Mr. William Edward Osborne was a First Class Steward aboard Titanic who died during the sinking of the liner.
Background[]
William Edward Osborne was born on the 14th April 1879 in Lambeth, London to William Osborne [1849 - 1924] and Barbara Hume [1854 - 1943]. He had eight siblings, Eliza Barbara Osborne [1876 - 1936], Frederick Arthur Osborne [1881 - 1957], Margaret Osborne [1884 - 1960], Hawthorne Hume Osborne [1886 - 1977], Rose Annie Osborne [1889 - 1972], John Thomas Osborne [1891 - 1937], Harry Nelson Osborne [1894 - 1964] and Eleanor Gladys Osborne [1897 - 1936].
His family was a seafaring one, as his father had served as a seaman in the Royal Navy, but by the time of William's birth, he had become a gardener. The first job William got was a grocer's assistant working at a shop on 9 Cromwell Road, Reigate, Surrey (as of the 1881 census records being taken).
Titanic[]
William had signed on to a position as a First Class Steward on Titanic on the 6th April 1912 after previously being stationed on the RMS Olympic. At this time, he lived at 7 Hewitts Road in Southampton, England.
He boarded Titanic at Southampton on the 10th of April and continued on into the North Atlantic. On the 14th of April, he celebrated his 33rd birthday, but later that night Titanic struck an iceberg and began to sink. His actions during the sinking are not known, but he unfortunately died during the disaster and his body, if recovered, was never identified.