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Sinking of the Titanic and Great Sea Disasters ................................................................................................1

Edited by Logan Marshall ........................................................................................................................1

CHAPTER I. FIRST NEWS OF THE GREATEST MARINE DISASTER IN HISTORY ...................4

CHAPTER II. THE MOST SUMPTUOUS PALACE AFLOAT...........................................................5

CHAPTER III. THE MAIDEN VOYAGE OF THE TITANIC ..............................................................8

CHAPTER IV. SOME OF THE NOTABLE PASSENGERS..............................................................10

CHAPTER V. THE TITANIC STRIKES AN ICEBERG!...................................................................14

CHAPTER VI. "WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST!".......................................................................18

CHAPTER VII. LEFT TO THEIR FATE.............................................................................................28

CHAPTER VIII. THE CALL FOR HELP HEARD ..............................................................................37

CHAPTER IX. IN THE DRIFTING LIFEBOATS .............................................................................38

CHAPTER X. ON BOARD THE CARPATHIA ..................................................................................46

CHAPTER XI. PREPARATIONS ON LAND TO RECEIVE THE SUFFERERS.............................51

CHAPTER XII. THE TRAGIC HOMECOMING ..............................................................................56

CHAPTER XIII. THE STORY OF CHARLES F. HURD ....................................................................78

CHAPTER XIV. THRILLING ACCOUNT BY L. BEASLEY ............................................................80

CHAPTER XV. JACK THAYER'S OWN STORY OF THE WRECK...............................................84

CHAPTER XVI. INCIDENTS RELATED BY JAMES McGOUGH ..................................................86

CHAPTER XVII. WIRELESS OPERATOR PRAISES HEROIC WORK..........................................88

CHAPTER XVIII. STORY OF THE STEWARD................................................................................90

CHAPTER XIX. HOW THE WORLD RECEIVED THE NEWS.......................................................93

CHAPTER XX. BRAVERY OF THE OFFICERS AND CREW .........................................................97

CHAPTER XXI. SEARCHING FOR THE DEAD .............................................................................101

CHAPTER XXII. CRITICISM OF ISMAY ........................................................................................107

CHAPTER XXIII. THE FINANCIAL LOSS.....................................................................................109

CHAPTER XXIV. OPINIONS OF EXPERTS...................................................................................110

CHAPTER XXV. OTHER GREAT MARINE DISASTERS .............................................................112

CHAPTER XXVI. DEVELOPMENT OF SHIPBUILDING ..............................................................115

CHAPTER XXVII. SAFETY AND LIFESAVING DEVICES.......................................................118

CHAPTER XXVIII. TIME FOR REFLECTION AND REFORMS..................................................121

CHAPTER XXIX. THE SENATORIAL INVESTIGATION .............................................................124

LIKE a bolt out of a clear sky came the wireless message on Monday, April 15, 1912, that on Sunday night

the great Titanic, on her maiden voyage across the Atlantic, had struck a gigantic iceberg, but that all the

passengers were saved. The ship had signaled her distress and another victory was set down to wireless.

Additional news was soon received that the ship had collided with a mountain of ice in the North Atlantic, off

Cape Race, Newfoundland, at 10.25 Sunday evening, April 14th. At 4.15 Monday morning the Canadian

Government Marine Agency received a wireless message that the Titanic was sinking and that the steamers

towing her were trying to get her into shoal water near Cape Race, for the purpose of beaching her.

Wireless despatches up to noon Monday showed that the passengers of the Titanic were being transferred

aboard the steamer Carpathia, a Cunarder, which left New York, April 13th, for Naples. Twenty boatloads

of the Titanic's passengers were said to have been transferred to the Carpathia then, and allowing forty to

sixty persons as the capacity of each lifeboat, some 800 or 1200 persons had already been transferred from

the damaged liner to the Carpathia. They were reported as being taken to Halifax, whence they would be sent

Another liner, the Parisian, of the Allan Company, which sailed from Glasgow for Halifax on April 6th, was

said to be close at hand and assisting in the work of rescue. The Baltic, Virginian and Olympic were also near

While badly damaged, the giant vessel was reported as still afloat, but whether she could reach port or shoal

water was uncertain. The White Star officials declared that the Titanic was in no immediate danger of

"While we are still lacking definite information," Mr. Franklin, vicepresident of the White Star Line, said

later in the afternoon, "we believe the Titanic's passengers will reach Halifax, Wednesday evening. We have

received no further word from Captain Haddock, of the Olympic, or from any of the ships in the vicinity, but

With the understanding that the survivors would be taken to Halifax the line arranged to have thirty Pullman

cars, two diners and many passenger coaches leave Boston Monday night for Halifax to get the passengers

after they were landed. Mr. Franklin made a guess that the Titanic's passengers would get into Halifax on

Wednesday. The Department of Commerce and Labor notified the White Star Line that customs and

immigration inspectors would be sent from Montreal to Halifax in order that there would be as little delay as

Monday night the world slept in peace and assurance. A wireless message had finally been received, reading:

It was not until nearly a week later that the fact was discovered that this message had been wrongly received

in the confusion of messages flashing through the air, and that in reality the message should have read:

With the dawning of Tuesday morning came the awful news of the true fate of the Titanic.

Early in 1908 officials of the White Star Company announced that they would eclipse all previous records in

The keel of the illfated ship was laid in the summer of 1909 at the Harland Wolff yards, Belfast. Lord Pirrie,

considered one of the best authorities on shipbuilding in the world, was the designer. The leviathan was

launched on May 31, 1911, and was completed in February, 1912, at a cost of $10,000,000.

The Titanic, largest liner in commission, was a sister ship of the Olympic. The registered tonnage of each

vessel is estimated as 45,000, but officers of the White Star Line say that the Titanic measured 45,328 tons.

The Titanic was commanded by Captain E. J. Smith, the White Star admiral, who had previously been on the

She was 882 1/2 long, or about four city blocks, and was 5000 tons bigger than a battleship twice as large as

Like her sister ship, the Olympic, the Titanic was a four funneled vessel, and had eleven decks. The distance

from the keel to the top of the funnels was 175 feet. She had an average speed of twentyone knots.

The Titanic could accommodate 2500 passengers. The steamship was divided into numerous compartments,

separated by fifteen bulkheads. She was equipped with a gymnasium, swimming pool, hospital with

The registered tonnage was 45,000, and the displacement tonnage 66,000. She was capable of carrying 2500

The largest plates employed in the hull were 36 feet long, weighing 43 1/2 tons each, and the largest steel

beam used was 92 feet long, the weight of this double beam being 4 tons. The rudder, which was operated

electrically, weighed 100 tons, the anchors 15 1/2 tons each, the center (turbine) propeller 22 tons, and each

of the two "wing" propellers 38 tons each. The after "bossarms," from which were sus pended the three

propeller shafts, tipped the scales at 73 1/2 tons, and the forward "bossarms" at 45 tons. Each link in the

anchorchains weighed 175 pounds. There were more than 2000 sidelights and windows to light the public

Nothing was left to chance in the construction of the Titanic. Three million rivets (weighing 1200 tons) held

the solid plates of steel together. To insure stability in binding the heavy plates in the double bottom, half a

All the plating of the hulls was riveted by hydraulic power, driving seventon riveting machines, suspended

from traveling cranes. The double bottom extended the full length of the vessel, varying from 5 feet 3 inches

Not only was the Titanic the largest steamship afloat but it was the most luxurious. Elaborately furnished

cabins opened onto her eleven decks, and some of these decks were reserved as private promenades that were

engaged with the best suites. One of these suites was sold for $4350 for the boat's maiden and only voyage.

Suites similar, but which were without the private promenade decks, sold for $2300.

The Titanic differed in some respects from her sister ship. The Olympic has a lower promenade deck, but in

the Titanic's case the staterooms were brought out flush with the outside of the superstructure, and the rooms

themselves made much larger. The sitting rooms of some of the suites on this deck were 15 x 15 feet.

The restaurant was much larger than that of the Olympic and it had a novelty in the shape of a private

promenade deck on the starboard side, to be used exclusively by its patrons. Adjoining it was a reception

Two private promenades were connected with the two most luxurious suites on the ship. The suites were

situated about amidships, one on either side of the vessel, and each was about fifty feet long. One of the suites

These private promenades were expensive luxuries. The cost figured out something like forty dollars a front

foot for a six days' voyage. They, with the suites to which they are attached, were the most expensive

The engine room was divided into two sections, one given to the reciprocating engines and the other to the

turbines. There were two sets of the reciprocating kind, one working each of the wing propellers through a

fourcylinder triple expansion, direct acting inverted engine. Each set could generate 15,000 indicated

horsepower at seventyfive revolutions a minute. The Parsons type turbine takes steam from the

reciprocating engines, and by developing a horsepower of 16,000 at 165 revolutions a minute works the

third of the ship's propellers, the one directly under the rudder. Of the four funnels of the vessel three were

connected with the engine room, and the fourth or after funnel for ventilating the ship including the gallery.

Practically all of the space on the Titanic below the upper deck was occupied by steamgenerating plant, coal

bunkers and propelling machinery. Eight of the fifteen watertight compartments contained the mechanical

part of the vessel. There were, for instance, twentyfour double end and five single end boilers, each 16 feet

9 inches in diameter, the larger 20 feet long and the smaller 11 feet 9 inches long. The larger boilers had six

fires under each of them and the smaller three furnaces. Coal was stored in bunker space along the side of the

ship between the lower and middle decks, and was first shipped from there into bunkers running all the way

across the vessel in the lowest part. From there the stokers handed it into the furnaces.

One of the most interesting features of the vessel was the refrigerating plant, which comprised a huge

icemaking and refrigerating machine and a number of provision rooms on the after part of the lower and

orlop decks. There were separate cold rooms for beef, mutton, poultry, game, fish, vegetables, fruit, butter,

bacon, cheese, flowers, mineral water, wine, spirits and champagne, all maintained at different temperatures

most suitable to each. Perishable freight had a compartment of its own, also chilled by the plant.

Two main ideas were carried out in the Titanic. One was comfort and the other stability. The vessel was

planned to be an ocean ferry. She was to have only a speed of twentyone knots, far below that of some other

modern vessels, but she was planned to make that speed, blow high or blow low, so that if she left one side of

the ocean at a given time she could be relied on to reach the other side at almost a certain minute of a certain

a vessel of the Titanic type can hardly imagine an accident that could cause her to founder. No collision such

as has been the fate of any ship in recent years, it has been thought up to this time, could send her down, nor

could running against an iceberg do it unless such an accident were coupled with the remotely possible

blowing out of a boiler. She would sink at once, probably, if she were to run over a submerged rock or

derelict in such manner that both her keel plates and her double bottom were torn away for more than half her

length; but such a catastrophe was so remotely possible that it did not even enter the field of conjecture.

The reason for all this is found in the modern arrangement of watertight steel compartments into which all

ships now are divided and of which the Titanic had fifteen so disposed that half of them, including the largest,

could be flooded without impairing the safety of the vessel. Probably it was the working of these bulkheads

and the watertight doors between them as they are supposed to work that saved the Titanic from foundering

These bulkheads were of heavy sheet steel and started at the very bottom of the ship and extended right up to

the top side. The openings in the bulkheads were just about the size of the ordinary doorway, but the doors

did not swing as in a house, but fitted into watertight grooves above the opening. They could be released

instantly in several ways, and once closed formed a barrier to the water as solid as the bulkhead itself.

