The anniversary of the most shocking attacks on civilians during the First World War which claimed the lives of two Macclesfield women is being commemorated.

RMS Lusitania was torpedoed by a German U-boat 11 miles off the Irish coast on the afternoon of May 7, 1915, as it sailed from New York to Liverpool.

Almost 1,200 men, women and children died in the tragedy, with the liner sinking in just 18 minutes.

Among them was Florence Wallace-Watson, 49, from Sutton, who was returning home to celebrate her parents’ golden wedding anniversary, and Cissie Wardle, 22, from Macclesfield, were among those who drowned.

However, two sisters Agnes and Evelyn Wild, and Tom Adamson, a steward on the first class part of the ship, who all came from Macclesfield, miraculously survived the tragedy.

Agnes Wild

In the days afterwards survivor Agnes Wild spoke to the Macclesfield Courier, the precursor to the Express.

The sisters, daughters of Mary and James Wild, a silk designer, had emigrated to America in 1912 and were returning home on the Lusitania the help with the war effort.

Agnes described a peaceful journey rocked by a ‘tremendous explosion’ when the torpedo hit.

She remembered a stampede of passengers which became a crush as people battled to get to safety.

Agnes said she was able to steer her sister to another stairwell to the main deck.

Artists impression of the sinking of Lusitania

She described the boat ‘listing fearfully’ and after almost falling into the sea finding herself in a lifeboat.

In a moment of drama Agnes said as she watched the vessel rapidly sinking one of the 38 passengers on the lifeboat realised that the lifeboat was still attached to the sticken ship.

Agnes described a terrifying few moments as the boat was cut free from the Lusitania just before it sank.

The sisters then helped row the boat for three hours before they were rescued by an Irish fishing boat and towed to safety.

Agnes, who died in 1950, kept a remarkable souvenir, a wrist watch broken as she climbed into the rescue ship. The hand remained at the time, a few minutes after two o’clock, that the ship sank.

Today, memorial services are being held in Liverpool, the liner’s home port, and in Ireland.

Passengers are laid to rest in a mass grave at Old Church Cemetery of Queenstown

The tragedy of the deaths of Florence Wallace-Watson and Cissie Wardle sent shockwaves through the town.

The Macclesfield Courier printed a full page about the sinking of the Lusitania where the editor described the ‘horror’ as the most ‘painful reading’ in its 101-year history.

Florence was the eldest daughter of Susannah and William Walshaw Stancliffe, a brewer of Spring Fields House, Byrons Lane, Sutton. She had two brothers Percy and Richard and a sister Esther.

Florence married William Wallace-Watson, a sugar refiner from Canada, at St George’s Church, Sutton, in 1887, and immigrated to Canada a year later. The couple had four children, Agnes, Stancliffe, Florence and William.

She is buried at St James Church, Sutton.

Grave of Florence Wallace-Watson at St James Church, Sutton.

The other tragic victim was Cissie Wardle, 22, the daughter of Annie Maria and Charles Dooley, a gardener.

The family, which included siblings George, James, Ernest, John, and Sidney, lived on Fowler Street, Macclesfield.

Cissie emigrated to America in 1914 and married 23-year-old former Prestbury resident Frank Wardle.

Cissie’s body was never recovered.