 Cheetham returned to Hull after the expedition where he learnt that one of his sons, William Alfred, had been lost at sea while Cheetham had been travelling back from Antarctica.His son, who was 16 years old, was presumed drowned while serving on .Cheetham enlisted in the Mercantile Marine and was serving as second officer on when on 22 August 1918, he was killed when the ship was torpedoed in the North Sea by a German U-boat.