On the February 5, 1918, the troop ship Tuscania – en route to Great Britain with more than 2,000 American soldiers on board – was torpedoed by a German submarine in the North Channel and sank seven miles off the coast of Scotland. More than 200 men drowned in the seas off Islay or were dashed to their death on the rocks including Roy Muncaster, D Company, 6th Battalion, 20th Engineers.
A native of Colorado, Roy was of nine children born to English immigrants William Muncaster and Elizabeth Ewing. He attended Colorado College and then enrolled in the Forestry program at the University of Washington, graduating with the class of 1917. A member of Phi Gamma Delta at the UW, the FIJIs named their fraternity house Muncaster Hall in his honor.
The Tuscania’s casualties were exhumed from their original burial in Scotland with the exception of Private Roy Muncaster. His family requested that his body remain undisturbed. (bit.ly/uw_muncaster). At the time of his enlistment Roy was working as a forest ranger in the Quinault District of the Olympic National Forest. The US Forest Service named Mount Muncaster in honor of Roy following his death. (bit.ly/mt_muncaster)