The date - 3 November 1916. James Curran (my wife
Sadie's great grandfather) was 60 years old when, on that dark and storm
lashed Friday night he, with 96 other unfortunate souls, met a sudden
and violent death in the raging seas of Carlingford Lough on a journey
that he had not initially planned to take. Born and living in Rostrevor
he was married to Alice Murdock from Burren. They had nine children, two
of whom died young - Sarah aged two by falling from a table and
Catherine killed by a stone at age 16. It appears that he accepted a
ticket from an acquaintance who could not use it (and thereby saved his
own life). He was going to Liverpool to work; I don't know where but it
may well have been in the munitions factories, as England was then half
way through The Great War in which more than 20 million people died.
The Ships
The SS Connemara was a sturdy vessel of 1106 gross
tons. She was a twin screw steamer, 272 feet long, 35 broad and 14 deep.
She had been build by Denny Brothers of Dunbarton in 1897 and put to
work by her owners, the London and North-Western Railway Company, on the
lucrative Holyhead & Greenore service - "The Direct & Most
Comfortable Route Between London & Belfast & The North of
Ireland", which had been inaugurated in 1874. Greenore is on the
Carlingford peninsula of County Louth, about four sea miles over the
water from Rostrevor, in County Down. The Connemara's Master, 50 year
old Captain GH Doeg, and his crew of 30, all from Holyhead in Wales,
were experienced seamen and well used to rough weather.
The "Retriever", the other ship involved in
the tragedy, was a 483 -ton collier owned by the Clanrye Shipping
Company, built by Ailsa Shipbuilding Company in 1899. She was a steel
screw, three masted steamer, 168 ft long, 25 broad and 10 deep. She had
a crew of nine. The Captain was Patrick O'Neill from Kilkeel. The Second
Mate was his son Joseph and one of the seamen, Joseph Donnan, was his
son-in-law. The sole survivor of the tragedy, James Boyle, from
Summerhill in Warrenpoint, was a fireman on the Retriever. The other
seamen were from Newry.
Both the Connemara and the Retriever had been
previously in collision with other ships. The Connemara sunk the
Liverpool vessel Marquis of Bute on 20 March 1910. On 31 August 1912 the
Retriever sunk the Spanish ship, the Lista, at Garston dock. This
accident was due to the sudden death on the bridge of the Captain of the
Retriever as he was taking his ship out of the dock.
The Passengers
The 51 passesngers were a mixed group. Some were
soldiers returning from leave, some recovered from wounds suffered in
Flanders. There were people from Sligo, from Longford, from Ballybay in
Monaghan, from Cavan, from Crossmaglen and Cullyhanna in South Armagh,
from Dundalk in County Louth, from Ballycastle on the north coast of Co
Antrim, and further afield. Many were on the first steps of emigration
to America, in search of a better life. Others were visiting relations
in great Britain. There were drovers who were to accompany the large
number of cattle and sheep that were making the crossing and many were
young girls making for the munitions factories.
Miss Williams, Stewardess on the Connemara, was
making her final trip before leaving to get married. Patrick Conlon, a
Dundalk railwayman, was travelling to Wigan with two female cousins -
Mrs Lily Fillington and Mrs M. Clarinbroke - and Mrs Fillington's two
children. A woman and her three children were going to England to meet
her soldier husband home from the front.
Each death was a tragedy for the people concerned and
for their families and communities. How each one arrived at their fate
was a personal journey. Some potential passengers were saved by
fortuitous circumtances, others who met their fate by ways that were
also fortuitous. Some of these stories follow.
Mrs Small, of Birkenhead, whose husband, a mining
engineer, had died on his way home from West Africa in September, had
arranged to return home with her daughter from Greenore. However, on
Thursday night she dreamed that she had sailed in the Connemara and that
she saw the vessel founder. She regarded the dream as a warning and
refused to sail, thus saving both their lives.
