On Tuesday's episode of BBC's The One Show (8 April), actor Stephen McGann shared his family's surprise connection to the Titanic.
Stephen, known for his role as Dr. Patrick Turner in Call the Midwife, joined Larry Lamb and Jill Halfpenny, and he hosts Clara Amfo and Gethin Jones on the programme.
Over a decade ago, Stephen discovered that his great uncle, Jimmy McGann, had worked on the ill-fated ship. The Titanic infamously sank in 1912 after striking an iceberg, resulting in the loss of over 1,500 lives.
Stephen recalled his great uncle's remarkable survival story during his appearance on The One Show.
"In 2012, I made an amazing discovery. My great uncle Jimmy, my grandad's brother, not only worked in the foul, filthy dirty engine room, which the water penetrated when the iceberg hit. He managed to get out," he said.
He continued: "He survived on one of the most famous lifeboats, the upside-down lifeboat called Collapsible B. With some of the most important people in the Titanic story, and he's a lonely, working-class engine worker, but he managed to survive with some of these big figures."
Stephen and his brother Paul, 65, delve deeper into their great uncle's experiences on the Titanic in their new podcast, Titanic: Ship of Dreams. Paul shared with the Observer that the podcast "reveals the conditions of the very people that drove the ship, that drove the business, without whom none of it would have worked."
The McGann brothers initially learned about their relative's tale through an aunt, but the family struggled to confirm his presence on the ship, reports the Express.
Years later, Stephen stumbled upon a memoir penned by another Titanic survivor, where a James McGann was referenced.
They also found American newspaper reports of Jimmy's testimony, which helped corroborate that he was indeed a worker on the Titanic.
Jimmy survived by leaping into the water and clambering onto an overturned boat. He was eventually transported to New York by the rescue ship Carpathia, and subsequently spent a brief period in hospital.
Despite surviving the disaster, Jimmy succumbed to tuberculosis six years later.
The One Show airs on weeknights on BBC One at 7pm
English (United States) ·