In the Titanic, as in other great modern ships, these doors were held in place above the openings by friction

clutches. On the bridge was a switch which connected with an electric magnet at the side of the bulkhead

opening. The turning of this switch caused the magnet to draw down a heavy weight, which instantly released

the friction clutch, and allowed the door to fall or slide down over the opening in a second. If, however,

through accident the bridge switch was rendered useless the doors would close automatically in a few

seconds. This was arranged by means of large metal floats at the side of the doorways, which rested just

above the level of the double bottom, and as the water entered the compartments these floats would rise to it

and directly release the clutch holding the door open. These clutches could also be released by hand.

It was said of the Titanic that liner compartments could be flooded as far back or as far forward as the engine

room and she would float, though she might take on a heavy list, or settle considerably at one end. To provide

against just such an accident as she is said to have encountered she had set back a good distance from the

bows an extra heavy cross partition known as the collision bulkhead, which would prevent water getting in

amidships, even though a good part of her bow should be torn away. What a ship can stand and still float was

shown a few years ago when the Suevic of the White Star Line went on the rocks on the British coast. The

wreckers could not move the forward part of her, so they separated her into two sections by the use of

dynamite, and after putting in a temporary bulkhead floated off the after half of the ship, put it in dry dock

and built a new forward part for her. More recently the battleship Maine, or what was left of her, was floated

EVER was illstarred voyage more auspiciously begun than when the Titanic, newly crowned empress of the

seas, steamed majestically out of the port of Southampton at noon on Wednesday, April 10th, bound for New

Elaborate preparations had been made for the maiden voyage. Crowds of eager watchers gathered to witness

the departure, all the more interested because of the notable people who were to travel aboard her. Friends

and relatives of many of the passengers were at the dock to bid Godspeed to their departing loved ones. The

Majestic and beautiful the ship rested on the water, marvel of shipbuilding, worthy of any sea. As this new

queen of the ocean moved slowly from her dock, no one questioned her construction: she was fitted with an

elaborate system of watertight compartments, calculated to make her unsinkable; she had been pronounced

There was silence just before the boat pulled outthe silence that usually precedes the leavetaking. The

heavy whistles sounded and the splendid Titanic, her flags flying and her band playing, churned the water and

Then the Titanic, with the people on board waving handkerchiefs and shouting goodbyes that could be

heard only as a buzzing murmur on shore, rode away on the ocean, proudly, majestically, her head up and, so

it seemed, her shoulders thrown back. If ever a vessel seemed to throb with proud life, if ever a monster of

the sea seemed to "feel its oats" and strain at the leash, if ever a ship seemed to have breeding and blue blood

And so it was only her due that as the Titanic steamed out of the harbor bound on her maiden voyage a

thousand "Godspeeds" were wafted after her, while every other vessel that she passed, the greatest of them

dwarfed by her colossal proportions, paid homage to the new queen regnant with the blasts of their whistles

In command of the Titanic was Captain E. J. Smith, a veteran of the seas, and admiral of the White Star Line

fleet. The next six officers, in the order of their rank, were Murdock, Lightollder,{sic} Pitman, Boxhall,

Lowe and Moody. Dan Phillips was chief wireless operator, with Harold Bride as assistant.

From the forward bridge, fully ninety feet above the sea, peered out the benign face of the ship's master, cool

of aspect, deliberate of action, impressive in that quality of confidence that is bred only of long experience in

From far below the bridge sounded the strains of the ship's orchestra, playing blithely a favorite air from "The

Chocolate Soldier." All went as merry as a wedding bell. Indeed, among that gay ship's company were two

score or more at least for whom the wedding bells had sounded in truth not many days before. Some were on

their honeymoon tours, others were returning to their motherland after having passed the weeks of the

honeymoon, like Colonel John Jacob Astor and his young bride, amid the diversions of Egypt or other Old

What daring flight of imagination would have ventured the prediction that within the span of six days that

stately ship, humbled, shattered and torn asunder, would lie two thousand fathoms deep at the bottom of the

Atlantic, that the benign face that peered from the bridge would be set in the rigor of death and that the happy

The big vessel had, however, a touch of evil fortune before she cleared the harbor of Southampton. As she

passed down stream her immense bulkshe displaced 66,000 tonsdrew the waters after her with an

irresistible suction that tore the American liner New York from her moorings; seven steel hawsers were

snapped like twine. The New York floated toward the White Star ship, and would have rammed the new ship

When the mammoth ship touched at Cherbourg and later at Queenstown she was again the object of a port

ovation, the smaller craft doing obeisance while thousands gazed in wonder at her stupendous proportions.

After taking aboard some additional passengers at each port, the Titanic headed her towering bow toward the

The Titanic made 484 miles as her first day's run, her powerful new engines turning over at the rate of

seventy revolutions. On the second day out the speed was hit up to seventythree revolutions and the run for

the day was bulletined as 519 miles. Still further increasing the speed, the rate of revolution of the engines

was raised to seventyfive and the day's run was 549 miles, the best yet scheduled.

But the ship had not yet been speeded to her capacity she was capable of turning over about seventyeight

revolutions. Had the weather conditions been propitious, it was intended to press the great racer to the full

limit of her speed on Monday. But for the Titanic Monday never came. FIRE IN THE COAL BUNKERS

Unknown to the passengers, the Titanic was on fire from the day she sailed from Southampton. Her officers

This story, told for the first time by the survivors of the crew, was only one of the many thrilling tales of the

"The Titanic sailed from Southampton on Wednesday, April 10th, at noon," said J. Dilley, fireman on the

"I was assigned to the Titanic from the Oceanic, where I had served as a fireman. From the day we sailed the

Titanic was on fire, and my sole duty, together with eleven other men, had been to fight that fire. We had

"Of course," he went on, "the passengers knew nothing of the fire. Do you think we'd have let them know

"The fire started in bunker No. 6. There were hundreds of tons of coal stored there. The coal on top of the

bunker was wet, as all the coal should have been, but down at the bottom of the bunker the coal had been

"The dry coal at the bottom of the pile took fire, and smoldered for days. The wet coal on top kept the flames

from coming through, but down in the bottom of the bunkers the flames were raging.

"Two men from each watch of stokers were tolled off, to fight that fire. The stokers worked four hours at a

time, so twelve of us were fighting flames from the day we put out of Southampton until we hit the iceberg.

"No, we didn't get that fire out, and among the stokers there was talk that we'd have to empty the big coal

bunkers after we'd put our passengers off in New York, and then call on the fireboats there to help us put out

"The stokers were alarmed over it, but the officers told us to keep our mouths shutthey didn't want to alarm

Until Sunday, April 14th, then, the voyage had apparently been a delightful but uneventful one. The

passengers had passed the time in the usual diversions of ocean travelers, amusing themselves in the

luxurious saloons, promenading on the boat deck, lolling at their ease in steamer chairs and making pools on

the daily runs of the steamship. The smoking rooms and card rooms had been as well patronized as usual, and

a party of several notorious professional gamblers had begun reaping their usual easy harvest.

As early as Sunday afternoon the officers of the Titanic must have known that they were approaching

dangerous ice fields of the kind that are a perennial menace to the safety of steamships following the regular

On Sunday afternoon the Titanic's wireless operator forwarded to the Hydrographic office in Washington,

"April 14.The German steamship Amerika (Hamburg American Line) reports by radiotelegraph passing

Despite this warning, the Titanic forged ahead Sunday night at her usual speedfrom twentyone to

THE ship's company was of a character befitting the greatest of all vessels and worthy of the occasion of her

maiden voyage. Though the major part of her passengers were Americans returning from abroad, there were

enrolled upon her cabin lists some of the most distinguished names of England, as well as of the younger

nation. Many of these had purposely delayed sailing, or had hastened their departure, that they might be

There were aboard six men whose fortunes ran into tens of millions, besides many other persons of

international note. Among the men were leaders in the world of commerce, finance, literature, art and the

learned professions. Many of the women were socially prominent in two hemispheres.

Wealth and fame, unfortunately, are not proof against fate, and most of these notable personages perished as

The list of notables included Colonel John Jacob Astor, head of the Astor family, whose fortune is estimated

at $150,000,000; Isidor Straus, merchant and banker ($50,000,000); J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the

International Mercantile Marine ($40,000,000); Benjamin Guggenheim, head of the Guggenheim family

($95,000,000): George D. Widener, son of P. A. B. Widener, traction magnate and financier ($5,000,000);

Colonel Washington Roebling, builder of the great Brooklyn Bridge; Charles M. Hays, president of the

Grand Trunk Railway; W. T. Stead. famous publicist; Jacques Futrelle, journalist; Henry S. Harper, of the

firm of Harper Bros.; Henry B. Harris, theatrical manager; Major Archibald Butt, military aide to President

Major Archibald Butt, whose bravery on the sinking vessel will not soon be forgotten, was military aide to

President Taft and was known wherever the President traveled. His recent European mission was apparently

to call on the Pope in behalf of President Taft; for on March 21st he was received at the Vatican, and

presented to the Pope a letter from Mr. Taft thanking the Pontiff for the creation of three new American

Major Butt had a reputation as a horseman, and it is said he was able to keep up with President Roosevelt, be

the ride ever so far or fast. He was promoted to the rank of major in 1911. He sailed for the Mediterranean on

March 2d with his friend Francis D. Millet, the artist, who also perished on the Titanic.

John Jacob Astor was returning from a trip to Egypt with his nineteenyearold bride, formerly Miss

Madeline Force, to whom he was married in Providence, September 9, 1911. He was head of the family

whose name he bore and one of the world's wealthiest men. He was not, however, one of the world's "idle

rich," for his life of fortyseven years was a well filled one. He had managed the family estates since 1891;

built the Astor Hotel, New York; was colonel on the staff of Governor Levi P. Morton, and in May, 1898,

was commissioned colonel of the United States volunteers. After assisting Major General Breckinridge,

inspectorgeneral of the United States army, he was assigned to duty on the staff of MajorGeneral Shafter

and served in Cuba during the operations ending in the surrender of Santiago. He was also the inventor of a

Next to Colonel Astor in financial importance was Benjamin Guggenheim, whose father founded the famous

house of M. Guggenheim and Sons. When the various Guggen heim interests were consolidated into the

American Smelting and Refining Company he retired from active business, although he later became

interested in the Power and Mining Machinery Company of Milwaukee. In 1894 he married Miss Floretta

Isidor Straus, whose wife elected to perish with him in the ship, was a brother of Nathan and Oscar Straus, a

partner with Nathan Straus in R. H. Macy Co. and L. Straus Sons, a member of the firm of Abraham Straus in

Brooklyn, and has been well known in politics and charitable work. He was a member of the Fiftythird

Congress from 1893 to 1895, and as a friend of William L. Wilson was in constant consultation in the matter

Mr. Straus was conspicuous for his works of charity and was an ardent supporter of every enterprise to

improve the condition of the Hebrew immigrants. He was president of the Educational Alliance,

vicepresident of the J. Hood Wright Memorial Hospital, a member of the Chamber of Commerce, on one of

the visiting committees of Harvard University, and was besides a trustee of many financial and philanthropic

Mr. Straus never enjoyed a college education. He was, however, one of the best informed men of the day, his

information having been derived from extensive reading. His library, said to be one of the finest and most

The best known of Philadelphia passengers aboard the Titanic were Mr. and Mrs. George D. Widener. Mr.

