William McCarthy was an Able Seaman on Titanic.
Background[]
William McCarthy was an Irishman that lived in Cork, Cork County, where he grew up since September 7, 1863. His father was John McCarthy and his mother was Catherine Cashman. John was posted as a coastguard. Wiliam was their first-born. May was his sister, brought forward in 1867. Their second son was Henry Thomas, came into sight in 1868. In 1869, Julia surfaced, with Alfred further expanding the family in 1870 and Catherine was their last, in 1871.
By 1901, his father was no longer alive, as well as his brother Henry Thomas. That same time, William seems to have abandoned the elderly house and that could be attestation that he was doing work on the blue highway, which he was still doing in 1911. In the meantime, he had gotten himself a wife, whose background information is minimal, with only ‘Nora’ given as her first name. There’s no indication if they had any off-spring.
Titanic[]
McCarthy was 47 years old at the time he was hired as Able Seaman for the Titanic, on the 6th of April, in Southampton. Titanic’s short-lived adventure began on the 10th. Soon, Southampton was a speck on the horizon behind them.
On April 14, Titanic had advanced well into her passage. It was late in the night, the lookouts had a bird’s eye view in their crow’s nest. It’s still inexplicable how those two men missed the iceberg until it could not be evaded anymore. The bridge received the message of the sighting via the telephone, upon which First Officer Murdoch rushed to the telegraph to select ‘Full Astern’ after he had given the order ‘Hard to Starboard’ to Quartermaster Hichens at the wheel. Titanic responded sluggish on the imput of the wheel. Therefore, her starboard side had come into contact with the iceberg, underneath the water line. The ice ripped through her structure. A torrential stream of water forced itself through small rifts in her hull.
With the carpenter and designer Thomas Andrews, Captain Smith had sounded the ship and taken a look at the flooding areas from above. With the information at hand, Andrews came to a verdict on the bridge, around midnight on April 15. Titanic was fatally wounded; in 2 hours later she would disappear below the surface, according to his calculations. With this bad news, Smith didn’t wait and send for his officers and sailor, who were given the task of arranging the ready-making of the lifeboats.
As an Able Seaman, William must have been called upon as well at that moment.
William could call himself a rescuee much later, because he was chosen to crew lifeboat 4, which was launched late in the night after hanging at A-Deck for a long time. In this boat was also Madeleine Astor. The men placed to give the orders was Quartermaster Walter John Perkis. At 1:50 A.M, lifeboat 4 finally was hauled down to the sea level, which was less than 3 feet away.
One of the First Class passengers in boat 4, Virginia Estelle Clark, was impressed with the way that McCarthy went about his business. This boat after all was well-known for securing a lot of other people, with her own load being far from the limit she could take. Encouraged by many of her passengers, boat 4 set about collecting many from the water, mostly crew, as well as taking over some of the men of Collapsible B.
At 2:20 A.M, Titanic made her way to her final destination.
After the sinking[]
William and the others could thank their lucky stars when a light had appeared. This was the RMS Carpathia, that had responded as soon as Titanic had called her for help. She was at too large a distance to come in time to save everyone, but around four o'clock in the morning, the ship arrived at the scene of the disaster and brought the survivors onboard and then to the destiation that Titanic had been due until her terrible fate had overcome her: New York, from were Carpathia had actually started her trip to Europe. Carpathia was there in the evening of April 18.
William disembarked and with the Lapland, he made his way back to England. The Inquiries that were held on both sides of the ocean didn’t ask for his contribution into the investigations into the disaster.
Later life[]
The man had not turned his back to the sea and went on to do more seafaring throughout the First World War. After an uncertain amount of years, he had retreated back to solid ground to do other professions, still being a local Corkian. As a passion, he enjoyed crafting trinkets in the shape of an anchor.
A heart stoppage made an end to his life while situated in Cork District Hospital. He was 69 years old at the time of his death, on Thursday 14th January 1932. His wife had already left earth before him.
His resting place can be found at Inch churchyard, Inch, County Cork.