Mr P.J. Kearney, and his sister, Miss Catherine
Kearney, children of the Principal of Drumilly National School,
Whitecross were waiting at the Edward St Station in Newry. Mr Kearney
had recently completed his training in Waterford for national school
teaching, Miss Kearney assisted her father in the school. They were
going to meet a married sister who was coming from America. While
waiting for the train to Greenore they were told by Sergeant
Fitzpatrick, who was always on duty at the station, that the Greenore
boat on which they meant to embark might not sail as the night was so
rough. After some hesitation Mr Kearney tossed a penny on the Waiting
Room table and on an the strength of the result decided to make the
journey.
Mary McArdle, from Crossmaglen, Co Armagh, who
travelled from Dundalk to Greenore, was bound for New York. She had
intended to travel to Liverpool by the Dundalk and Newry Steam Packet
Company's boat on Wednesday, but missed the sailing. She waited over in
town until the Friday, and caught the evening train.
John Loy, of Leish was told that his son, who had
been wounded at the front, was in hospital in England and was making
ready to go on the Connemara, but his wife, seeing how wild was the
night, succeeded in keeping him at home, thereby probably saving his
life.
Henry George Tumelty, of High Street in Newry, a
fireman on the Retriever, missed the sailing at Newry on its last trip
to Garston. He cycled three miles along the canal and jumped aboard the
ship as it was passing out of the locks at Fathom.
The Collision
The Retriever had left Garston for Newry, with a
cargo of coal, at 4 am on Friday morning but, according to James Boyle,
the gale force winds and mountainous seas had slowed her progress and
shifted her cargo, although he maintained that this did not unduly
affect her handling.
The Connemara left her berth at Greenore at shortly
after 8 o'clock bound for Holyhead on her regular run. A fierce gale was
raging ("The wildest night he had experienced in 70 years"
according to one old farmer in the area). The hurricane force wind was
from WSW against a strong ebb tide of some eight knots. About two and a
half miles from Greenore she passed the Halbowline lighthouse (marking
the Carlingford bar) and entered the comparatively narrow channel, or
"cut", leading to the open sea. The "cut" is about
300 yards wide and, in the prevailing conditions of wind and wave,
afforded no great leeway for vessels to pass each other. Conditions in
the channel were atrocious. The combination of wind and tide had churned
the sea into a fearful cauldron at the bar mouth, making navigation
difficult.
About half a mile beyond the bar the Connemara met
the Retriever inbound from Garston. Both vessels were showing their
lights and these is no reason to suppose the least lack of care from
either of their masters. The watch at the Haulbowline lighthouse, seeing
the ships too close for comfort, fired off rockets in warning. Almost
immediately the crash happened. The Retriever, battling against the wind
and tide, and with an unstable cargo, was caught by a huge gust and
swung into the side of the Connemara, penetrating the hull to the
funnel. For a moment the ships locked together, then the Retriever,
having apparently reversed engines just before the impact, swung wide
and the Connemara, terribly ripped from the bow on the port side to
amidships, sank within minutes, the boilers exploding when the sea
entered the engine room. The Retriever, with her bows stove in, took
about twenty minutes to perish. Its boilers also blew up on contact with
the sea and she sank about 200 yards from the Connemara. In all, 97
people died. Twenty one year old James Boyle, who was the only
non-swimmer among the crew of the Retriever, and who had been below deck
when the collision happened, was lucky to survive, clinging precariously
to an upturned boat and avoiding being dashed against the rocks. William
Hanna, the son of a farmer at Cranfield, finally pulled him ashore after
about half an hour in the raging seas.
Alerted by the rockets, people from Cranfield to
Kilkeel flocked to the beaches but such were the condition of the wind
and the sea that there was nothing anyone could do but keep vigil in the
vain hope that they might be able to help some struggling survivors from
the surf. Had it not been for that vigil, James Boyle might have
perished within reach of safety.
An odd feature of the disaster was that news of it did not reach
Greenore (less than three miles away) until 9:30 the following morning
as the lighthouse keeper signalled to the Co Down coast.
