A visit from a Titanic survivor's daughter

We had a special visitor at the Maritime Museum - 91 year old Ellen Jones is the daughter of Titanic crewman Thomas Jones. She came in to the museum to see our exhibition Titanic and Liverpool: the untold story and look at a postcard in the Archives Centre sent by her father to her mother Clara.

Able seaman Thomas Jones was born in Anglesey and was living in Liverpool when he signed on for Titanic’s maiden voyage. He was put in charge of lifeboat number 8 which had been ordered away carrying only 27 people, as other passengers had chosen to remain on Titanic believing it would not sink. Jones and a few others in the boat wanted to return to pick up other survivors, but they were overruled by the rest of the people in boat number 8.

One of the people in boat 8 who wanted to go back with Jones for other survivors was the Countess of Rothes, who later sent him a silver watch. Jones and the Countess continued to write to each other until her death in 1956. As a child Ellen said that she thought that this was nothing out of the ordinary and that “everyone knew a Countess!”

Ellen met with Dawn Littler and Ian Murphy from the Maritime Museum and spoke to them about her father, who is featured in the museum’s exhibition. She said that Thomas Jones continued to work at sea and in later life was stationed on the light ship in Liverpool Bay. Thomas Jones died in 1972.

Image: Dawn Littler, Ellen Jones and Ian Murphy in the Archives Centre