Gli italiani a bordo del TITANIC, erano trentotto.
Nel computo si devono registrare una sola presenza femminile (Argene Genovesi): tutti gli altri erano maschi.
Di questi trentotto connazionali, solamente sette erano passeggeri veri e propri, mentre i rimanenti erano membri dell’equipaggio, e più esattamente erano al soldo di Luigi Gatti, il manager dei ristoranti a bordo del transatlantico.
Il Ristorante A’ la carte serviva prelibatezze e vini pregiati ai signori della prima classe. Non solo era il miglior e più esclusivo ristorante su nave in circolazione, ma addirittura del mondo terrestre. Tra pareti in pannelli dorati, tende di seta rossa, cristalli, argenti e porcellane regnava il maitre Giuseppe Antonio Pietro Gatti, conosciuto come Luigi. Lui era l’abile gestore di quell’angolo di ricchezza e di delizia e fu lui ad arruolare altri italiani.
Mister Gatti assunse anche piemontesi per servire tra i tavoli industriali, per riempire le coppe alle ereditiere, per porgere le sedie a sederi aristocratici, per offrire i sigari a potenti finanzieri. Davide Beux, 26 anni, nacque a San Germano Chisone (provincia di Torino). Quando firmò il contratto per lavorare (assistente cameriere) a bordo del TITANIC, diede indirizzo il 5 Beauchamp Place, Brompton Road, S.W. Londra. Davide Beux, emigrato a Londra per lavoro, fu uno dei garçons di Mister Gatti. Era cresciuto a San Germano in Val Chisone intorno ai monti tra Pinerolo e Sestriere Beux morì nel naufragio. Il suo corpo, se recuperato, non fu mai identificato. Di lui si ebbe notizia solo il 2 aprile 1913, quindi un anno dopo, quando arrivò, nel comune nativo, una lettera della Regia Marina Italiana.
From: https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-victim/david-beux.html
Mr David Beux was born in San Germano Chisone, Turin, Italy on 22 June 1886.
He was the son of Paolo Beux and Gioanna Catterina Long. Little is known about his family life but he is known to have had an elder brother, Emile (b. 1879).
Emile Beux had come to Britain prior to 1901 and began working in London as a domestic cook before securing employment as a valet; he was married to a Swiss woman, Rose Frey (b. 1882) and together they had a daughter, Helene Marguerite (b. 1904).
David would join his brother in London and by 1911 was living he and his family, shown on the 1911 census at 5 Beauchamp Place, London SW and being described as an unmarried commissionaire.
When he began working for the Italian restaurateur Luigi Gatti is not known but he signed on for the Titanic, his first ship, as an assistant waiter on 6 April 1912 and joined the ship on 10 April, the day of departure.
During the sinking there were reports that the largely continental staff of the restaurant, mainly French, Italian, Swiss, German and Belgian, were herded to their quarters by stewards and kept there. Indeed, only three from the staff survived, two of whom were the female cashiers.
David Beux was lost in the sinking and his body, if recovered, was never identified.
His brother Emile continued to live in London and would cross the ocean many times in his employment; he died in 1924 and his wife and daughter relocated to the USA around the same time. Rose Beux died in Nassau, New York in 1969.