The Survivor's Story
Boyle
was taken to Hanna's house and cared for until his family arrived from
Warrenpoint to take him home. His story, which he refused to discuss
life until interviewed as an elderly man for television, was harrowing
in the extreme. As he recalled it, the Retriever was steaming towards
the leading lights that mark the entrance to the channel. Half a mile
away, between the lighthouse and Greenore, the Connemara could be seen
ploughing steadily along. Both ships showed lights and were on the
proper course.
"Just as I thought the two ships were about to
pass, I went down into the cabin to attend to the fire. The
Retriever's whistle sounded three times and, suspecting that something
out of the ordinary had happened, I rushed up the stairway. Before I
reached the deck there was a collision, and our ship shivered from
stem to stern.
Contrary to what one might suspect, there was no
panic or confusion on the Retriever. Captain O'Neill, who had been on
the bridge all afternoon, gave the order, in a clear firm voice, for the
crew to take to the boats. Boyle, William Clugson, and Joe Donnan
immediately went to get one of the two available boats ready for
launching. They were joined by Joe O'Neill. Joe Donnan went below for
lifebelts and advised them to remove their seaboots. Boyle continued,
"That was the last I saw of him, although I
heard his voice a few minutes later crying 'Cut her away, cut her
away.' The Retriever took a heavy lift to starboard, swinging the boat
well out from the side. I was holding on to a rope ready to jump into
her. It was then that I heard Donnan shout, and I cut her away,
springing in at the same time. I don't know what became of the others.
I drifted away clear of the steamer, which had parted from the
Connemara after the collision. The mail boat sank in about seven or
eight minutes. I heard no shouts from her, and cannot tell you what
happened aboard her, but just before she went under she was very low
in the water, and she seemed to be on fire."
The Retriever listed more and more and eventually
went to the bottom but young Boyle's troubles had only begun. His boat,
tossed about for half an hour or so, was capsized by a mountainous wave.
Boyle clung to the keel and drifted towards the shore. Another huge wave
swept him and the boat out to sea again but righted the boat at the same
time and he was able to climb aboard once more. This happened a second
time. Eventually, on reaching the surf the boat capsised for the third
time and exhaused to the point of helplessness, Boyle thought that his
end had come. However, when he felt the sand under his feet he started
to crawl through the surf where William Hanna, with Tom Crutchley, found
him and carried him to Hanna's house, half a mile from the shore, where
he was cared for until his family arrived to take him home to
Warrenpoint.
The Aftermath
By morning, the shoreline was littered with wreckage,
the carcases of animals and the bodies of the passengers and crew of the
ships. On the first day 58 bodies were found. By Sunday afternoon a
number had been identified. Among them was James Curran. His body was
taken back to Rostrevor where he was buried in Kilbroney Graveyard on
Tuesday 7 November.
For many days bodies of people and animals were
washed up along the coastline from Cranfield to Kilkeel. Some took weeks
to arrive on land. The scenes of grief and dispair as people identified
their loved ones were harrowing in the extreme. The bodies of the dead
passengers and crew were temporarily stored in barns and people's
houses, those identified being taken home by their families. Some were
never identified and were buried in Kilkeel. A number of appeals were
made for financial assistance to the bereaved families and Trust Funds
established.
The inquest was held on 6 November in Kilkeel, the
Coroner and members of the Jury journeying to the scene of the tragedy
to view the wreckage and the bodies that had been collected. James Boyle
gave his evidence, on the lines outlined above, breaking down several
times as he recounted the events of that terrible night, only two days
before. The verdict was death by drowning caused by the collision of the
ships.
It was the worst tragedy ever to hit the County Down
Coast.
James Boyle lived on in Warrenpoint for another 50
years - he died on 19 April 1967.
On 3 November 1981 the pupils of Kilkeel High School
erected this stone in Kilkeel Graveyard in memory of the victims of the
tragedy.
Footnote: It was reported
that the ghost ship "Lord
Blaney" had been seen some days before the tragedy.
