Thamine Thannūs

Thamine Tannūs was a young, 16 year old woman at the time she took voyage on Titanic. Also known as Mrs. Iskander Alexander Thomas. She was born 25 December 1895 in the Lebanon, née Kouri. Her parents were Ilyās Khūrī and Sufīyah Riyād Hassī. Her nickname was 'Thelma'. In 1910, she married Iskandar Tannūs also known as Alexander Thomas. The latter's brother Bashīr Tannūs also known as Charles Thomas had migrated to the USA, but for this special occasion Charles, with wife and kids, came over to Lebanon.

Alexander wanted to settle in the same place as his brother Charles in the United States. The two brothers therefore then returned to the United States, leaving their respective families in Hardīn with the intention of bringing them over in due course.

Thamine, gave birth to a son on November 8, 1911 and soon after that, Alexander asked his brother Charles to fetch his wife Thelma and infant son and return with them to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. He did so and his brother Charle travelled all the way to Lebanon. From there, they went to Marseille.

She boarded the Titanic at Cherbourg with her 5 month old son As'ad and her brother Charles. Travelling as Third Class passengers Thamine and her son held ticket No. 2625, price £8, 10s, 4d. Mrs Thomas and her son her husband (his father) in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Among the various members of Thelma's family who traveled with her were her cousins ​​Amīnah Mubārik and her sons and Sīlānah Yazbak and her husband Antūn Mūsà Yazbak.

On the night of April 14, 23:40 P.M. Charles, who heard the thud when they hit the iceberg, quickly went to Thelma's room and told her to get warm clothes on and to wrap the baby up warmly. "Something is wrong and we are needed on deck," he told her. When they got to the deck, people were everywhere and lifeboats were being filled. One of the men in charge tried to put Thelma on a life boat but she was hysterical and did not want to leave her brother. It was very confusing & frightening since she did not speak English. Charles translated that she must go without him. She still refused. In the chaos someone put her in the life boat and lowered it before she could get baby As'ad from her brother! She was nearly out of her mind crying for him and her brother,

Because Thamine and her son now had become separated, Charles carried the baby to lifeboat 16. He begged for the child to be rescued and Winnie Troutt took it upon herself to take the child into the lifeboat. Meanwhile Thamine boarded another lifeboat (most likely no. 14 or C).

Mother and child were reuinted on Carpathia. Charles sadly didn't make it.

Thelma and her infant As'ad hospitalized in New York for the effects of shock and reunited with her husband Alexander. She remained in Wilkes-Barre for the rest of her life and had nine more children: Sadie (b. 1914), Edward (b. 1916), Sarah (b. 1919), Helen (b. 1921), Joseph ( born in 1923), Mae (born in 1925), Peter (born in 1927), Marjorie (born in 1930) and Jean (born in 1932).

She had to experience much grief in 1931 when her son As'ad died at the age of 19. Fortunately, she and her husband were well-supported to overcome this ordeal.

The couple continued to operate a produce store. In her vicinity she had gained fame for having been in the Titanic disaster and she would always stress how upset she had become by the screams of the dying people in the icy waters, which gave her occasional nightmaters.

She was widowed in 1938. She had taken parts in very small reunions with other survivors from her area, namely Leah Aks, Selena Cook and May Futrelle.

Thamine was once on the screenset of the Titanic movie *A Night to Remember* in 1958, that was based on the similary named book by Walter Lord.

Edwina Trout and Thamine Tannūs came into contact later in the 1970's after NBC's *Today Show* had an in interview with Trout. Atter a lot of research, the manager of a radiostation who had broadcasted this interview, arranged a phone call between the two women. They never met in person but kept writing eachother.

Thamine "Thelma" Thomas died 7 January 1974 in Wilkes-Barre, where she spent most of her life.

Three of her children are still alive today. Mae, one of the three, loves to talk about her mother's experience. She said her mother never went near another body of water in her life, not even a lake.