Widener was a son of Peter A. B. Widener and, like his father, was recognized as one of the foremost

financiers of Philadelphia as well as a leader in society there. Mr. Widener married Miss Eleanor Elkins, a

daughter of the late William L. Elkins. They made their home with his father at the latter's fine place at

Eastbourne, ten miles from Philadelphia. Mr. Widener was keenly interested in horses and was a constant

exhibitor at horse shows. In business he was recognized as his father's chief adviser in managing the latter's

extensive traction interests. P. A. B. Widener is a director of the International Mercantile Marine.

Mrs. Widener is said to be the possessor of one of the finest collections of jewels in the world, the gift of her

husband. One string of pearls in this collection was reported to be worth $250,000.

The Wideners went abroad two months previous to the disaster, Mr. Widener desiring to inspect some of his

business interests on the other side. At the opening of the London Museum by King George on March 21st

last it was announced that Mrs. Widener had presented to the museum thirty silver plates once the property of

Nell Gwyn. Mr. Widener is survived by a daughter, Eleanor, and a son, George D. Widener, Jr. Harry Elkins

Colonel Washington Augustus Roebling was president of the John A. Roebling Sons' Company,

manufacturers of iron and steel wire rope. He served in the Union Army from 1861 to 1865, resigning to

assist his father in the construction of the Cincinnati and Covington suspension bridge. At the death of his

father in 1869 he took entire charge of the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge, and it is to his genius that the

One of the most notable of the foreign passengers was William T. Stead. Few names are more widely known

to the world of contemporary literature and journalism than that of the brilliant editor of the Review of

Reviews. Matthew Arnold called him "the inventor of the new journalism in England." He was on his way to

America to take part in the Men and Religion Forward Movement and was to have delivered an address in

Union Square on the Thursday after the disaster, with William Jennings Bryan as his chief associate.

Mr. Stead was an earnest advocate of peace and had written many books. His commentary "If Christ Came to

Chicago" raised a storm twenty years ago. When he was in this country in 1907 he addressed a session of

Methodist clergymen, and at one juncture of the meeting remarked that unless the Methodists did something

about the peace movement besides shouting "amen" nobody "would care a damn about their amens!"

Other distinguished Englishmen on the Titanic were Norman C. Craig, M.P., Thomas Andrews, a

representative of the firm of Harland Wolff, of Belfast, the ship's builders, and J. Bruce Ismay, managing

Mr. Ismay is president and one of the founders of the International Mercantile Marine. He has made it a

custom to be a passenger on the maiden voyage of every new ship built by the White Star Line. It was Mr.

Ismay who, with J. P. Morgan, consolidated the British steamship lines under the International Mercantile

Marine's control; and it is largely due to his imagination that such gigantic ships as the Titanic and Olympic

Jacques Futrelle was an author of short stories, some of which have appeared in the Saturday Evening Post,

and of many novels of the same general type as "The Thinking Machine," with which he first gained a wide

popularity. Newspaper work, chiefly in Richmond, Va., engaged his attention from 1890 to 1909, in which

year he entered the theatrical business as a manager. In 1904 he returned to his journalistic career.

Henry B. Harris, the theater manager, had been manager of May Irwin, Peter Dailey, Lily Langtry, Amelia

Bingham, and launched Robert Edeson as star. He became the manager of the Hudson Theater in 1903 and

the Hackett Theater in 1906. Among his best known productions are "The Lion and the Mouse," "The

Traveling Salesman" and "The Third Degree." He was president of the Henry B. Harris Company controlling

Young Harris had a liking for the theatrical business from a boy. Twelve years ago Mr. Harris married Miss

Rene Wallach of Washington. He was said to have a fortune of between $1,000,000 and $3,000,000. He

owned outright the Hudson and the Harris theaters and had an interest in two other show houses in New

York. He owned three theaters in Chicago, one in Syracuse and one in Philadelphia.

Henry Sleeper Harper, who was among the survivors, is a grandson of John Wesley Harper, one of the

founders of the Harper publishing business. H. Sleeper Harper was himself an incorporator of Harper

Brothers when the firm became a corporation in 1896. He had a desk in the offices of the publishers, but his

hand of late years in the management of the business has been very slight. He has been active in the work of

keeping the Adirondack forests free from aggression. He was in the habit of spending about half of his time

in foreign travel. His friends in New York recalled that he had a narrow escape about ten years ago when a

Millet was one of the bestknown American painters and many of his canvasses are found in the leading

galleries of the world. He served as a drummer boy with the Sixtieth Massachusetts volunteers in the Civil

War, and from early manhood took a prominent part in public affairs. He was director of the decorations for

the Chicago Exposition and was, at the time of the disaster, secretary of the American Academy in Rome. He

was a wide traveler and the author of many books, besides translations of Tolstoi.

Another person of prominence was Charles Melville Hays, president of the Grand Trunk and the Grand

Trunk Pacific railways. He was described by Sir Wilfrid Laurier at a dinner of the Canadian Club of New

York, at the Hotel Astor last year, as "beyond question the greatest railroad genius in Canada, as an executive

genius ranking second only to the late Edward H. Harriman." He was returning aboard the Titanic with his

SUNDAY night the magnificent ocean liner was plunging through a comparatively placid sea, on the surface

of which there was much mushy ice and here and there a number of comparatively harmlesslooking floes.

The night was clear and stars visible. First Officer William T. Murdock was in charge of the bridge The first

intimation of the presence of the iceberg that he received was from the lookout in the crow's nest.

Three warnings were transmitted from the crow's nest of the Titanic to the officer on the doomed steamship's

bridge 15 minutes before she struck, according to Thomas Whiteley, a first saloon steward.

Whiteley, who was whipped overboard from the ship by a rope while helping to lower a lifeboat, finally

reported on the Carpathia aboard one of the boats that contained, he said, both the crow's nest lookouts. He

heard a conversation between them, he asserted, in which they discussed the warnings given to the Titanic's

Whiteley did not know the names of either of the lookout men and believed that they returned to England

"I heard one of them say that at 11.15 o'clock, 15 minutes before the Titanic struck, he had reported to First

Officer Murdock, on the bridge, that he fancied he saw an iceberg!" said Whiteley. "Twice after that, the

lookout said, he warned Murdock that a berg was ahead. They were very indignant that no attention was paid

Murdock's tardy answering of a telephone call from the crow's nest is assigned by Whiteley as the cause of

When Murdock answered the call he received the information that the iceberg was due ahead. This

information was imparted just a few seconds before the crash, and had the officer promptly answered the ring

of the bell it is probable that the accident could have been avoided, or at least, been reduced by the lowered

The lookout saw a towering "blue berg" looming up in the sea path of the Titanic, and called the bridge on

the ship's telephone. When, after the passing of those two or three fateful minutes an officer on the bridge

lifted the telephone receiver from its hook to answer the lookout, it was too late. The speeding liner, cleaving

a calm sea under a starstudded sky, had reached the floating mountain of ice, which the theoretically

Had Murdock, according to the account of the tragedy given by two of the Titanic's seamen, known how

imperative was that call from the lookout man, the men at the wheel of the liner might have swerved the great

ship sufficiently to avoid the berg altogether. At the worst the vessel would probably have struck the mass of

Murdock, if the tale of the Titanic sailor be true, expiated his negligence by shooting himself within sight of

When at last the danger was realized, the great ship was so close upon the berg that it was practically

The first officer did what other startled and alert commanders would have done under similar circumstances,

that is he made an effort by going full speed ahead on the starboard propeller and reversing his port propeller,

simultaneously throwing his helm over, to make a rapid turn and clear the berg. The maneuver was not

successful. He succeeded in saving his bows from crashing into the icecliff, but nearly the entire length of

the underbody of the great ship on the starboard side was ripped. The speed of the Titanic, estimated to be at

least twentyone knots, was so terrific that the knifelike edge of the iceberg's spur protruding under the sea

The Titanic was in 41.46 north latitude and 50.14 west longitude when she was struck, very near the spot on

the wide Atlantic where the Carmania encountered a field of ice, studded with great bergs, on her voyage to

New York which ended on April 14th. It was really an ice pack, due to an unusually severe winter in the

north Atlantic. No less than twentyfive bergs, some of great height, were counted.

The shock was almost imperceptible. The first officer did not apparently realize that the great ship had

received her death wound, and none of the passengers had the slightest suspicion that anything more than a

usual minor sea accident had happened. Hundreds who had gone to their berths and were asleep were

To illustrate the placidity with which practically all the men regarded the accident it is related that Pierre

Marechal, son of the viceadmiral of the French navy, Lucien Smith, Paul Chevre, a French sculptor, and A.

The four calmly got up from the table and after walking on deck and looking over the rail returned to their

game. One of them had left his cigar on the card table, and while the three others were gazing out on the sea

he remarked that he couldn't afford to lose his smoke, returned for his cigar and came out again.

They remained only for a few moments on deck, and then resumed their game under the impression that the

ship had stopped for reasons best known to the captain and not involving any danger to her. Later, in

describing the scene that took place, M. Marechal, who was among the survivors, said: "When threequarters

of a mile away we stopped, the spectacle before our eyes was in its way magnificent. In a very calm sea,

beneath a sky moonless but sown with millions of stars, the enormous Titanic lay on the water, illuminated

from the water line to the boat deck. The bow was slowly sinking into the black water."

The tendency of the whole ship's company except the men in the engine department, who were made aware

of the danger by the inrushing water, was to make light of and in some instances even to ridicule the thought

When Captain Smith came from the chart room onto the bridge, his first words were, "Close the emergency

"Send to the carpenter and tell him to sound the ship," was the next order. The message was sent to the

carpenter, but the carpenter never came up to report. He was probably the first man on the ship to lose his

The captain then looked at the communicator, which shows in what direction the ship is listing. He saw that

The ship was then rapidly settling forward. All the steam sirens were blowing. By the captain's orders, given

in the next few minutes, the engines were put to work at pumping out the ship, distress signals were sent by

the Marconi, and rockets were sent up from the bridge by Quartermaster Rowe. All hands were ordered on

The blasting shriek of the sirens had not alarmed the great company of the Titanic, because such steam calls

are an incident of travel in seas where fogs roll. Many had gone to bed, but the hour, 11.40 P. M., was not too

late for the friendly contact of saloons and smoking rooms. It was Sunday night and the ship's concert had

ended, but there were many hundreds up and moving among the gay lights, and many on deck with their eyes

strained toward the mysterious west, where home lay. And in one jarring, breathsweeping moment all of

these, asleep or awake, were at the mercy of chance. Few among the more than 2000 aboard could have had a

thought of danger. The man who had stood up in the smoking room to say that the Titanic was vulnerable or

that in a few minutes twothirds of her people would be face to face with death, would have been considered

a fool or a lunatic. No ship ever sailed the seas that gave her passengers more confidence, more cool security.

Within a few minutes stewards and other members of the crew were sent round to arouse the people. Some

utterly refused to get up. The stewards had almost to force the doors of the staterooms to make the somnolent

appreciate their peril, and many of them, it is believed, were drowned like rats in a trap.

Colonel and Mrs. Astor were in their room and saw the ice vision flash by. They had not appreciably felt the

gentle shock and supposed that nothing out of the ordinary had happened. They were both dressed and came

on deck leisurely. William T. Stead, the London journalist, wandered on deck for a few minutes, stopping to

talk to Frank Millet. "What do they say is the trouble?" he asked. "Icebergs," was the brief reply. "Well," said

From end to end on the mighty boat officers were rushing about without much noise or confusion, but giving

orders sharply. Captain Smith told the third officer to rush downstairs and see whether the water was coming

in very fast. "And," he added, "take some armed guards along to see that the stokers and engineers stay at

In two minutes the officer returned. "It looks pretty bad, sir," he said. "The water is rushing in and filling the

bottom. The locks of the watertight compartments have been sprung by the shock."

