[Image: Lusitania graves - Wikimedia/Imperial War Museum collection, Q18816]

Luton-born Thomas Edward George Bodell, his wife Florence and toddler son Thomas were lost with the sinking of the liner RMS Lusitania by German submarine U20 on May 7th, 1915.

Mr Bodell, aged 33, was the son of Thomas Bodell Snr, of 59 Clarendon Road, Luton. He was returning to England for the first time since sailing to Canada ten years previously. His father told The Luton News that his son was intending to enlist here.

In Canada, Thomas had set up in business as a brass and electrical fittings maker in Toronto. He married a Welsh women, Florence (nee Saunders), and lived at 21 Macaulay Avenue, Toronto.

Mr Bodell Jnr had served his apprenticeship at Hayward Tyler and Co in Luton before going to work in London. He was an old boy of Waller Street School and former a secretary of Luton Amateurs Football Club.

In the 1901 Census, the last before he moved to Canada, Thomas was described, as was his father, as a brass finisher. The family lived at 13 Havelock Road, Luton, where they had been for at least 20 years. His mother Mary was then aged 40, and Thomas had two brothers and two sisters - Emily, 17, a dressmaker; Percy, 16, a coach builder; Talbot William, 13; and Mary Ethel, aged six.

Thomas Snr, mother Mary, Talbot and sister Mary had moved to 59 Clarendon Road by the time of the 1911 Census.

See - http://www.rmslusitania.info/people/third-class/thomas-bodell/

[Beds & Herts Saturday Telegraph, May 8th, 1915]