SUDDEN DEATH

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 154, 28 December 1936, Page 5

SUDDEN DEATH

SIR EDGAR BRITTEN

Two hours before he was to have taken the Queen Mary out of Southampton on her voyage to New York Sir Edgar Britten, her commander, Commodore of the Cunard-White Star fleet, was found lying' unconscious on the floor of his cabin, says the "Daily Telegraph." Five hours later, while the Queen Mary was crossing the Channel to Cherbourg, he died in a Southampton nursing home to which he had been taken. He was sixty-one. No official announcement was made until after dinner, when notices were posted outside the purser's office and in the smoking-rooms. Few passengers were aware of the tragedy until the liner had left Cherbourg and was heading out into the Atlantic. One of the ship's officers said: "It is all very sad. We are flying our flags at half-mast, and I hear that cables have been sent to Lady Britten and her daughter, and to the CunardWhite Star Company, expressing the grief of the acting commander, Captain Peel,, and the ship's. company. "There will probably be a memorial service on board for the officers and crew, which the passengers may attend if they choose." ABOUT TO DRESS. Sir Edgar had been about to dress at 7 a.m., in readiness to take his place on the-bridge, when he had a stroke. His personal steward entered the cabin and found him lying on the floor, still dressed in his pyjamas. He was barely conscious as he was carried down the covered gangway on a stretcher and lifted into the, ambulance, to be taken to a nursing home. Captain R. V. Peel, who commanded the Queen Mary on her previous voyage while Sir Edgar was off duty, was hastily summoned from.his home in Hursley Road,. Chandler's Ford, about six miles from Southampton, to take over the command of the liner within an hour. He boarded the ship half an hour before 9 a.m., her scheduled time for departure, and she sailed on time. In an official tribute to Sir Edgar's work by the Cunard-White Star Line it is stated: ''It bad been the hope of the directors and management- of the Cunard-White St'ar.rthat Sir Edgar, would have remained in command of the Queen Mary until the time arrived'for his retirement under the age limit, which would have been in the early summer of .next year. "This was not to be, and the chairman and other officials of the company which he has so well and truly served are left to mourn the great loss of a trusted colleague and a dear friend."