William Dale, 31, was an Irish-Canadian civil engineer living in Toronto. traveling aboard Lusitania with Albert Thompson, who was reportedly an invalid. Both men lived in Toronto and were lost in the Lusitania sinking. Dale’s body was either not recovered or not identified.
Dale’s last known address in Toronto was, 1 Moss Park Place. He was an assistant engineer in the sewer branch of the Toronto Works Department. He took a leave of absence to visit his parents in Tullylinkisay, County Londonderry (now County Derry), Ireland. Dale was prominent in in the men’s brotherhood of the Cook’s Presbyterian Church.
Dale was returning to Ireland aboard Lusitania to see a sister who was ill. During the sinking, he may have been trying to save his friend Albert, who was an invalid. Dale’s friends and colleagues remembered him as “a man of the kindest and most generous disposition” and a man “in the forefront of his profession in Canada”.
Taken from an Irish newspaper of that time period:
| 6 August 1915 The Lusitania — Mr. William Dale, Civil Engineer, Toronto, a native of Tullylinkisay, is among the victims of the Lusitania. He was a brother of Mr. Thomas Dale, owner of Dale Mills, Tullylinkisay, and of Edward Dale, inspector of National Schools, Balina. Accompanied by an invalid friend, Mr. Thompson, who is also among the missing, Mr. Dale was coming home on a holiday, and preparations to receive him were being made by his brother and two sisters, who are now prostrated with grief may be added that Mr. Dale had arranged to travel by the ill fated Empress of Ireland, when that ship went down, but was prevented. |
The ill-fated Empress of Ireland sank in the St. Lawrence River with a loss of over 1,100 lives on 29 May 1914. The ship had collided with the Norwegian collier Storstad and sank in 14 minutes.
Contributors:
Cliff Barry, UK
Brad Dale
Senan Molony, Ireland
References:
Mid-Ulster Mail, 15 May 1915, pg. 6.
Molony, Senan. Lusitania: An Irish Tragedy, pgs. 29, 74. Mercier Press, 2004.
William Dales’s last known address in Toronto was, 1 Moss Park Place, he was an assistant engineer in the sewer branch of the Toronto Works Department. He has got a leave of absence to visit his parents.
He was prominent in in the men’s brotherhood of the Cook’s Presbyterian Church.