Mr Arthur Wilfred Roberts was born in Liverpool, England on 19 February 1897. He was the second child of John William Roberts, a chief inspector on the railways, and the former Catherine Halsall. 

Roberts was still a schoolboy when he and his family appeared on the 1911 census, then residents of 21 Rice Lane in Walton; his brother John, two years his senior, was then working as a ship’s steward. Young Arthur followed his brother to sea and in April 1912 was a steward’s boy aboard Carpathia when that ship rescued the survivors of the Titanic disaster. 

Roberts did not continue a lengthy seagoing career, instead taking land-based jobs as a motor driver. In August 1921 he married Violet Hadfield (b. September 1893) and they had two sons and one daughter: Cecil, Violet and Ronald. Their firstborn Cecil died as an infant. 

A long-time resident of Stanley Park Avenue in Liverpool, Arthur Roberts died aged 63 on 17 January 1961 and was buried four days later in Anfield Cemetery (grave 736, section 17), a family grave.