Mr Vernon Hyde St Lawrence Livermore was born in Cleckheaton, Yorkshire, England on 14 June 1880.¹ He was the son of William St Lawrence Livermore, a mechanical engineer originally from Kent, and the former Catherine Hyde, a native of Manchester. He had two younger siblings.

The Livermore family had moved to Stockport, Lancashire by the time of the 1901 census and when Vernon was described as a commercial clerk; when he went to sea is not known. In April 1912 he was a waiter aboard the Carpathia when that ship rescued the survivors of the Titanic disaster. 

In 1913 Vernon was married to another veteran of the Carpathia rescue, stewardess Julia Cservenka (b. 1886). The couple made their home in Liverpool and welcomed their only child Catherine Hilda Ethel in 1914.

In May 1915 Livermore and his brother-in-law Algernon Percy Penny (Penny was married to Julia’s sister Ethel Cservenka) were saloon cabin stewards aboard the Lusitania when that ship was torpedoed. Both men survived, Livermore sinking with the ship and managing to find refuge aboard an upturned boat until his rescue by the Heron. 

Vernon Livermore remained at sea for many years, serving during both World Wars and later on ships including Aquitania and Carinthia. He remained a resident of Liverpool where he died on 2 August 1964, being buried five days later in West Derby Cemetery. He was predeceased by his wife Julia in 1961.