BBC Call The Midwife star Stephen McGann has spoken about his family connection to the 'last survivor' of the Titanic disaster – and how he cried when he discovered his great uncle's account of the tragedy.
April 15 2022 marks the 110th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, a tragedy in which over 1,500 people sadly died.
Stephen's uncle Jimmy McGann was one of the 'last survivors' of the Titanic and recalled his great uncle's story in an interview with Liverpool Echo in 2017.
His brother, Doctor Who and Withnail and I actor Paul McGann has also recently narrated an account of personal stories of those aboard the Titanic for a Short History Of podcast by Noisier.
Speaking to Liverpool Echo, Stephen explained that his great uncle Jimmy was a fireman in one of the ship's boiler rooms, but survived the disaster and arrived in New York on the Carpathia after being hospitalised, with Stephen saying he 'cried' when he read his account of the disaster.
"I had no concrete proof about Jimmy until five years ago. I cried when I read his quotes," said Stephen.
"It felt like two members of the McGann family were talking to each other 100 years apart – and he was the first member of our family to make the newspapers."
On his arrival in New York, Jimmy's experiences were noted in an interview with the New York Tribune, which was later printed in the Yorkshire Post on April 23, 1912.
In this interview Jimmy described standing beside Titanic Captain, Edward Smith, who with tears in his eyes said, "Well, boys, you've done your duty, and done it well.
"I ask no more of you. I release you. You know the rule of the sea. It's every man for himself now, and God bless you."
He then recalls jumping from the ship into the freezing water, saying: "Then he [Captain Smith] took one of the two little children who were on the bridge beside him. They were both crying. He held the child, I think it was little girl, under his right arm and jumped into the sea.
"All of us jumped. I jumped right after the captain, but I grabbed the remaining child before I did so."
He and Captain Smith, along with thirty others, are reported to have clung onto a collapsible boat after jumping from the Titanic, before being picked up by the Carpathia.
Jimmy was later treated for frostbite before arriving in New York, but six years later, he died from pneumonia in 1918.
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