Erin’s Lament, Galway’s Gain - A Titanic Tale

Erin’s Lament, Galway’s Gain - A Titanic Tale

In April 1912, Eugene Patrick Daly, then aged 29, (born 1883), a weaver from Athlone, County Westmeath, Ireland, was travelling to New York City, just one of 113 Irish passengers who unfortunately chose the Titanic to emigrate to the USA. He boarded the Titanic on the 11^th of April, 1912, at Queenstown (ticket number 382651). The ticket cost him £7. 15s, or almost 6 months pay for a working man.

It has been confirmed in eye witness accounts of the Titanic’s call to Cobh, that Daly played "Erin's Lament", "A Nation Once Again", "Boolavogue" and other well known nationalist tunes on his uilleann (elbow) pipes (a traditional Irish instrument) for his fellow steerage passengers, as America, one of the two tenders to the Titanic steamed away from Queenstown harbour, bound for the gleaming liner that lay at anchor far out in Cork harbour, near Roches Point. It was both a heartening and a poignant moment listening to those traditional airs as the passengers left Ireland, most of them for the last time.

Amazingly Daly survived the Titanic’s tragic sinking by clinging to an upturned collapsible lifeboat (Collapsible 2). He credited his survival to his heavy overcoat. Though frost-bitten and near death, he was rescued, but he lost his precious uileann pipes, which he claimed he'd played as the ship sank, saying he'd never heard the orchestra play. He would later file a claim against the White Star Line’ for $50 for their loss. Similar pipes, possibly Eugene Daly's, were recently salvaged from the Titanic wreck and are now in the Titanic Museum collection.

Eugene Daly got married in America to Lil Caulfield from Co. Mayo, and whether he was homesick or inspired by the Irish Free State, he returned to Ireland in 1921. He suffered terribly from paranoia on the return ship journey, so much so that his wife paid a crew-member to sit with him at night while the others slept and he vowed never again to set foot aboard a ship once they arrived home. 

With his new wife he moved to Galway where he found work in the Galway Woolen Mills and later in Palmers Mill, now the Bridge mill, which was then a busy flour mill. He lived with his wife and daughter, (born in 1925) Mary Kate, but known as Marion, at 7 St. Johns Terrace in Galway and was a popular musician in the city, playing pipes and flute in ceili bands around the city.

In 1961, after his wife had died, and after he'd retired from the now obsolete flour mill, he emigrated one last time to the USA, but this time by plane, to Washington Heights in New York, to live out his last days there with his only child, his now married daughter Marion Joyce. 

Marion had emigrated some ten years earlier with her husband, a locally renowned tenor, John Joyce. He worked in Manhattan and Marion looked after her growing family, where she also was superintendent of the building they lived in. While living with his daughter, Eugene was a regular mass-goer, a volunteer at the church and a doting grand-father to his grand-children. He was tight-lipped about his near-death experience. He died there age 82, in 1965. 

His daughter and her husband later moved to Branson Missouri, to be near their youngest son, who was serving as a police officer there. They are buried in Branson.

To his credit, Eugene testified at the Titanic Hearings in New York and his description of the sinking, the inadequate lifeboats and especially his eye witness testimony of a ship’s officer shooting third class passengers who were trying to board a lifeboat has been relied on heavily by historians of the Titanic and is the stuff of film legend now. 

His credible eye witness testimony of the chaotic scenes and passenger discrimination onboard Titanic was instrumental in the passing of new Lifeboat laws for passenger ships.  He helped save many lives in subsequent ship wrecks because of the new Lifeboat laws.

His account of the tragedy was used as research in many movies and stories about the great liner. He was interviewed by Walter Lord while he was writing his book on Titanic, 'A night to remember', which was later in 1958 made into the famous movie of the same name. That book and movie informed the makers of the modern movie 'Titanic'. 

Initially Eugene was unique amongst survivors in his willingness to recount the story whenever asked, as most other survivors, no doubt suffering from post-traumatic shock, or grief, rarely ever uttered a word on their brush with death when Titanic sank. Later as he grew older, he stopped talking about Titanic entirely, so painful was the memory.

Eugene Daly died on 30 October 1965 aged 82. He is buried in St. Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx

I tell the stories of the Irish Titanic passengers from Galway on my Walking Tours of Galway. I also recount Eugene's story on my Fireside Tales, in O'Connors bar in Salthill. For more information check out http://www.galwaywalks.com 

Thanks for reading. Brian Nolan

galwaywalks@gmail.com 

086-3273560