People on board

SHARP, Charles Thomas

Charles Thomas Sharp was born in Birmingham in 1874 to Samuel Sharp and his wife Hannah. Samuel was a Coachman who had died before the 1891 census. In that census Hannah was living in Barford Street, Birmingham with three sons and two daughters, all employed. Charles, aged sixteen was a ‘Hardware Factors Apprentice’. In August 1895 he married Mary Emily Lavender, the daughter of an Engineer. By 1901 they were living in Aston and had two sons, Charles and Leslie, and a daughter Doris was born in 1905.

In 1911 the family was living in Balsall Heath and Charles gave his occupation as ‘Order Clerk’. In October 1918 he was described as a Commercial Traveller, employed by Alfred Brown and Co. Manufacturers of Locks and Lock Furniture, of Severn Road, Birmingham. On the 14th of October the Birmingham Daily Post reported that he had been on business in Ireland for about a month and that it was feared that he had been drowned in the sinking of RMS Leinster. A letter had apparently been received from him on the Tuesday from Waterford saying that he intended going to Dublin. A telegram was received by the firm from the St Andrews Hotel in Dublin stating that he sailed by the mailboat on Thursday. Nothing further was heard of him.

It is clear that Charles Sharp did not survive the sinking of the ship, nor was his body found. His Will was finally probated in March 1919. His son Charles served with the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and then the Army Service Corps while his son Leslie served in the Royal Navy.