People on board

BENNISON, William

William Bennison was born in 1897 in Coppull, Chorley, Lancashire to John Richard Bennison and Mary Turner. He was their first child and another son, Henry, was born in 1900. Coppull was a coalmining village with a Bleach Works also and John was a Fitter there. In the 1911 census he gave his occupation as a ‘Motor Driver’ while William, aged fourteen, was a ‘Colliery Labourer’. By then the family was living at Sunny Mount, Birkacre in Coppull and William was working in the Birkacre Colliery.

William Bennison enlisted at Chorley in the 12th (Prince of Wales Royal) Lancers which, after a major reorganisation in 1917, became part of the 1st Reserve Regiment of Cavalry, a training unit based in the Curragh, Co Kildare. He was on his way home on sick leave when he travelled on RMS Leinster on the 10th of October 1918. It was reported in the Lancashire Evening Post on the 19th that his parents had been informed that he had drowned at sea.

His body was recovered and he was buried in Grangegorman Military Cemetery in Dublin. His name is also recorded on the family grave in Coppull Parish Churchyard.