World’s luckiest sailor?
Incredible story of seaman who survived the Titanic... AND sinking of the Lusitania
AFTER escaping from the Titanic on a rowing boat, sailor George Beauchamp could have been forgiven for becoming a landlubber.
But just three years later in 1915, he was said to be aboard the RMS Lusitania – then one of the world’s largest passenger ships – as it was torpedoed by a German U-boat, killing 1,198. Once again he had a lucky escape, although it prompted him to apparently tell his family later: ‘I have had enough of large ships – I’m going to work on smaller boats.’ The incredible story of Mr Beauchamp, who died in 1944 aged 72, has now been told by his relatives, who believe he is the only sailor to survive both disasters.
He was one of 705 people to survive the Titanic sinking, which killed more than 1,500 passengers, and thought to be one of 767 survivors when the Lusitania was struck during the First World War.
The young sailor was working as a stoker below deck when the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in the Atlantic on April 14, 1912.
Originally a Londoner, he recalled hearing a ‘roar like thunder’ on impact and was up to his waist in seawater before being permitted to leave the engine room.
Mr Beauchamp went up on to deck to help frantic passengers into a lifeboat before getting in himself and rowing away from the liner.
Despite that ordeal, Mr Beauchamp remained at sea and his family believe he may have been aboard the RMS Lusitania when it was sunk on May 7, 1915. Its sinking contributed to the US entering the war.
Now some 75 years after his death, Mr Beauchamp’s great-granddaughter, Susan Norton, has said she was ‘proud’ of the ‘part he played in saving the lives of some passengers’. He was married and had a family in Hull when he took a job aged 42 with White Star Line for the Titanic’s maiden voyage. He claimed he was ten years younger.
He was later called to testify at the British inquiry into the disaster. Transcripts reveal that he said: ‘I noticed the shock and then a roar like thunder. We were ordered to close the dampers as water poured through over the plates. We climbed up the escape ladder.’
Records state that Mr Beauchamp was tasked with helping passengers into lifeboat 13. He said: ‘I had one foot on the deck and one on the lifeboat and I was helping ladies and children into the lifeboat. We pulled on the oars to get away as far as possible from the suction of the ship as it went down. I saw the ship go down bow first and I could still see the stern and then that went too.
‘It was a roar like thunder as it went down and I heard cries as the ship sank. We would have gone back for others but we were full up.’
Lifeboat 13 was rescued by the RMS Carpathia, a steamship that braved treacherous conditions to rescue hundreds. After returning to dry land, Mr Beauchamp remarried and lived out his days in Southampton.