City of Boston (I)

DESCRIPTION: Singer hears a woman mourning for her husband, lost on steamship City of Boston, bound to Liverpool from Halifax. He was "a gallant sailor ... A kind and loving husband" with six children. "Many now in Liverpool with aching hearts like me"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1951 (MUNFLA/Leach)
KEYWORDS: separation travel death drowning wreck children father husband mother wife
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
Jan 28, 1870 - City of Boston bound to Liverpool from New York via Boston and Halifax lost at sea with 207(?) dead (per Northern Shipwrecks Database)
FOUND IN: Canada(Newf)
Roud #18254
RECORDINGS:
Alexander March, "City of Boston" (on MUNFLA/Leach)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "City of Boston (II)" (subject)
NOTES [118 words]: According to Robert C. Parsons, Cape Race: Stories from the Coast that Sank the Titanic, Flanker Press, 2011, pp. 111-113, the City of Boston was a liner belonging to the Inman Line, which named its ships "City of XXX," e.g. City of Boston, City of Philadelphia. Based on the picture on p. 112 of Parsons, she used both sail and steam. No trace was ever found of her; Parsons says that 177 were lost.
There is a footnote. Inman Line ships tended to sail a more northerly route than other liners. Newfoundlanders in 1892 found a "bank" (region of shallow water) about 32 km. ENE of Cape Race, which they thought was formed from the wreck of the City of Boston. But Parsons cites no direct evidence. - RBW
Last updated in version 4.4
File: RcCiBos1

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