull. It is not known how he became injured; however, he was serving as an assistant first class dining room steward on the Empress of Australia at the time of his death. Although he was residing with his family at 19. Shirley Road, Southampton, at the time of his death, he was buried in Scartho Road Cemetery, Grimsby.
Register of Births, Marriages and Deaths, Liverpool England Church of England Baptisms 1813 – 1919, 1891 Census of England, 1901 Census of England, 1911 Census of England, 1921 Census of England, Massachusetts U.S. State and Federal Naturalization Records 1798 – 1950, Liverpool England Crew Lists 1861 – 1919, Cunard Records, PRO BT 351/1/45681, Deaths at Sea 1871 – 1971, Graham Maddocks, Peter Threlfall, Geoff Whitfield, Michael Poirier, Jim Kalafus, Cliff Barry, Paul Latimer, Norman Gray.
Copyright © Peter Kelly.
Revised & Updated – 20th November 2023.