Through the length and breadth of the boat, upstairs and downstairs, on all decks, the cry rang out: "All

For the first time, there was a feeling of panic. Husbands sought for wives and children. Families gathered

together. Many who were asleep hastily caught up their clothing and rushed on deck. A moment before the

men had been joking about the lifebelts, according to the story told by Mrs. Vera Dick, of Calgary, Canada.

"Try this one," one man said to her, "they are the very latest thing this season. Everybody's wearing them

Another man suggested to a woman friend, who had a fox terrier in her arms, that she should put a lifesaver

on the dog. "It won't fit," the woman replied, laughing. "Make him carry it in his mouth," said the friend.

Below, on the steerage deck, there was intense confusion. About the time the officers on the first deck gave

the order that all men should stand to one side and all women should go below to deck B, taking the children

with them, a similar order was given to the steerage passengers. The women were ordered to the front, the

men to the rear. Half a dozen healthy, husky immigrants pushed their way forward and tried to crowd into the

"Stand back," shouted the officers who were manning the boat. "The women come first."

Shouting curses in various foreign languages, the immigrant men continued their pushing and tugging to

climb into the boats. Shots rang out. One big fellow fell over the railing into the water. Another dropped to

the deck, moaning. His jaw had been shot away. This was the story told by the bystanders afterwards on the

pier. One husky Italian told the writer on the pier that the way in which the men were shot down was horrible.

On board the Titanic, the wireless operator, with a lifebelt about his waist, was hitting the instrument that

"Shall I tell captain to turn back and help?" flashed a reply from the Carpathia.

An hour later, when the second wireless man came into the boxlike room to tell his companion what the

situation was, he found a negro stoker creeping up behind the operator and saw him raise a knife over his

head. He said afterwardshe was among those rescuedthat he realized at once that the negro intended to

kill the operator in order to take his life belt from him. The second operator pulled out his revolver and shot

"That negro was going to kill you and steal your lifebelt," the second man replied.

"Thanks, old man," said the operator. The second man went on deck to get some more information. He was

just in time to jump overboard before the Titanic went down. The wireless operator and the body of the negro

On the deck where the first class passengers were quartered, known as deck A, there was none of the

confusion that was taking place on the lower decks. The Titanic was standing without much rocking. The

ONCE on the deck, many hesitated to enter the swinging lifeboats. Tho glassy sea, the starlit sky, the

absence, in the first few moments, of intense excitement, gave them the feeling that there was only some

slight mishap; that those who got into the boats would have a chilly half hour below and might, later, be

It was such a feeling as this, from all accounts, which caused John Jacob Astor and his wife to refuse the

places offered them in the first boat, and to retire to the gymnasium. In the same way H. J. Allison, a

Montreal banker, laughed at the warning, and his wife, reassured by him, took her time dressing. They and

their daughter did not reach the Carpathia. Their son, less than two years old, was carried into a lifeboat by

The admiration felt by the passengers and crew for the matchlessly appointed vessel was translated, in those

first few moments, into a confidence which for some proved deadly. The pulsing of the engines had ceased,

and the steamship lay just as though she were awaiting the order to go on again after some trifling matter had

been adjusted. But in a few minutes the canvas covers were lifted from the lifeboats and the crews allotted

Nearly all the boats that were lowered on the port side of the ship touched the water without capsizing. Four

of the others lowered to starboard, including one collapsible, were capsized. All, however, who were in the

collapsible boats that practically went to pieces, were rescued by the other boats.

Presently the order was heard: "All men stand back and all women retire to the deck below." That was the

smoking room deck, or the B deck. The men stood away and remained in absolute silence, leaning against

the rail or pacing up and down the deck slowly. Many of them lighted cigars or cigarettes and began to

The boats were swung out and lowered from the A deck above. The women were marshaled quietly in lines

along the B deck, and when the boats were lowered down to the level of the latter the women were assisted to

As each of the boats was filled with its quota of passengers the word was given and it was carefully lowered

Nobody seemed to know how Mr. Ismay got into a boat, but it was assumed that he wished to make a

presentation of the case of the Titanic to his company. He was among those who apparently realized that the

splendid ship was doomed. All hands in the lifeboats, under instructions from officers and men in charge,

were rowed a considerable distance from the ship herself in order to get far away from the possible suction

Captain Smith and Major Archibald Butt, military aide to the President of the United States, were among the

coolest men on board. A number of steerage passengers were yelling and screaming and fighting to get to the

boats. Officers drew guns and told them that if they moved towards the boats they would be shot dead. Major

The following story of his bravery was told by Mrs. Henry B. Harris, wife of the theatrical manager:

"The world should rise in praise of Major Butt. That man's conduct will remain in my memory forever. The

American army is honored by him and the way he taught some of the other men how to behave when women

and children were suffering that awful mental fear of death. Major Butt was near me and I noticed everything

"When the order to man the boats came, the captain whispered something to Major Butt. The two of them had

become friends. The major immediately became as one in supreme command. You would have thought he

was at a White House reception. A dozen or more women became hysterical all at once, as something

" `Really, you must not act like that; we are all going to see you through this thing.' He helped the sailors

rearrange the rope or chain that had gone wrong and lifted some of the women in with a touch of gallantry.

Not only was there a complete lack of any fear in his manner, but there was the action of an aristocrat.

"When the time came he was a man to be feared. In one of the earlier boats fifty women, it seemed, were

about to be lowered, when a man, suddenly panicstricken, ran to the stern of it. Major Butt shot one arm out,

caught him by the back of the neck and jerked him backward like a pillow. His head cracked against a rail

" `Sorry,' said Major Butt, `women will be attended to first or I'll break every damned bone in your body.'

"The boats were lowered one by one, and as I stood by, my husband said to me, `Thank God, for Archie

Butt.' Perhaps Major Butt heard it, for he turned his face towards us for a second and smiled. Just at that

moment, a young man was arguing to get into a lifeboat, and Major Butt had a hold of the lad by the arm,

"Major Butt helped those poor frightened steerage people so wonderfully, so tenderly and yet with such cool

and manly firmness that he prevented the loss of many lives from panic. He was a soldier to the last. He was

one of God's greatest noblemen, and I think I can say he was an example of bravery even to men on the ship."

Miss Marie Young, who was a music instructor to President Roosevelt's children and had known Major Butt

during the Roosevelt occupancy of the White House, told this story of his heroism.

"Archie himself put me into the boat, wrapped blankets about me and tucked me in as carefully as if we were

starting on a motor ride. He, himself, entered the boat with me, performing the little courtesies as calmly and

with as smiling a face as if death were far away, instead of being but a few moments removed from him.

"When he had carefully wrapped me up he stepped upon the gunwale of the boat, and lifting his hat, smiled

down at me. `Goodbye, Miss Young,' he said. `Good luck to you, and don't forget to remember me to the

folks back home.' Then he stepped back and waved his hand to me as the boat was lowered. I think I was the

last woman he had a chance to help, for the boat went down shortly after we cleared the suction zone."

Colonel Astor was another of the heroes of the awful night. Effort was made to persuade him to take a place

in one of the lifeboats, but he emphatically refused to do so until every woman and child on board had been

"He led Mrs. Astor to the side of the ship and helped her to the lifeboat to which she had been assigned. I

saw that she was prostrated and said she would remain and take her chances with him, but Colonel Astor

quietly insisted and tried to reassure her in a few words. As she took her place in the boat her eyes were fixed

upon him. Colonel Astor smiled, touched his cap, and when the boat moved safely away from the ship's side

Mrs. Ida S. Hippach and her daughter Jean, survivors of the Titanic, said they were saved by Colonel John

"We saw Colonel Astor place Mrs. Astor in a boat and assure her that he would follow later," said Mrs.

"He turned to us with a smile and said, `Ladies, you are next.' The officer in charge of the boat protested that

"Colonel Astor exclaimed, `Hold that boat,' in the voice of a man accustomed to be obeyed, and they did as

he ordered. The boat had been lowered past the upper deck and the colonel took us to the deck below and put

There were some terrible scenes. Fathers were parting from their children and giving them an encouraging pat

on the shoulders; men were kissing their wives and telling them that they would be with them shortly. One

man said there was absolutely no danger, that the boat was the finest ever built, with watertight

compartments, and that it could not sink. That seemed to be the general impression.

A few of the men, however, were panicstricken even when the first of the fiftysix foot lifeboats was

being filled. Fully ten men threw themselves into the boats already crowded with women and children. These

men were dragged back and hurled sprawling across the deck. Six of them, screamed with fear, struggled to

About ten shots sounded in quick succession. The six cowardly men were stopped in their tracks, staggered

and collapsed one after another. At least two of them vainly attempted to creep toward the boats again. The

others lay quite still. This scene of bloodshed served its purpose. In that particular section of the deck there

"I helped fill the boats with women," said Thomas Whiteley, who was a waiter on the Titanic. "Collapsible

boat No. 2 on the starboard jammed. The second officer was hacking at the ropes with a knife and I was being

dragged around the deck by that rope when I looked up and saw the boat, with all aboard, turn turtle. In some

way I got overboard myself and clung to an oak dresser. I wasn't more than sixty feet from the Titanic when

she went down. Her big stern rose up in the air and she went down bow first. I saw all the machinery drop out

Henry B. Harris, of New York, a theatrical manager, was one of the men who showed superb courage in the

crisis. When the lifeboats were first being filled, and before there was any panic, Mr. Harris went to the side

"Women first," shouted one of the ship's officers. Mr. Harris glanced up and saw that the remark was

"All right," he replied coolly. "Goodbye, my dear," he said, as he kissed his wife, pressed her a moment to

Up to this time there had been no panic; but about one hour before the ship plunged to the bottom there were

three separate explosions of bulkheads as the vessel filled. These were at intervals of about fifteen minutes.

From that time there was a different scene. The rush for the remaining boats became a stampede.

The stokers rushed up from below and tried to beat a path through the steerage men and women and through

the sailors and officers, to get into the boats. They had their iron bars and shovels, and they struck down all

The first to come up from the depths of the ship was an engineer. From what he is reported to have said it is

probable that the steam fittings were broken and many were scalded to death when the Titanic lifted. He said

he had to dash through a narrow place beside a broken pipe and his back was frightfully scalded.

Right at his heels came the stokers. The officers had pistols, but they could not use them at first for fear of

killing the women and children. The sailors fought with their fists and many of them took the stoke bars and

Many of the coalpassers and stokers who had been driven back from the boats went to the rail, and

whenever a boat was filled and lowered several of them jumped overboard and swam toward it trying to

climb aboard. Several of the survivors said that men who swam to the sides of their boats were pulled in or

Dozens of the cabin passengers were witnesses of some of the frightful scenes on the steerage deck. The

steerage survivors said that ten women from the upper decks were the only cool passengers in the lifeboat,

and they tried to quiet the steerage women, who were nearly all crazed with fear and grief.

Among the chivalrous young heroes of the Titanic disaster were Washington A. Roebling, 2d, and Howard

Case, London representative of the Vacuum Oil Company. Both were urged repeatedly to take places in

lifeboats, but scorned the opportunity, while working against time to save the women aboard the illfated

ship. They went to their death, it is said by survivors, with smiles on their faces.

