People on board

MULHOLLAND, George William

George William Mulholland was born on the 15th of November 1892 in Harrogate, Yorkshire to William Mulholland and Emma Louisa Barwick. He was the eldest of their three sons. William, born in Edinburgh, was a ‘Coach Painter’ and in the 1911 census George, then aged eighteen, was an ‘Apprentice Coach Trimmer’. The family lived at Ashfield Terrace, moving to Duchy Grove in the late 1920s. Alexander was born in 1895 and Donald in 1913.

The Hull Daily Mail reported that George Mulholland enlisted in the army in February 1915, having been a prominent member of the Y.M.C.A. in Harrogate. The military records for his father, William, have been found which show that he enlisted in the West Yorkshire Regiment in July 1915 in a Territorial Force Attestation. He was with the 3/6th, a home reserve battalion, where he was quickly promoted to Corporal and then Sergeant by the end of July. He was transferred to the Labour Corps in 1917 and then to the 360 Reserve Employment Company and finally to the Army Reserve. He was discharged in August 1919.

Meanwhile Alexander had also enlisted in the West Yorkshire Regiment and was killed in action with the 10th Battalion in France in July 1916. The original records for George Mulholland have not been found but the transcriptions state that in October 1918 he was with the 2/1st Yorkshire Hussars in Ireland, a training and reserve unit. It is not known if he had enlisted in 1915 in this regiment. What is known is that he married Elizabeth Dewse on the 3rd of August 1918 and was returning home from Ireland on leave when he travelled on the 10th of October on RMS Leinster. He did not survive the sinking but his body was recovered and he was buried in Grangegorman Military Cemetery in Dublin.

Both George William and Alexander Mulholland are named on the Harrogate War Memorial. Elizabeth Mulholland née Dewse remarried in 1920, Donald Mulholland died suddenly in 1937 aged twenty-four, while William and Emily Mulholland were still together in Harrogate in the 1939 Register.