Frederick William Barrett was a Fireman on the Titanic.
*Not to be confused with Leading Stoker Frederick Barrett.
Background[]
Frederick William Barrett was from a family of three children, as he was formed by Thomas Barrett and his wife Ellen. His birth occured in 1879 in Portsmouth. This is also where the wedding took place a year prior, between a man from Poole, Dorset and his love from West Cowes, both Hampshire natives. He was the first and two sisters were conceived later. They were Jessie and Lucy, born in 1880 and 1885 respectively. Before Lucy’s birth, the family had changed location. They were living in Portsea before 1882. Thomas made his money at sea by being a carpenter onboard vessels. Frederick may have had to deal with his father early on since he was gone from their new household in Northam by the year 1891.
Frederick initially worked on land but left the solid ground later before the 1900s. His services were accepted in the Royal Navy in 1897, with him being a stoker in their fleet, shovling coal for at least 6 of their vessels. He later made a chance to civilian liners.
In 1909, Fred married Agnes Louise Maud Prince of Sholing, formerly known as Agnes Kelley, as Fred was not her first husband. Her marriage to her previous partner, Mr Arthur Prince, from Saint Mary's, Southampton, whom she had wed in 1899 was unfortunately cut short by an incident revolving a train while he was at work. He was a dockworker. The man didn’t survive and he left two children behind, Arthur junior and Alice Emma. Frederick’s stepson was from 1901 and his stepdaughter from 1903. Frederick and Agnes expanded their family in Southampton, with Frederick’s first biological son becoming his namesake in 1910. Like his parents, Frederick also had his own pair of twins. 24 March 24, 1912 saw a boy and a girl appear. The girl was named Rosina Mauda and the boy Thomas Samuel. In October, they were purified in the tradition of Saint Mary’s Church, by sprinkling them with water in the Catholic fashion.
Titanic[]
Frederick still did his work at sea and was placed in the role of a Fireman, as he was offically contracted to work on the Titanic in Southampton on the 6th of April. He stayed in Southampton before deployment and he had been on the Cunarder Ausonia just before then. The Titanic left the mainland far behind on the 10th of April. Frederick would work a few daily shifts of shoveling coal in the bunkers down below, in the belly of the ship. Fred was aged 33 at the time.
As Titanic was crossing the North Atlantic Ocean and on route for a faster passage than originaly planned, when, on the night of April 14, her crew had become quite used to the daily routine. This routine would be disturbed by the incident that occured at 23:39 A.M. The weather and the sea were both very calm, flat and quiet, revealing nothing of any sort of trouble lying ahead. Lookout Frederick Fleet therefore could only make out the iceberg from the surroudings when she was right in front of them. The man gave a sign to the bridge and the Officer on watch responded. He told his quartermaster to turn hard to port with the rudder swung to starboard sharply. Then he put the telegraph to full astern. This couldn’t have gone any worse for Titanic, which collided with the iceberg with her broadside instead of her forward bow. The starboard side had gashes all over beneath sea level and the sea could freely enter the ship in 6 compartments. A burst of water came into the ship, well down into the stoker holds as well.
Ship’s designer Thomas Andrews thrashed out on the stance of Titanic at midnight, April 15. The pumps weren’t enough to keep Titanic buoyed up and she had too many leaks. The water would spill over her bulkheads and pull her down by the bow. Thomas Andrews gave Titanic a few hours to live. The Captain, shocked, gathered his sailors to tell them to detach the lifeboats and get them ready.
Frederick’s story of how he had lived through to sinking to eventually meet his maker, can only be guessed. There weren’t lifeboats for everybody and only some of the hundreds of Firemen were saved. Frederick wasn’t on the list of survivors.
Two hours and 40 minutes after the contact with the iceberg, so much water had come over Titanic, that the ocean had dragged her nose down with her stern up diagonally. She split between funnels 3 and 4 and the stern fell back level while the forward section was quickly submerged. As the clocks struck 2:20 A.M, The stern section of Titanic was aborbed by the sea. Her stern was almost vertical as she stood for a few seconds before she eased down into the depths. Many of those who were still onboard before her descent, could only hold out as long as their body could endure in freezing waters. This how most of the 1503 casualties had met a sea grave, including Frederick. A search party arrived days later to identify bodies, but Frederick was not on the list.
After his death[]
On the 22nd of April, Mrs. Barrett stil wasn’t sure whether Frederick was still alive, but she kept hoping. When all was confirmed, the Titanic Relief Fund had to stand by to but Agnes could not receive any compensation for the stepchildren. Her personal tragedy was made even worse when Rosina Maud was no longer with them before she could have her first birthday. They had to say goodbye to their dear daughter.
In 1917, she no longer had to be dependent on them as she had found a new suitor. Wilfred Evans and they created another familytree, having their only child, a son, named after the father in 1918: Wilfred Thomas. Agnes lived on until 1962.