The Basin Record Newsletter Vol.2 Issue 4

Basin Biography The political discussion of this act of treachery would drag on for some time. The German Ambassador conveyed the official message that this could not have been accomplished by a German U-boat. Reuters News Agency reported that “according to information in competent quarters it appears …. to be as good as excluded that a German submarine can be held responsible for sinking the Hesperian. Firstly, in view of the distribution of submarines in accordance with war plans, no German submarine was in the sea district on September 4 in which the Hesperian was sunk. Secondly – according to description received from English sources, the explosion was of such a kind that it must be inferred from the effects that it was caused by a mine rather than a torpedo.” Official sourceswent on to say that a free-floatingmine, non-German, had washed up on the Irish coast in the same area. The denials continued, in an attempt to keep the United States from joining with the Allied forces against Germany. Thirty-two lives were lost during the sinking of the Hesperian. Most of these casualties occurred during the process of launching the lifeboats. According to reports the discipline was perfect in getting passengers and crew into the lifeboats. One of the boats did, however, jam in its blocks. According to Canadian bugler A. Royle the boat was left hanging in mid- air, bow up and stern down. All of those in this lifeboat were thrown into the sea. Bessie Williamson’s firsthand account states “I’m afraid most people were panic-stricken and made a big rush for the boats. Fortunately for me I was near a boat when the crash took place and assisted by my friend I got into this at once. I Bessie Lafleur think I was about the first to get into the boat. This luck stuck to me throughout, for I was in the first boat to get picked up by the steamer Empress, which came out from Queenstown to rescue us.” Undaunted by this life-threatening experience, Miss Williamson was soon on board another steamer bound for Montreal. She disembarked from the train in Cranbrook on October 1st, 1915 with memories to last a lifetime. According to a later interview in The Cranbrook Courier she said that “… most especially at this time of year, I am flooded with phone calls asking me if I had been a passenger on the ill fated White Star liner, the Titanic, which was stabbed by an iceberg…. I am happy to answer in the negative.” In the same interview she states that “the picture of the ill fated ship [Hesperian, on this page] going down was sent to me about six weeks following my arrival here, by an officer of the R[oyal] N[avy] who turned over his cabin to myself and my lady friend on the rescue ship.” Bessie Williamson’s life is another of the stories that bring the larger outside events home to us in the Columbia Basin. The sinking of the Hesperian was key to the decision of the United States to enter WW I against Germany. Mrs. Isabella (Williamson) Lafleur, universally known as “Bessie”, immigrated from Saintfield, County Down in Northern Ireland, in 1915 during the height of WorldWar I (see Hesperian story in this issue for details). She was a determined and positive young woman who, undeterred by torpedoes and death at sea, proceeded to cross the Atlantic and travel to Cranbrook, B.C. Her older sister, Mrs. R.W. Edmondson, was resident there. Arriving October 3, 1915, Bessie quickly secured employment with the CPR as a billing clerk in the Cranbrook freight shed. This perhaps is where she met Charles Lafleur, a brakeman with the same company. The two were married after a whirlwind courtship on December 9th, 1915. A son, Stephen Charles Lafleur, followed in 1917, the same year that Charles was promoted to conductor. When the billing clerk position was suspended Bessie moved to an old Cranbrook firm, Parks Hardware, as a stenographer. Very active in both the arts community and the Knox Presbyterian Church, Bessie was known everywhere in the small Cranbrook of the first half of the 20th century. After Charles passed away in 1957 Bessie made a radical change and, in August 1959, joined The Courier newspaper as their social reporter. She reported the local news, showers, parties and weddings in full detail. “For tradition, the bride wore her mother’s medal on a gold chain and for her gown, she chose peau de soi with chiffon overlay.” Continued from page 1 0019.0047 She even reported hard news from time-to- time, with a byline on stories such as the 1973 Haney, B.C., fire where a former Cranbrook man named Robert Wills received a heroism award. Bessie continued to report on the growing Cranbrook social scene until a corporate reorganization did away with The Courier in September of 1973. On February 7, 1978, at the age of 86, Bessie Lafleur passed away, three days beforeacommunitybanquetwas tobeheld in her honour. Her determination and courage, which got her through troublesome times, also assisted her in compiling the “gossip” of history which helps the researcher today to fill in the blanks of yesterday.