Both of these young men aided in the saving of Mrs. William T. Graham, wife of the president of the

"There was a rap at the door. It was a passenger whom we had met shortly after the ship left Liverpool, and

his name was RoeblingWashington A. Roebling, 2d. He was a gentleman and a brave man. He warned us

of the danger and told us that it would be best to be prepared for an emergency. We heeded his warning, and I

looked out of my window and saw a great big iceberg facing us. Immediately I knew what had happened and

" `We've only burst two pipes,' he said. `Everything is all right, don't worry.'

"Just at that time they were filling up the third lifeboat on the port side of the ship. I thought at the time that

it was the third boat which had been lowered, but I found out later that they had lowered other boats on the

other side, where the people were more excited because they were sinking on that side.

"Just then Mr. Roebling came up, too, and told us to hurry and get into the third boat. Mr. Roebling and Mr.

Case bustled our party of three into that boat in less time than it takes to tell it. They were both working hard

to help the women and children. The boat was fairly crowded when we three were pushed into it, and a few

men jumped in at the last moment, but Mr. Roebling and Mr. Case stood at the rail and made no attempt to

"They shouted goodbye to us. What do you think Mr. Case did then? He just calmly lighted a cigarette and

waved us goodbye with his hand. Mr. Roebling stood there, too I can see him now. I am sure that he

Scenes on the sinking vessel grew more tragic as the remaining passengers faced the awful certainty that

death must be the portion of the majority, death in the darkness of a wintry sea studded with its ice

In that hour, when cherished illusions of possible safety had all but vanished, manhood and womanhood

aboard the Titanic rose to their sublimest heights. It was in that crisis of the direst extremity that many brave

women deliberately rejected life and chose rather to remain and die with the men whom they loved.

"I will not leave my husband," said Mrs. Isidor Straus. "We are old; we can best die together," and she turned

from those who would have forced her into one of the boats and clung to the man who had been the partner of

her joys and sorrows. Thus they stood hand in hand and heart to heart, comforting each other until the sea

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

Miss Elizabeth Evans fulfilled this final test of affection laid down by the Divine Master. The girl was the

niece of the wife of Magistrate Cornell, of New York. She was placed in the same boat with many other

women. As it was about to be lowered away it was found that the craft contained one more than its full quota

The grim question arose as to which of them should surrender her place and her chance of safety. Beside

Miss Evans sat Mrs. J. J. Brown, of Denver, the mother of several children. Miss Evans was the first to

"Your need is greater than mine," said she to Mrs. Brown. "You have children who need you, and I have

So saying she arose from the boat and stepped back upon the deck. The girl found no later refuge and was

one of those who went down with the ship. She was twentyfive years old and was beloved by all who knew

Mrs. Brown thereafter showed the spirit which had made her also volunteer to leave the boat. There were

only three men in the boat and but one of them rowed. Mrs. Brown, who was raised on the water,

In the boat which carried Mrs. Cornell and Mrs. Appleton there were places for seventeen more than were

carried. This too was undermanned and the two women at once took their places at the oars.

The Countess of Rothes was pulling at the oars of her boat, likewise undermanned because the crew preferred

Miss Bentham, of Rochester, showed splendid courage. She happened to be in a lifeboat which was very

much crowdedso much so that one sailor had to sit with his feet dangling in the icy cold water, and as time

went on the sufferings of the man from the cold were apparent. Miss Bentham arose from her place and had

Scarcely any of the lifeboats were properly manned. Two, filled with women and children, capsized

immediately, while the collapsible boats were only temporarily useful. They soon filled with water. In one

heard it, but have forgotten it. But I saw an order for five pounds which this man gave to each of the crew of

his boat after they got aboard the Carpathia. It was on a piece of ordinary paper addressed to the Coutts Bank

"We called that boat the `money boat.' It was lowered from the starboard side and was one of the first off.

Our orders were to load the lifeboats beginning forward on the port side, working aft and then back on the

starboard. This man paid the firemen to lower a starboard boat before the officers had given the order."

Whiteley's own experience was a hard one. When the uncoiling rope, which entangled his feet, threw him

into the sea, it furrowed the flesh of his leg, but he did not feel the pain until he was safe aboard the

"I floated on my lifepreserver for several hours," he said, "then I came across a big oak dresser with two

men clinging to it. I hung on to this till daybreak and the two men dropped off. When the sun came up I saw

the collapsible raft in the distance, just black with men. They were all standing up, and I swam to italmost

a mile, it seemed to me and they would not let me aboard. Mr. Lightoller, the second officer, was one of

" `It's thirtyone lives against yours,, he said, `you can't come aboard. There's not room.' "

"I pleaded with him in vain, and then I confess I prayed that somebody might die, so I could take his place. It

"By and by, we saw seven lifeboats lashed together, and we were taken into them."

The officers had to assert their authority by force, and three foreigners from the steerage who tried to force

Robert Daniel, a Philadelphia passenger, told of terrible scenes at this period of the disaster. He said men

fought and bit and struck one another like madmen, and exhibited wounds upon his face to prove the

assertion. Mr. Daniel said that he was picked up naked from the icecold water and almost perished from

exposure before he was rescued. He and others told how the Titanic's bow was completely torn away by the

K. Whiteman, of Palmyra, N. J., the Titanic's barber, was lowering boats on deck after the collision, and

declared the officers on the bridge, one of them First Officer Murdock, promptly worked the electrical

apparatus for closing the water tight compartments. He believed the machinery was in some way so

damaged by the crash that the front compartments failed to close tightly, although the rear ones were secure.

Whiteman's manner of escape was unique. He was blown off the deck by the second of the two explosions of

the boilers, and was in the water more than two hours before he was picked up by a raft.

"The explosions," Whiteman said; "were caused by the rushing in of the icy water on the boilers. A bundle of

deck chairs, roped together, was blown off the deck with me, and I struck my back, injuring my spine, but it

"The crew and passengers had faith in the bulkhead system to save the ship and we were lowering a

collapsible boat, all confident the ship would get through, when she took a terrific dip forward and the water

"The bow went clean down, and I caught the pile of chairs as I was washed up against the rim. Then came the

"After the water had filled the forward compartments, the ones at the stern could not save her, although they

did delay the ship's going down. If it wasn't for the compartments hardly anyone could have got away."

One of the Titanic's stewards, Johnson by name, carried this message to the sorrowing widow of Benjamin

"When Mr. Guggenheim realized that there was grave danger," said the room steward, "he advised his

secretary, who also died, to dress fully and he himself did the same. Mr. Guggenheim, who was cool and

" `I think there is grave doubt that the men will get off safely. I am willing to remain and play the man's

game, if there are not enough boats for more than the women and children. I won't die here like a beast. I'll

" `Tell my wife, Johnson, if it should happen that my secretary and I both go down and you are saved, tell her

I played the game out straight and to the end. No woman shall be left aboard this ship because Ben

" `Tell her that my last thoughts will be of her and of our girls, but that my duty now is to these unfortunate

women and children on this ship. Tell her I will meet whatever fate is in store for me, knowing she will

In telling the story the room steward said the last he saw of Mr. Guggenheim was when he stood fully dressed

Before the last of the boats got away, according to some of the passengers' narratives, there were more than

fifty shots fired upon the decks by officers or others in the effort to maintain the discipline that until then had

Richard Norris Williams, Jr., one of the survivors of the Titanic, saw his father killed by being crushed by

"We stood on deck watching the lifeboats of the Titanic being filled and lowered into the water," said Mr.

Williams. "The water was nearly up to our waists and the ship was about at her last. Suddenly one of the

great funnels fell. I sprang aside, endeavoring to pull father with me. A moment later the funnel was swept

"I sprang overboard and swam through the ice to a life raft, and was pulled aboard. There were five men and

one woman on the raft. Occasionally we were swept off into the sea, but always managed to crawl back.

"A sailor lighted a cigarette and flung the match carelessly among the women. Several screamed, fearing they

would be set on fire. The sailor replied: `We are going to hell anyway and we might as well be cremated now

A huge cake of ice was the means of aiding Emile Portaleppi, of Italy, in his hairbreadth escape from death

when the Titanic went down. Portaleppi, a second class passenger, was awakened by the explosion of one of

the bulkheads of the ship. He hurried to the deck, strapped a lifepreserver around him and leaped into the

sea. With the aid of the preserver and by holding to a cake of ice he managed to keep afloat until one of the

lifeboats picked him up. There were thirtyfive other people in the boat, he said, when he was hauled

Somewhere in the shadow of the appalling Titanic disaster slinksstill living by the inexplicable grace of

Goda cur in human shape, today the most despicable human being in all the world.

In that grim midnight hour, already great in history, he found himself hemmed in by the band of heroes

whose watchword and countersign rang out across the deep"Women and children first!"

What did he do? He scuttled to the stateroom deck, put on a woman's skirt, a woman's hat and a woman's

veil, and picking his crafty way back among the brave and chivalric men who guarded the rail of the doomed

His name is on that list of branded rescued men who were neither picked up from the sea when the ship went

down nor were in the boats under orders to help get them safe away. His identity is not yet known, though it

The eyes of strong men who have read this crowded record of golden deeds, who have read and reread that

deathless roll of honor of the dead, are still wet with tears of pity and of pride. This man still lives. Surely he

was born and saved to set for men a new standard by which to measure infamy and shame.

It is well that there was sufficient heroism on board the Titanic to neutralize the horrors of the cowardice.

When the first order was given for the men to stand back, there were a dozen or more who pushed forward

and said that men would be needed to row the lifeboats and that they would volunteer for the work.

The officers tried to pick out the ones that volunteered merely for service and to eliminate those who

volunteered merely to save their own lives. This elimination process however, was not wholly successful.

As the ship began to settle to starboard, heeling at an angle of nearly fortyfive degrees, those who had

believed it was all right to stick by the ship began to have doubts, and a few jumped into the sea. They were

followed immediately by others, and in a few minutes there were scores swimming around. Nearly all of

them wore lifepreservers. One man, who had a Pomeranian dog, leaped overboard with it and striking a

piece of wreckage was badly stunned. He recovered after a few minutes and swam toward one of the

Said one survivor, speaking of the men who remained on the ship. "There they stoodMajor Butt, Colonel

Astor waving a farewell to his wife, Mr. Thayer, Mr. Case, Mr. Clarence Moore, Mr. Widener, all

multimillionaires, and hundreds of other men, bravely smiling at us all. Never have I seen such chivalry and

fortitude. Such courage in the face of fate horrible to contemplate filled us even then with wonder and

Why were men saved? ask: others who seek to make the occasional male survivor a hissing scorn; and yet the

testimony makes it clear that for a long time during that ordeal the more frightful position seemed to many to

be in the frail boats in the vast relentless sea, and that some men had to be tumbled into the boats under orders

from the officers. Others express the deepest indignation that 210 sailors were rescued, the testimony shows

that most of these sailors were in the welter of ice and water into which they had been thrown from the ship's

The one alleviating circumstance in the otherwise immitigable tragedy is the fact that so many of the men

stood aside really with out the necessity for the order, "Women and children first," and insisted that the

There were men whose word of command swayed boards of directors, governed institutions, disposed of

millions. They were accustomed merely to pronounce a wish to have it gratified. Thousands "posted at their

bidding"; the complexion of the market altered hue when they nodded; they bought what they wanted, and for

one of the humblest fishing smacks or a dory they could have given the price that was paid to build and

launch the ship that has become the most imposing mausoleum that ever housed the bones of men since the

But these men stood asideone can see them!and gave place not merely to the delicate and the refined,

but to the scared Czech woman from the steerage, with her baby at her breast; the Croatian with a toddler by

her side, coming through the very gate of Death and out of the mouth of Hell to the imagined Eden of

To many of those who went it was harder to go than to stay there on the vessel gaping with its mortal wounds

and ready to go down. It meant that tossing on the waters they must wait in suspense, hour after hour even

after the lights of the ship were engulfed in appalling darkness, hoping against hope for the miracle of a

It was the tradition of AngloSaxon heroism that was fulfilled in the frozen seas during the black hours of

Sunday night. The heroism was that of the women who went, as well as of the men who remained!

