Thomas, known as Tom, was from Caltra, County Galway, Ireland. Though his family were very poor, he nevertheless was generous with giving to others, such as giving a ring to his sister Maria and his friend Catherine Fallon before leaving for America in 1912. He lost his father when he was just a boy; he was killed in a farming accident on 28 October 1897. One of his brothers, Michael, also met a premature end when he went off to work in England and disappeared without a trace between 1904 and 1905. He perished on the Titanic at age twenty-two, though before his death he and his friend Martin Gallagher managed to save the two women in their party, Ellen Mockler and Margaret Mannion, by leading them up to the upper deck. Tom took off his sweater and put it on Ellen before she got into a lifeboat. (Nine years later Ellen returned to Ireland and gave the sweater back to his mother.) His family created a memorial to him in the form of a surviving lock of his hair knitted into a linen garment (possibly his christening gown), surrounded by prayer cards and set in a frame, surmounted by the name Thomas. His name and date of death are also carved into the Kilgannon family's gravestone in the Chapelfinnerty Cemetery.
Thomas, known as Tom, was from Caltra, County Galway, Ireland. Though his family were very poor, he nevertheless was generous with giving to others, such as giving a ring to his sister Maria and his friend Catherine Fallon before leaving for America in 1912. He lost his father when he was just a boy; he was killed in a farming accident on 28 October 1897. One of his brothers, Michael, also met a premature end when he went off to work in England and disappeared without a trace between 1904 and 1905. He perished on the Titanic at age twenty-two, though before his death he and his friend Martin Gallagher managed to save the two women in their party, Ellen Mockler and Margaret Mannion, by leading them up to the upper deck. Tom took off his sweater and put it on Ellen before she got into a lifeboat. (Nine years later Ellen returned to Ireland and gave the sweater back to his mother.) His family created a memorial to him in the form of a surviving lock of his hair knitted into a linen garment (possibly his christening gown), surrounded by prayer cards and set in a frame, surmounted by the name Thomas. His name and date of death are also carved into the Kilgannon family's gravestone in the Chapelfinnerty Cemetery.
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