Kaegogi :
Joseph Philippe Le Mercier Laroche was born in Cap-Haitien, Haiti 🇭🇹, on May 26, 1886.
He was the nephew of Cincinnatus Leconte, who was the President of Haiti 🇭🇹, (August 1911-August 1912, and the great-grandson of General Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who proclaimed the creation of the Kingdom of Hayti, on January 1st, 1804.
His parents had sent to Paris, France, to study engineering.
After earning his engineering degree; he married Juliette Lafargue and they had two daughters; Simone, (born in 1909,) and Louise in 1910.
Due to racial discrimination during that period of time, Joseph couldn't find employment in Paris, France.
Being unemployed, and depending on his father-in law to sustain his family, he decided to return with his family to Haiti 🇭🇹, where his uncle Cincinnatus Leconte, (the then Haitian President had arranged a job as a mathematics teacher for him.
Joseph had planned to travel to Haiti in late 1912, but, after learning, that his wife was pregnant, he wanted, that the child should be born in Haiti, and wanted to leave Paris, France as soon as possible.
His mother (in Haiti) purchased a first class voyage for him and his family to travel to the United States aboard the Liner SS France.
After learning the SS France's policy about children on board; Joseph and his wife exchanged their first class tickets on board of the SS France for a second class passage on board the RMS Titanic; they boarded it, on April 10, 1912.
On April 14, 1912 at 11: 40 p.m, the RMS Titanic struck an Iceberg.
Joseph immediately woke his wife Juliette and told her, that the ship had struck something
He then put their valuables in his pockets and took their sleeping daughters to the upper deck of the ship.
Juliette and her daughters escaped from the sinking ship aboard a lifeboat, but, Joseph (as other men) perished in the sinking "RMS Titanic."
His wife didn't continue to go to Haiti; but returned to Villejuif in France, (after being rescued at sea,) since she didn't know anyone in Haiti.
She gave birth to a son in May 1912, and named him Joseph Jr, in honor of his father.
Joseph Philippe Le Mercier Laroche was an Haitian, who died in the RMS Titanic.
2026-06-27 18:12:10