THE general feeling aboard the ship after the boats had left her sides was that she would not survive her

William T. Stead, the famous English journalist, was so litt{l}e alarmed that he calmly discussed with one of

the passengers the probable height of the iceberg after the Titanic had shot into it.

Confidence in the ability of the Titanic to remain afloat doubtlessly led many of the passengers to death. The

theory that the great ship was unsinkable remained with hundreds who had entrusted themselves to the

The captain and officers behaved with superb gallantry, and there was perfect order and discipline among

those who were aboard, even after all hope had been abandoned for the salvation of the ship.

Many women went down, steerage women who were unable to get to the upper decks where the boats were

launched, maids who were overlooked in the confusion, cabin passengers who refused to desert their

husbands or who reached the decks after the last of the lifeboats was gone and the ship was settling for her

Narratives of survivors do not bear out the supposition that the final hours upon the vessel's decks were

passed in darkness. They say the electric lighting plant held out until the last, and that even as they watched

the ship sink, from their places in the floating lifeboats, her lights were gleaming in long rows as she

plunged under by the head. Just before she sank, some of the refugees say, the ship broke in two abaft the

"Many men were hanging on to rafts in the sea. William T. Stead and Colonel Astor were among them. Their

The last man among the survivors to speak to Colonel Astor was K. Whiteman, the ship's barber.

"I shaved Colonel Astor Sunday afternoon," said Whiteman. "He was a pleasant, affable man, and that awful

night when I found myself standing beside him on the passenger deck, helping to put the women into the

" `Get one while there is time,' I told him. `The last boat is gone, and we are done for.'

" `No,' he said, `I think there are some lifeboats to be launched, and we may get on one of them.'

" `There are no liferafts,' I told him, `and the ship is going to sink. I am going to jump overboard and take a

chance on swimming out and being picked up by one of the boats. Better come along.'

"I asked him if he would mind shaking hands with me. He said, `With pleasure,' gave me a hearty grip, and

then I climbed up on the rail and jumped overboard. I was in the water nearly four hours before one of the

Murdock's last orders were to Quartermaster Moody and a few other petty officers who had taken their places

in the rigid discipline of the ship and were lowering the boats. Captain Smith came up to him on the bridge

several times and then rushed down again. They spoke to one another only in monosyllables.

There were stories that Captain Smith, when he saw the ship actually going down, had committed suicide.

There is no basis for such tales. The captain, according to the testimony of those who were near him almost

until the last, was admirably cool. He carried a revolver in his hand, ready to use it on anyone who disobeyed

"I want every man to act like a man for manhood's sake," he said, "and if they don't, a bullet awaits the

With the revolver in his handa fact that undoubtedly gave rise to the suicide theorythe captain moved up

and down the deck. He gave the order for each lifeboat to make off and he remained until every boat was

gone. Standing on the bridge he finally called out the order: "Each man save himself." At that moment all

discipline fled. It was the last call of death. If there had been any hope among those on board before, the hope

The bearded admiral of the White Star Line fleet, with every lifesaving device launched from the decks, was

returning to the deck to perform the sacred office of going down with his ship when a wave dashed over the

The Titanic was sinking rapidly by the head, with the twisting sidelong motion that was soon to aim her on

her course two miles down. Murdock saw the skipper swept out; but did not move. Captain Smith was but

one of a multitude of lost at that moment. Murdock may have known that the last desperate thought of the

gray mariner was to get upon his bridge and die in command. That the old man could not have done this may

have had something to do with Murdock's suicidal inspiration. Of that no man may say or safely guess.

The wave that swept the skipper out bore him almost to the thwart of a crowded lifeboat. Hands reached

He disappeared for a moment, then reappeared where a rail was slipping under water. Cool and courageous to

the end, loyal to his duty under the most difficult circumstances, he showed himself a noble captain, and he

Quartermaster Moody saw all this, watched the skipper scramble aboard again onto the submerged decks, and

As Moody's eye lost sight of the skipper in this confusion of waters it again shifted to the bridge, and just in

time to see Murdock take his life. The man's face was turned toward him, Moody said, and he could not

mistake it. There were still many gleaming lights on the ship, flickering out like little groups of vanishing

stars, and with the clear starshine on the waters there was nothing to cloud or break the quartermaster's vision.

"I saw Murdock die by his own hand," said Moody, "saw the flash from his gun, heard the crack that

Others report hearing several pistol shots on the decks below the bridge, but amid the groans and shrieks and

cries, shouted orders and all that vast orchestra of sounds that broke upon the air they must have been faint

The band had broken out in the strains of "Nearer, My God, to Thee," some minutes before Murdock lifted

the revolver to his head, fired and toppled over on his face. Moody saw all this in a vision that filled his brain,

while his ears drank in the tragic strain of the beautiful hymn that the band played as their own dirge, even to

Wherever Murdock's eye swept the water in that instant, before he drew his revolver, it looked upon veritable

seas of drowning men and women. From the decks there came to him the shrieks and groans of the caged and

drowning, for whom all hope of escape was utterly vanished. He evidently never gave a thought to the

possibility of saving himself, his mind freezing with the horrors he beheld and having room for just one

The strains of the hymn and the frantic cries of the dying blended in a symphony of sorrow.

Led by the green light, under the light of stars, the boats drew away, and the bow, then the quarter, then the

stacks and last the stern of the marvel ship of a few days before passed beneath the waters. The great force of

the ship's sinking was unaided by any violence of the elements, and the suction, not so great as had been

feared, rocked but mildly the group of boats now a quarter of a mile distant from it.

Just before the Titanic disappeared from view men and women leaped from the stern. More than a hundred

men, according to Colonel Gracie, jumped at the last. Gracie was among the number and he and the second

As the vessel disappeared, the waves drowned the majestic hymn which the musicians played as they went to

their watery grave. The most authentic accounts agree that this hymn was not "Nearer, My God, to Thee,"

which it seems had been played shortly before, but "Autumn," which is found in the Episcopal hymnal and

which fits appropriately the situation on the Titanic in the last moments of pain and darkness there. One line,

"Hold me up in mighty waters," particularly may have suggested the hymn to some minister aboard the

doomed vessel, who, it has been thought, thereupon asked the remaining passengers to join in singing the

hymn, in a last service aboard the sinking ship, soon to be ended by death itself.

It was a little lame schoolmaster, Tyrtaeus, who aroused the Spartans by his poetry and led them to victory

It was the musicians of the band of the Titanicpoor men, paid a few dollars a weekwho played the

"The way the band kept playing was a noble thing," says the wireless operator. "I heard it first while we were

working the wireless, when there was a ragtime tune for us, and the last I saw of the band, when I was

floating, struggling in the icy water, it was still on deck, playing `Autumn.' How those brave fellows ever did

Perhaps that music, made in the face of death, would not have satisfied the exacting critical sense. It may be

that the chilled fingers faltered on the pistons of the cornet or at the valves of the French horn, that the time

was irregular and that by an organ in a church, with a decorous congregation, the hymns they chose would

have been better played and sung. But surely that music went up to God from the souls of drowning men, and

was not less acceptable than the song of songs no mortal ear may hear, the harps of the seraphs and the

choiring cherubim. Under the sea the musicmakers lie, still in their fingers clutching the broken and battered

means of melody; but over the strident voice of warring winds and the sound of many waters there rises their

chant eternally; and though the musicians lie hushed and cold at the sea's heart, their music is heard

That great ship, which started out as proudly, went down to her death like some grime silent juggernaut,

drunk with carnage and anxious to stop the throbbing of her own heart at the bottom of the sea. Charles H.

"I stuck to the ship until the water came up to my ankles. There had been no lamentations, no demonstrations

either from the men passengers as they saw the last lifeboat go, and there was no wailing or crying, no

outburst from the men who lined the ship's rail as the Titanic disappeared from sight.

"The men stood quietly as if they were in church. They knew that they were in the sight of God; that in a

moment judgment would be passed upon them. Finally, the ship took a dive, reeling for a moment, then

plunging. I was sucked to the side of the ship against the grating over the blower for the exhaust. There was

an explosion. It blew me to the surface again, only to be sucked back again by the water rushing into the ship

"This time I landed against the grating over the pipes, which furnish a draught for the funnels, and stuck

there. There was another explosion, and I came to the surface. The ship seemed to be heaving tremendous

sighs as she went down. I found myself not many feet from the ship, but on the other side of it. The ship had

"I came up near a collapsible lifeboat and grabbed it. Many men were in the water near me. They had

jumped at the last minute. A funnel fell within four inches of me and killed one of the swimmers. Thirty

clung to the capsized boat, and a lifeboat, with forty survivors in it already, finally took them off.

"George D. Widener and Harry Elkins Widener were among those who jumped at the last minute. So did

Robert Williams Daniel. The three of them went down together. Daniel struck out, lashing the water with his

arms until he had made a point far distant from the sinking monster of the sea. Later he was picked up by one

"The Wideners were not seen again, nor was John B. Thayer, who went down on the boat. `Jack' Thayer, who

was literally thrown off the Titanic by an explosion, after he had refused to leave the men to go with his

Graphic accounts of the final plunge of the Titanic were related by two Englishmen, survivors by the merest

chance. One of them struggled for hours to hold himself afloat on an overturned collapsible lifeboat, to one

end of which John B. Thayer, Jr., of Philadelphia, whose father perished, hung until rescued.

The men gave their names as A. H. Barkworth, justice of the peace of East Riding, Yorkshire, England, and

W. J. Mellers, of Christ Church Terrace, Chelsea, London. The latter, a young man, had started for this

Mellers, like Quartermaster Moody, said Captain Smith did not commit suicide. The captain jumped from the

bridge, Mellers declares, and he heard him say to his officers and crew: "You have done your duty, boys.

Now every man for himself." Mellers and Barkworth, who say their names have been spelled incorrectly in

most of the lists of survivors, both declare there were three distinct explosions before the Titanic broke in

two, and bow section first, and stern part last, settled with her human cargo into the sea.

Her four whistles kept up a deafening blast until the explosions, declare the men. The death cries from the

shrill throats of the blatant steam screechers beside the smokestacks so rent the air that conversation among

the passengers was possible only when one yelled into the ear of a fellowunfortunate.

"I did not know the Thayer family well," declared Mr. Barkworth, "but I had met young Thayer, a clearcut

chap, and his father on the trip. The lad and I struggled in the water for several hours endeavoring to hold

afloat by grabbing to the sides and end of an overturned lifeboat. Now and again we lost our grip and fell

back into the water. I did not recognize young Thayer in the darkness, as we struggled for our lives, but I did

recall having met him before when we were picked up by a lifeboat. We were saved by the merest chance,

because the survivors on a lifeboat that rescued us hesitated in doing so, it seemed, fearing perhaps that

"I considered my fur overcoat helped to keep me afloat. I had a life preserver over it, under my arms, but it

would not have held me up so well out of the water but for the coat. The fur of the coat seemed not to get wet

through, and retained a certain amount of air that added to buoyance. I shall never part with it.

