The Death Of Enrique Granados

In March 1916, Enrique Granados was 48 years old traveling with his wife, Amparo Gal, across the English Channel in a ferry boat called the Sussex. Granados had not been what anyone would call an ideal husband — indeed, he’d been repeatedly and, arguably, flagrantly unfaithful.

That Granados was infidelitous — from some perspectives even a philanderer — in no way diminishes what, in my view, is the tragic romance of his and Amparo Gal’s untimely demise.

It was to be a relatively short return journey — only four hours. The Sussex went without escort and made haste for Dieppe. But an hour after leaving port, a German U-Boat caught sight of the Sussex and torpedoed her. The ship was hit, albeit non-fatally, but in the chaos Granados and Amparo both ended up in the water.

They were found by a life raft — but though Granados was able to climb aboard, Amparo, water logged, was too heavy and could not make it into the boat.

And so Enrique Granados was presented with one of those rare moments, rarer still to have been outwardly witnessed and recorded, wherein fate administers a fire assay to the human spirit — tossing a person into the crucible of circumstance to reveal their unadorned nature and thereby discern, without any shadow of a doubt, the true substance of their mettle.

Rather than abandon her, Granados was witnessed to have leapt back into the freezing waters. The two were last scene struggling to stay aloft before being swallowed by the sea.

Make of that what you will.