Military service
Burial/memorial information
Her maiden name is Hannah Russell Crawford.
Daughter of John Russell Crawford and Marion McMillan, of Glasgow, Scotland. Wife of James Baird. Mother of Marion, Nellie and Nancy Baird and adoptive mother of the three children from her husband's first marriage.
On 4 September 1939, at 19:39, the Athenia was torpedoed by the U-30 250 miles (402 km) west of Inishtrahull, Ireland. The submarine surfaced and fired twice at the liner, which was carrying 1,103 civilians and 315 crew members. The lifeboat, with Hannah Baird on board, collided with the propeller of the MS Knute Nelson, which had come to the rescue of the shipwrecked crew. The collision killed 52 women, including Hannah Baird, and three sailors. The attack cost the lives of 112 people.
Stewardess Baird, as well as being commemorated on the Halifax Memorial, is also commemorated on a memorial plaque affixed to a new eight sided old-fashioned bandstand in Veteran's Park in Langford, British Columbia. The plaque was unveiled by ex-merchant mariner Tom Osborne and Barbara Duncan on May 19, 2002 as a bugler sounded Reveille. It is believed to be the first war memorial anywhere in the world dedicated to women merchant mariners who died at their posts in the two world wars.
Digital gallery of Stewardess Hannah Baird
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Newspaper clipping
Submitted for the project Operation Picture Me -
Memorial Plaque
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Ribbon Cutting Ceremony
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Newspaper clipping
Submitted for the project Operation Picture Me
Digital gallery of
Stewardess Hannah Baird
Digital gallery of
Stewardess Hannah Baird
Digital gallery of
Stewardess Hannah Baird
Digital gallery of
Stewardess Hannah Baird
In the Books of Remembrance
Commemorated on:
Page 90 of the Merchant Navy Book of Remembrance.
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Learning resources
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