"The testimony of J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the White Star Line, that he had not heard explosions

before the Titanic settled, indicates that he must have gotten some distance from her in his lifeboat. There

were three distinct explosions and the ship broke in the center. The bow settled headlong first, and the stern

last. I was looking toward her from the raft to which young Thayer and I had clung."

Barkworth jumped, just before the Titanic went down. He said there were enough lifepreservers for all the

passengers, but in the confusion many may not have known where to look for them. Mellers, who had donned

a life preserver, was hurled into the air, from the bow of the ship by the force of the explosion, which he

"I was not far from where Captain Smith stood on the bridge, giving full orders to his men," said Mellers.

"The brave old seaman was crying, but he had stuck heroically to the last. He did not shoot himself. He

jumped from the bridge when he had done all he could. I heard his final instructions to his crew, and recall

that his last words were: `You have done your duty, boys. Now every man for himself.'

"I thought I was doomed to go down with the rest. I stood on the deck, awaiting my fate, fearing to jump

from the ship. Then came a grinding noise, followed by two others, and I was hurled into the deep. Great

waves engulfed me, but I was not drawn toward the ship, so that I believe there was little suction. I swam

Charles Herbert Lightoller, previously mentioned, stood by the ship until the last, working to get the

passengers away, and when it appeared that he had made his last trip he went up high on the officers' quarters

and made the best dive he knew how to make just as the ship plunged down to the depths. This is an excerpt

Children shall hear that episode sung in after years and his own descendants shall recite it to their bairns. Mr.

Lightoller acted as an officer and gentleman should, and he was not the only one.

That Jay Yates, gambler, confidence man and fugitive from justice, known to the police and in sporting

circles as J. H. Rogers, went down with the Titanic after assisting many women aboard lifeboats, became

known when a note, written on a blank page torn from a diary: was delivered to his sister. Here is a

This note was given by Rogers to a woman he was helping into a lifeboat. The woman, who signed herself

"You will find note that was handed to me as I was leaving the Titanic. Am stranger to this man, but think he

was a card player. He helped me aboard a lifeboat and I saw him help others. Before we were lowered I saw

him jump into the sea. If picked up I did not recognize him on the Carpathia. I don't think he was registered

Rogers' mother, Mrs. Mary A. Yates, an old woman, broke down when she learned son had perished.

"Thank God I know where he is now," she sobbed. "I have not heard from him for two years. The last news I

Among the many hundreds of heroic souls who went bravely and quietly to their end were fifty

happygolucky youngsters shipped as bell boys or messengers to serve the first cabin passengers. James

Humphreys, a quartermaster, who commanded lifeboat No. 11, told a li{t}tle story that shows how these

Humphreys said the boys were called to their regular posts in the main cabin entry and taken in charge by

their captain, a steward. They were ordered to remain in the cabin and not get in the way. Throughout the first

hour of confusion and terror these lads sat quietly on their benches in various parts of the first cabin.

Then, just toward the end when the order was passed around that the ship was going down and every man

was free to save himself, if he kept away from the lifeboats in which the women were being taken, the bell

Humphreys said he saw numbers of them smoking cigarettes and joking with the passengers. They seemed to

think that their violation of the rule against smoking while on duty was a sufficient breach of discipline.

The women who left the ship; the men who remained there is little to choose between them for heroism.

Many of the women compelled to take to the boats would have stayed, had it been possible, to share the fate

of their nearest and dearest, without whom their lives are crippled, broken and disconsolate.

The heroes who remained would have said, with Grenville. "We have only done our duty, as a man is bound

to do." They sought no palms or crowns of martyrdom. "They also serve who only stand and wait," and their

first action was merely to step aside and give places in the boats to women and children, some of whom were

There was no debate as to whether the life of a financier, a master of business, was rated higher in the scale of

values than that of an ignorant peasant mother. A woman was a woman, whether she wore rags or pearls. A

life was given for a life, with no assertion that one was priceless and the other comparatively valueless.

Many of those who elected to remain might have escaped. "Chivalry" is a mild appellation for their conduct.

Some of the vaunted knights of old were desperate cowards by comparison. A fight in the open field, or

jousting in the tournament, did not call out the manhood in a man as did the waiting till the great ship took

the final plunge, in the knowledge that the seas round about were covered with loving and yearning witnesses

When the roll is called hereafter of those who are "purged of pride because they died, who know the worth of

their days," let the names of the men who went down with the Titanic be found written there in the sight of

And, whatever view of the accident be taken, whether the moralist shall use it to point the text of a solemn or

denunciatory warning, or whether the materialist, swinging to the other extreme, scouts any other theory than

that of the "fortuitous concurrence of atoms," there is scarcely a thinking mortal who has heard of what

happened who has not been deeply stirred, in the sense of a personal bereavement, to a profound humility and

Many there are whom the influences of religion do not move, and upon whose hearts most generous

sentiments knock in vain, who still are overawed and bowed by the magnitude of this catastrophe. No matter

what they believe about it, the effect is the same. The effect is to reduce a man from the swaggering

braggartthe vainglorious lord of what he sees the selfmade master of fate, of nature, of time, of space,

of everythingto his true microscopic stature in the cosmos. He goes in tears to put together again the

The only comfort, all that can bring surcease of sorrow, is that men fashioned in the image of their Maker

rose to the emergency like heroes, and went to their grave as bravely as any who have given their lives at any

time in war. The hearts of those who waited on the land, and agonized, and were impotent to save, have been

laid upon the same altars of sacrifice. The mourning of those who will not be comforted rises from alien lands

together with our own in a common broken intercession. How little is the 882 feet of the "monster" that we

launched compared with the arc of the rainbow we can see even in our grief spanning the frozen boreal mist!

And still our work must go on. It is the business of men and women neither to give way to unavailing grief

nor to yield to the crushing incubus of despair, but to find hope that is at the bottom of everything, even at the

Even so, for any progress of the race, there must be the ancient sacrifice of man's own stubborn heart, and all

his pride. He must forever "lay in dust life's glory dead." He cannot rise to the height it was intended he

should reach till he has plumbed the depths, till he has devoured the bread of the bitterest affliction, till he has

known the ache of hopes deferred, of anxious expectation disappointed, of dreams that are not to be fulfilled

this side of the river that waters the meads of Paradise. There still must be a reason why it is not an unhappy

thing to be taken from "the world we know to one a wonder still," and so that we go bravely, what does it

matter, the mode of our going? It was not only those who stood back, who let the women and children go to

the boats, that died. There died among us on the shore something of the fierce greed of bitterness, something

of the sharp hatred of passion, something of the mad lust of revenge and of knife edge competition. Though

we are not aware of it, perhaps, we are not quite the people that we were before out of the mystery an awful

hand was laid upon us all, and what we had thought the colossal power of wealth was in a twinkling shown to

be no more than the strength of an infant's little finger, or the twining tendril of a plant.

Seaward and landward, J. G. Phillips, the Titanic's wireless man, had hurled the appeal for help. By fits and

startsfor the wireless was working unevenly and blurringly Phillips reached out to the world, crying the

Titanic's peril. A word or two, scattered phrases, now and then a connected sentence, made up the message

that sent a thrill of apprehension for a thousand miles east, west and south of the doomed liner.

The early despatches from St. John's, Cape Race, and Montreal, told graphic tales of the race to reach the

Titanic, the wireless appeals for help, the interruption of the calls, then what appeared to be a successful

conclusion of the race when the Virginian was reported as having reached the giant liner.

Other rushing liners besides the Virginian heard the call and became on the instant something more than

cargo carriers and passenger greyhounds. The big Baltic, 200 miles to the eastward and westbound, turned

again to save life, as she did when her sister of the White Star fleet, the Republic, was cut down in a fog in

January, 1909. The Titanic's mate, the Olympic, the mightiest of the seagoers save the Titanic herself, turned

in her tracks. All along the northern lane the miracle of the wireless worked for the distressed and sinking

White Star ship. The HamburgAmerican Cincinnati, the Parisian from Glasgow, the North German Lloyd

Prinz Friedrich Wilhelm, the HamburgAmerican liners Prinz Adelbert and Amerika, all heard the C. Q. D.

But the Virginian was nearest, barely 170 miles away, and was the first to know of the Titanic's danger. She

went about and headed under forced draught for the spot indicated in one of the last of Phillips'

messageslatitude 41.46 N. and longitude 50.14 W. She is a fast ship, the Allan liner, and her wireless has

told the story of how she stretched through the night to get up to the Titanic in time. There was need for all

the power of her engines and all the experience and skill of her captain. The final fluttering Marconigrams

that were released from the Titanic made it certain that the great ship with 2340 souls aboard was filling and

Further out at sea was the Cunarder, Carpathia, which left New York for the Mediterranean on April 13th.

Round she went and plunged back westward to take a hand in saving life. And the third steamship within

short sailing of the Titanic was the Allan liner Parisian away to the eastward, on her way from Glasgow to

While they sped in the night with all the drive that steam could give them, the Titanic's call reached to Cape

Race and the startled operator there heard at midnight a message which quickly reached New York:

"Have struck an iceberg. We are badly damaged. Titanic latitude 41.46 N., 50.14 W."

Then for hours, while the world waited for a crumb of news as to the safety of the great ship's people, not one

thing more was known save that she was drifting, broken and helpless and alone in the midst of a waste of

ice. And it was not until seventeen hours after the Titanic had sunk that the words came out of the air as to

her fate. There was a confusion and tangle of messagesa jumble of rumors. Good tidings were trodden

upon by evil. And no man knew clearly what was taking place in that stretch of waters where the giant

It was at 12.17 A. M., while the Virginian was still plunging eastward, that all communication from the

Titanic ceased. The Virginian's operator, with the Virginian's captain at his elbow, fed the air with blue

flashes in a desperate effort to know what was happening to the crippled liner, but no message came back.

The last word from the Titanic was that she was sinking. Then the sparking became fainter. The call was

dying to nothing. The Virginian's operator labored over a blur of signals. It was hopeless. So the Allan ship

It was this ominous silence that so alarmed the other vessels hurrying to the Titanic and that caused so much

SIXTEEN boats were in the procession which entered on the terrible hours of rowing, drifting and suspense.

Women wept for lost husbands and sons, sailors sobbed for the ship which had been their pride. Men choked

back tears and sought to comfort the widowed. Perhaps, they said, other boats might have put off in another

direction. They strove, though none too sure themselves, to convince the women of the certainty that a rescue

In the distance the Titanic looked an enormous length, her great bulk outlined in black against the starry sky,

every porthole and saloon blazing with light. It was impossible to think anything could be wrong with such

a leviathan, were it not for that ominous tilt downwards in the bows, where the water was now up to the

lowest row of portholes. Presently, about 2 A. M., as near as can be determined, those in the lifeboats

observed her settling very rapidly with the bows and the bridge completely under water, and concluded it was

now only a question of minutes before she went. So it proved She slowly tilted straight on end with the stern

vertically upwards, and as she did, the lights in the cabins and saloons, which until then had not flickered for

a moment, died out, came on again for a single flash, and finally went altogether. At the same time the

machinery roared down through the vessel with a rattle and a groaning that could be heard for miles, the

weirdest sound surely that could be heard in the middle of the ocean, a thousand miles away from land. But

To the amazement of the awed watchers in the lifeboats, the doomed vessel remained in that upright

position for a time estimated at five minutes; some in the boat say less, but it was certainly some minutes that

at least 150 feet of the Titanic towered up above the level of the sea and loomed black against the sky.

