Irish Titanic victim to be given memorial headstone

By Michael Norby

A body pulled from the ocean is placed on the foredeck of the Mackay-Bennett. The ship found the remains of Catherine Buckley approx. one week after Titanic sank.

RMS Titanic carried over 1,500 people to their deaths. One of the victims, Catherine Buckley, will be remembered at a graveside ceremony in May.

Of the 1,513 people who perished in the frigid waters of the North Atlantic in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912, only 330 bodies were recovered for burial. The rest, victims of the sinking of RMS Titanic, either plunged to the ocean floor with the doomed vessel or simply floated south, away from the reaches of recovery ships.

For weeks after the disaster, merchant naval seamen reported sightings of deceased bodies floating miles away from the location of the disaster – faceless victims whose remains would eventually decompose and return to nature. In contrast to the ghastly, drawn out fate of their lifeless bodies, the victims died very quickly after entering the water.

“The temperature of the North Atlantic at that time was so cold that anyone who was in the water could not have survived for more than 15 minutes,” said Bob Bracken, trustee and treasurer of the Titanic International Society. “Many victims didn’t drown and most of them had life preservers on. They died of hypothermia."

A total of 78 Irish natives died in the tragedy. Of that number, only one third-class passenger was brought ashore for burial. The rest were left to the Atlantic. Catherine “Kate” Buckley was just 22-years-old when she skipped excitedly across the gangway to board Titanic in Queenstown, now known as Cobh, Ireland.

“Kate was a domestic from Cork and was just another young immigrant girl coming from Ireland,” said Bracken “Like many others, she left Ireland to better herself and boarded Titanic to begin an adventure.”

The mighty, “unsinkable” ship would surely bring her safely to the eastern shores of the United States, to a brand new, more prosperous existence. Buckley’s half-sister, Margaret, lived in West Roxbury, Mass. and had sent money to Cork to pay for her sister's passage to the America – much to the annoyance of the father they shared, and especially of the mother they didn’t.

“Margaret was the only child by a first marriage,” explained Bracken. “Her mother died in child birth and, when the father remarried, his new wife didn’t take kindly to Margaret and shuffled her off to a convent and then onwards to America.”

Catherine's remains found

Tragically, at 2:20 a.m. on April 15, Catherine entered the water. The lifeboats were gone, no help was imminent and the young Irish girl probably knew that she would die shortly after her ordeal began.

Approximately one week after Titanic sank, the cable ship Mackay-Bennett, one of four vessels chartered by White Star Line to recover bodies, found Kate’s remains floating aimlessly in the vast ocean. They estimated that she was 18-years-old.

According to the ship’s log Catherine was wearing a long blue overcoat, a blue serge jacket and skirt, a white blouse, blue corsets and grey knickers. She possessed 10 shillings in silver, one pound in gold, and had $5 in her purse. A satchel with her third class ticket (#329944) was also found around her body.

Catherine's remains were shipped to Nova Scotia and her sister, desperate for news, was notified of her death.

Most of the bodies that were brought ashore were buried in Nova Scotia, Canada. Margaret, however, requested that her young half sister’s remains be transported for burial to Boston. After a short ceremony, Catherine “Kate” Buckley was buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery in West Roxbury.

In December of that same year, Margaret traveled to Cork to help console her father but was met at the doorstep by her step mother who called her a murderer and slammed the door in her face. Margaret would never see or speak to her father again.

West Roxbury Memorial

Now, 98 years later, the Titanic International Society along with the descendants of Margaret, will unveil a brand new memorial head stone at the grave of Kate Buckley – commemorating Kate’s tragic fate aboard the most talked about maritime disaster in history.

Thomas Carrigg and Sons Monument Company in West Roxbury donated the new marker and St. Joseph’s Cemetery waived the preparation and placement fees for the memorial.

To the descendants of Margaret Buckley, however, the ceremony is more than a tribute to Kate and the victims of Titanic. It has a deeper, more personal meaning.

“I think that it is finding closure for an ancestor,” Susan Strong-Dowd, the wife of Margaret’s grandson told The Irish Emigrant. “The marking of the grave and the whole ceremony is a way of saying to the ancestors that ‘we know what happened.' It's a way for all of us to finally say ‘Margaret, this was not your fault.’ This is a wonderful way to do that.”

The Titanic International Society, in cooperation with the cemetery, Thomas Carrigg & Sons Monument Co. in West Roxbury, and members of the Buckley family, will unveil the grave marker at a 3:30 p.m. ceremony at St. Joseph's Cemetery, West Roxbury, on Saturday, May 22.

The general public is encouraged to attend the ceremony. Those needing additional information can visit www.titanicinternationalsociety.org or contact Bob Bracken at 201-447-4594.