Price, Florence Lucy (Florrie)
[Passenger list, "KOOMBANA" 37, compiled 04 June 1912, Adelaide Steamship Company. Broome Historical Society]
List of passengers known to have been bound for Derby.
From Fremantle [saloon]
...
Steerage
...
Price, Miss Flo. * Accompanied Mrs. Sack as domestic. Niece to
Mrs. Hughes, Stephen Street, White Gum Valley
near Fremantle.
...
* Signifies that persone indicated had been reported by relative
or friends as having travelled and presumably booked on board.
[Passenger list, "KOOMBANA" 37, compiled 02 April 1912, Adelaide Steamship Company. Noel Butlin Archives Centre, Australian National University, 0186/N46/634]
Fremantle-Derby Price Miss F. Accompanied Mrs. Sack as domestic.
[Barker, Malcolm, 2001, The Truth Is So Precious, Success Print, Perth, Western Australia, page53]
...
Running through the passenger list Captain Allen saw that Mrs D.C. Sack who had come down with the Koombana from Derby on the last trip was going back home after less than 5 days in Perth. This was not an uncommon length of stay because it enabled the passenger to complete business or perhaps attend a family occasion or function. Mrs Sack who was the wife of the publican at Derby, and was accompanied by her 6 year old grandson Thomas Crotty, and Florence Price who was working for her as a domestic.
...
["The Passengers", The West Australian, Wednesday 03 April 1912, page 7]
FOR DERBY.
Saloon.
...
Miss Price.
...
["The Koombana", The West Australian, Saturday 30 March 1912, page 11]
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PASSENGERS AND CREW.
...
Mrs. Sack, for Broome, is supposed to have taken a young lady named Miss Price with her.
...
[Personal communication, Aly Loney, descendant of Koombana passenger Florence "Florrie" Price, 31 March 2010]
...
The Price family came to Australia in 1909 following the death of William, their husband & father. I am not sure what happened to William. There is an entry in the family bible of a William dying on 27 April 1906 and I am presuming it was that William. There was a son William also, but he was the oldest and stayed in the UK. I have tried to locate the death, but William Price is too common a name, esp in the area they lived (Pemberton, Lanc).
Florence’s mother was Emma Price and there were 8 children in total. 6 of the children came with Emma to Australia. The other child died as a baby.
They came to Australia on the maiden voyage of the "Otranto", leaving London 1 October 1909 and arriving in Fremantle 4 November 1909. That must have been exciting for them, to be on a brand new ship! It was prior to the Titanic, so no-one would think of it sinking. Mind you the Koombana was supposed to be 'state of the art' as well wasn’t it?
I only have a copy of the postcard. We have no idea who the lady was that she wrote it too, and it has possibly been destroyed by now. The scan I have off it is very dark, so I will try and correct it and email you a copy. My Dad’s father was only a young lad at the time (9), and he died at 50. I get shivers when I read the postcard, that she keeps saying 'goodbye' - even the sign off 'goodbye from Flo'. It seems so final.
[Florrie Price, letter to her friend Mrs Lambert, March 1912, postcard]
[A postcard sent by Flo to Mrs Lambert at the Coffee Palace in Beverley, a few days before Koombana's final departure from Fremantle.]
["In Memoriam", The West Australian, Thursday 20 March 1913, page 1]
...
PRICE.-In sad but loving memory of our dear cousin, Florrie, who was drowned through the loss of the s.s. Koombana during the Nor'-West gale on March 20, 1912.
The winds roared loudly and the seas ran high.
As the Koombanna laboured against the Nor'. West shoals;
But little we thought, dear cousin, when saying good-bye,
That we for ever farewelled to the steamer and her many souls.
Twelve silent months have now gone by, dear Florrie,
Since we last heard your sweet voice.
But Jesus will help us to await that great Day
When once more in reunion we shall again rejoice.
-Inserted by her affectionate cousins, Lucy, David, and William Hughes.
PRICE.-In sad but loving remembrance of my dear friend, Florence Lucy (Flo), who was lost in the wreck of the ill-fated Koombana, on or about March 20, 1912.
She sleeps serene and safe
From tempest or from billow,
Where the storms that high above her chafe,
Scarce rock her peaceful pillow.
-Inserted by her sorrowing friend Agnes M. Pringle.
["In Memoriam", The West Australian, Friday 21 March 1913, page 1]
...
PRICE.-In affectionate remembrance of Florrie, the second daughter of the late William Price, of Wigan, Lancashire, England, who was lost at sea on or about March 20 or 21, 1912, by the loss of the s.s. Koombana.
When the dark waves around us roll,
And we look to Thee for aid,
Whisper to the trembling soul,
"It is I, be not afraid."
Now when our lives are clouded o'er.
And storm winds drift us from the shore,
Say, lest we sink to rise no more,
"Peace, be still."
-Inserted by mother, sisters, and brothers.
PRICE.--Sacred to the memory of dear little Florrie, who entered into rest on or about March 21, 1912, included amongst the passengers of the ill-fated Koombana, aged 21 years.
The lips need not speak where the heart mourns sincerely,
And thoughts often dwell where they seldom are seen.
-Inserted by her loving friend, A. W. Chalkley
AB notes:
from frontispiece of family bible, Florrie's date of birth is read as 21st November, 1890