“It was a dirty and horrible job”: the actors Paul and Stephen McGann reveal how their great uncle survived Titanic | The Titanic
Clarifying an inverted raft in the dangerous and frozen waters of the North Atlantic, Jimmy McGann was witnessed with the horror of the sinking of the Titanic of 1912. He was one of his coal cutters covered with soot, worker of burning heat, shooting coal in furnaces that fueled the powerful ship.
Jimmy remained on board with the captain until the last moments of the ship and, although survived the most famous maritime disaster in history, he died a few years later from pneumonia.
Now two of his great -grandchildren, the Liverpudian actors Paul and Stephen McGann, will tell his story in a BBC podcast series, Titanic: Ship of Dreamswhich starts on April 8.
Paul hosts the podcasts, while his brother contributes, having carried out in -depth research on their family history. Paul, who recited Withnail and me and as an eighth incarnation of the doctor in Doctor WhoHe said the brothers wanted to show which men like Jimmy endured.
“Reveals the conditions of the same people who guided the ship, who led the activity, without which nothing of these would have worked,” he told the Observer. “The work of these particular men … it was crucial.”
The McGanns believe that Jimmy’s work on Titanic had an impact on his health. Beyond his “dirty, horrible” working conditions, Jimmy was hospitalized by freezing after spending six hours drift when the ship sinked until it was saved. He died in 1918, at the age of only 36.
Jimmy was one of the men of the working class that constituted the “black band” of the ship, the so -called because their faces were covered with soot and coal. Most were Irish Catholics whose families had escaped from the famine of potatoes, just to find themselves living in poverty by grinding the Liverpool’s slums.
Stephen Mcgann, who played dr. Turner in BBC’s successful dramatic series Call the midwifehe said to Observer: “This man and his brother (our grandfather), grew up in streets that were called the worst of the empire … so dirty and sick. These same people, who had been avoided by the local company, were suddenly incredibly precious for commercial shipments because they literally fed the ships.”
He added: “(it was) a dirty and horrible job, almost like the minister of coal on acid, because you probably are illness in the lungs with the coal you are taking on.”
An aunt told Stephen of “Titanic Mcgann”, but he had no detail and no one else in the family could confirm that he was actually on board. Years later, Stephen found a mention of a “James McGann” in the book of Memoirs of Colhibald Gracie, one of the surviving companions, who wrote of “The Strike of the Terror-Collen and the terrible ends for the breath of those in the last drowned outlets”.
Further research led Stephen to the relationships in the US newspapers of Jimmy’s same testimony, in which he had described in a moving way that he was with the captain of the Titanic, Edward Smith, while the water reached his knees: “I was standing next to him … it seemed that he could try to keep the tears while thinking about the ship done”, Jimmy wrote.
“I felt very much like crying myself as I looked at him. Suddenly he shouted:” Well guys, you did your duty and did it well. I don’t ask for more than you. He freed you. I know the rule of the sea. He is every man for himself, and God bless you.
The ship sank on his inaugural journey from Southampton to New York after hitting an iceberg about 370 miles south of Terranova, killing over 1,500 passengers and crew members.
Jimmy arrived on the boat bridge when the ship’s arc was already completely immersed and all the main lifeboats had long started. However, there were still four “folding” lifeboats. He jumped into the water, climbed on an inverted hull, from where he witnessed the last moments of Titanic.
He received £ 5 10s for his titanic work. Stephen expressed amazement that “his wages stop on the night of the disaster because they say:” Well, you weren’t working. “
