Maria Mathilda Backström
Maria Mathilda Backström was a passenger on Titanic.
Background[]
Maria Mathilda Gustafsdotter was born in Kejtala, Ruotsinpyhtää, Finland on July 28, 1878. Her parents were Karl Gustafsson and Maria Lovisa Gustafsson. Her father was a farmer. Maria was often addressed as ‘Mathilda’.
Maria had many siblings. Emilia Sofia was the first child to be born, in 1870. The second child was Maria’s namesake, born in 1871, but as a baby. she died the same day. Maria was named after her, following the birth of Karl Viktor in 1872 and Anders Vilhelm in 1875. The next girl was Kristina in 1880 but she survived only for 2 years, dieing in 1883. In June that year, the family was blessed with another son named Johan Birger, Three more children followed: Elin Kristina in 1885, Fredrik Hjalmar in 1892 and Erna Elise in 1900.
Her brother Anders left Finland in 1906 to find his future in America. After some time he had come back. He was in Finland in 1911 when she married a childhood friend, named Karl Alfred Backström. Their wedding was on September 24.
In 1912, Maria was 6 months pregnant, when she, her husband Karl would undertake a big move with two of Maria’s brothers: Anders and Johan Birger. Karl was presented with a chance for employment in the United States at a construction site and he put the same proposal forward to the two Gustafssons. They all agreed and set out on a journey to find themselves a ship for crossing the Atlantic Ocean.
On April 3, she and her company were on the SS Polaris, a ship that carried many Finnish emigrants. Lots of them would end up at the Titanic later. The Polaris left from Hankö in Finland . That same day,she gave an update on her travels and wrote a letter home, stating it was all plain sailing so far. Polaris dropped her anchor at Copenhagen before moving on to Hull in England, where she dropped off the Finns on April 7. From there, they made their way to Southampton, likely by train.
Titanic[]
In Southampton, the 4 Finns were aboard the Titanic in Third Class as she left port after noon on April 10th. Mathilda was 33 years old.
On April 14, Titanic had developed good speed and everything went well, right up until that night, on the moment that the ship encountered something she was warned for multiple times: an iceberg. It was seemingly not visible to the lookouts until it was less than half a mile away. The ship’s engines were reversed and the rudder was turned hard to starboard but it was futile. She hit the big mass on her starboard side. The iceberg had done enough damage to cause a calamity. The tiny gaps in some of the plates affected her seaworthiness. Water was now gushing through onto the lowest deck.
On April 15, the awful truth was unavoidable, the ship’s best defense was no match for the inflow of sea water. The ship was doomed to sink, as Thomas Andrews calculated. The captain wasted no time and ordered his men to start preparing the boats, as to evaucuate passengers of the ship, women and children first.
Maria was not willing to get on any lifeboat, but eventually Karl stepped up to overcome her strong wish to stay with him. He guided her, or rather pushed her, maybe under the false premise of taking another boat later, safely to Collapsible D. This way, she survived the disaster, albeit with not enough warm clothes on, so she didn’t feel too well in the cold.
The three men in her company would probably have stayed behind and weren’t saved. They became victims in this big maritime disaster as Titanic slipped beneath the waveless ocean at 2:20 A.M. Of the bodies, only her brother Anders’ was found. It was marked number #98. He recieved a sea burial.
After the sinking[]
The Carpathia, a Cunard Liner that was on her way to Gibraltar, had come to the resuce of Titanic but was too far away to help the sinking ship. She was at the scene were Titanic had spit out all the wreckage around 4:00 A.M, spending most of the morning gathering the survivors and lifeboats of the unfotrunate vessel. After she was done, she set course for New York, where she arrived at April 18.
After disembarkment Maria was staying in the Union League Home together with fellow Finnish Titanic passenger Erna Andersson.
She didn’t feel like staying in America now that she lost the people that were most close to her. She was given good money for her circumstances. $300 came from the volunteers and immigrant care-takers in New York, $100 was donated by the English Charity Funds. She also recieved new clothes. With all that, she booked passge for a ship to take her to Finland once more.
White Star Line was kind enough to arrange the voyage and the financial part of it. The Urania brought her back home. She arrived on May 9. She was later paid £325 for the loss of her husband.
Later life[]
On June 29, she gave birth to her daughter, which she named Alfhid Maria Forss.
Maria Mathilda Backström continued to live life in her native town Kejtala where she passed away on June 30, 1947 at the age of 68. Her grave is at Ahvenkosken Hautausmaa in Loviisa.