Then with a quiet, slanting dive she disappeared beneath the waters, and the eyes of the helpless spectators

had looked for the last time upon the gigantic vessel on which they had set out from Southampton. And there

was left to the survivors only the gently heaving sea, the lifeboats filled with men and women in every

conceivable condition of dress and undress, above the perfect sky of brilliant stars with not a cloud, all

tempered with a bitter cold that made each man and woman long to be one of the crew who toiled away with

the oars and kept themselves warm therebya curious, deadening; bitter cold unlike anything they had felt

And then with all these there fell on the ear the most appalling noise that human being has ever listened

tothe cries of hundreds of fellowbeings struggling in the icy cold water, crying for help with a cry that

Third Officer Herbert John Pitman, in charge of one of the boats, described this cry of agony in his testimony

before the Senatorial Investigating Committee, under the questioning of Senator Smith:

Those in the lifeboats longed to return and pick up some of the poor drowning souls, but they feared this

Some of the men tried to sing to keep the women from hearing the cries, and rowed hard to get away from the

scene of the wreck, but the memory of those sounds will be one of the things the rescued will find it difficult

The waiting sufferers kept a lookout for lights, and several times it was shouted that steamers' lights were

seen, but they turned out to be either a light from another boat or a star low down on the horizon. It was hard

"Let me go backI want to go back to my husbandI'll jump from the boat if you don't," cried an agonized

"You can do no good by going backother lives will be lost if you try to do it. Try to calm yourself for the

sake of the living. It may be that your husband will be picked up somewhere by one of the fishing boats."

The woman who pleaded to go back, according to Mrs. Vera Dick, of Calgary, Canada, later tried to throw

herself from the lifeboat. Mrs. Dick, describing the scenes in the lifeboats, said there were half a dozen

women in that one boat who tried to commit suicide when they realized that the Titanic had gone down.

"Even in Canada, where we have such clear nights," said Mrs. Dick, "I have never seen such a clear sky. The

stars were very bright and we could see the Titanic plainly, like a great hotel on the water. Floor after floor of

the lights went out as we watched. It was horrible, horrible. I can't bear to think about it. From the distance, as

"Among the lifeboats themselves, however, there were scenes just as terrible, perhaps, but to me nothing

could outdo the tragic grandeur with which the Titanic went to its death. To realize it, you would have to see

the Titanic as I saw it the day we set sailwith the flags flying and the bands playing. Everybody on board

was laughing and talking about the Titanic being the biggest and most luxurious boat on the ocean and being

unsinkable. To think of it then and to think of it standing out there in the night, wounded to death and gasping

"The women on our boat were in nightgowns and bare feet some of themand the wealthiest women

mingled with the poorest immigrants. One immigrant woman kept shouting: `My God, my poor father! He

put me in this boat and would not save himself. Oh, why didn't I die, why didn't I die? Why can't I die now?'

"We had to restrain her, else she would have Jumped over board. It was simply awful. Some of the men

apparently had said they could row just to get into the boats. We paid no attention to cowardice, however. We

were all busy with our own troubles. My heart simply bled for the women who were separated from their

"The night was frightfully cold, although clear. We had to huddle together to keep warm. Everybody drank

sparingly of the water and ate sparingly of the bread. We did not know when we would be saved. Everybody

tried to remain cool, except the poor creatures who could think of nothing but their own great loss. Those

How Mrs. George D. Widener, whose husband and son perished after kissing her goodbye and helping her

into one of the boats, rowed when exhausted seamen were on the verge of collapse, was told by Emily

The girl said Mrs. Widener bravely toiled throughout the night and consoled other women who had broken

Mrs. William E. Carter and Mrs. John B. Thayer were in the same lifeboat and worked heroically to keep it

free from the icy menace. Although Mrs. Thayer's husband remained aboard the Titanic and sank with it, and

although she had no knowledge of the safety of her son until they met, hours later, aboard the Carpathia, Mrs.

"When I went over the side with my children and got in the boat there were no seamen in it. Then came a few

men, but there were oars with no one to use them. The boat had been filled with passengers, and there was

"We could see now that the time of the ship had come. She was sinking, and we were warned by cries from

the men above to pull away from the ship quickly. Mrs. Thayer, wife of the vicepresident of the

"It was cold and we had no time to clothe ourselves with warm overcoats. The rowing warmed me. We

started to pull away from the ship. We could see the dim outlines of the decks above, but we could not

Mrs. William R. Bucknell's account of the part women played in the rowing is as follows:

"There were thirtyfive persons in the boat in which the captain placed me. Three of these were ordinary

"One of these men seemed to think that we should not start away from the sinking ship until it could be

learned whether the other boats would accommodate the rest of the women. He seemed to think that; more

" `I would rather go back and go down with the ship than leave under these circumstances.' he cried.

"The captain shouted to him to obey orders and to pull for a little light that could just be discerned miles in

the distance. I do not know what this little light was. It may have been a passing fishing vessel, which, of

"We rowed all night, I took an oar and sat beside the Countess de Rothes. Her maid had an our and so did

mine. The air was freezing cold, and it was not long before the only man that appeared to know anything

about rowing commenced to complain that his hands were freezing: A woman back of him handed him a

"As we rowed we looked back at the lights of the Titanic. There was not a sound from her, only the lights

began to get lower and lower, and finally she sank. Then we heard a muffled explosion and a dull roar caused

"There was not a drop of water on our boat. The last minute before our boat was launched Captain Smith

threw aboard a bag of bread. I took the precaution of taking a good drink of water before we started, so I

Mrs. Lucien Smith, whose young husband perished, was another heroine. It is related by survivors that she

took turns at the oars, and then, when the boat was in danger of sinking, stood ready to plug a hole with her

In another boat Mrs. Cornell and her sister, who had a slight knowledge of rowing, took turns at the oars, as

The boat in which Mrs. J. J. Brown, of Denver, Col., was saved contained only three men in all, and only one

rowed. He was a halffrozen seaman who was tumbled into the boat at the last minute. The woman wrapped

him in blankets and set him at an oar to start his blood. The second man was too old to be of any use. The

Strange to say, there was room in this boat for ten other people. Ten brave men would have received the

warmest welcome of their lives if they had been there. The coward, being a quartermaster and the assigned

head of the boat, sat in the stern and steered. He was terrified, and the women had to fight against his

The women sat two at each oar. One held the oar in place, the other did the pulling. Mrs. Brown coached

them and cheered them on. She told them that the exercise would keep the chill out of their veins, and she

spoke hopefully of the likelihood that some vessel would answer the wireless calls. Over the frightful danger

And the coward sat in his stern seat, terrified, his tongue loosened with fright. He assured them there was no

chance in the world. He had had fourteen years' experience, and he knew. First, they would have to row one

and a half miles at least to get out of the sphere of the suction, if they did not want to go down. They would

"Oh, we shall be picked up sooner or later," said some of the braver ones. No, said the man, there was no

bread in the boat, no water; they would starveall that big boatload wandering the high seas with nothing to

"Don't," cried Mrs. Brown. "Keep that to yourself, if you feel that way. For the sake of these women and

But the coward only knew that there was no compass and no chart aboard. They sighted what they thought

was a fishing smack on the horizon, showing dimly in the early dawn. The man at the rudder steered toward

it, and the women bent to their oars again. They covered several miles in this waybut the smack faded into

the distance. They could not see it any longer. And the coward said that everything was over.

They rowed back nine weary miles. Then the coward thought they must stop rowing, and lie in the trough of

the waves until the Carpathia should appear. The women tried it for a few moments, and felt the cold

creeping into their bodies. Though exhausted from the hard physical labor they thought work was better than

"We shall freeze," cried several of the women together. "We must row. We have rowed all this time. We must

When the coward still demurred, they told him plainly and once for all that if he persisted in wanting them to

stop rowing, they were going to throw him overboard and be done with him for good. Something about the

look in the eye of that Mississippibred oarswoman, who seemed such a force among her fellows, told him

Miss Alice Farnam Leader, a New York physician, escaped from the Titanic on the same boat which carried

the Countess Rothes. "The countess is an expert oarswoman," said Doctor Leader, "and thoroughly at home

on the water. She practically took command of our boat when it was found that the seaman who had been

placed at the oars could not row skilfully. Several of the women took their place with the countess at the oars

and rowed in turns, while the weak and unskilled stewards sat quietly in one end of the boat."

"With nothing on but a nightgown I helped row one of the boats for three hours," said Mrs. Florence Ware, of

"In our boat there were a lot of women, a steward and a fireman. None of the men knew anything about

"It was cold and I worked as hard as I could at an oar until we were picked up. There was nothing to eat or

"The temperature must have been below freezing," testified another survivor, "and neither men nor women in

my boat were warmly clothed. Several of them died. The officer in charge of the lifeboat decided it was

better to bury the bodies. Soon they were weighted so they would sink and were put overboard. We could

also see similar burials taking place from other lifeboats that were all around us."

In one boat were two card sharps. With the same cleverness that enabled them to win money on board they

In the boat with the gamblers were women in their night gowns and women in evening dress. None of the

boats were properly equipped with food, but all had enough bread and water to keep the rescued from

To the credit of the gamblers who managed to escape, it should be said that they were polite and showed the

women every courtesy. All they wanted was to be sure of getting in a boat. That once accomplished, they

reverted to their habitual practice of politeness and suavity. They were even willing; to do a little manual

The people on that particular boat were a sad group. Fathers had kissed their daughters goodbye and

husbands had parted from their wives. The card sharps, however philosophized wonderfully about the will of

the Almighty and how strange His ways. They said that one must be prepared for anything; that good always

"Who knows?" said one. "It may be that everybody on board will be saved." Another added: "Our duty is to

the living. You women owe it to your relatives and friends not to allow this thing to wreck your reason or

undermine your health." And they took pains to see that all the women who were on the lifeboat had plenty

The survivors were in the lifeboats until about 5.30 A. M. About 3 A. M. faint lights appeared in the sky and

all rejoiced to see what was supposed to be the coming dawn, but after watching for half an hour and seeing

no change in the intensity of the light, the disappointed sufferers realized it was the Northern Lights.

Presently low down on the horizon they saw a light which slowly resolved itself into a double light, and they

watched eagerly to see if the two lights would separate and so prove to be only two of the boats, or whether

these lights would remain together, in which case they should expect them to be the lights of a rescuing

To the inexpressible joy of all, they moved as one! Immediately the boats were swung around and headed for

the lights. Someone shouted: "Now, boys, sing!" and everyone not too weak broke into song with "Row for

the shore, boys." Tears came to the eyes of all as they realized that safety was at hand. The song was sung,

but it was a very poor imitation of the real thing, for quavering voices make poor songs. A cheer was given

"Our rescuer showed up rapidly, and as she swung round we saw her cabins all alight, and knew she must be

a large steamer. She was now motionless and we had to row to her. Just then day broke, a beautiful quiet

dawn with faint pink clouds just above the horizon, and a new moon whose crescent just touched the horizon.

`Turn your money over, boys,' said our cheery steersman, `that is, if you have any with you,' he added.

"We laughed at him for his superstition at such a time, but he countered very neatly by adding: `Well, I shall

never say again that 13 is an unlucky number; boat 13 has been the best friend we ever had.' Certainly the 13

superstition is killed forever in the minds of those who escaped from the Titanic in boat 13.

"As we neared the Carpathia we saw in the dawning light what we thought was a fullrigged schooner

standing up near her, and presently behind her another, all sails set, and we said: `They are fisher boats from

the Newfoundland bank and have seen the steamer lying to and are standing by to help.' But in another five

minutes the light shone pink on them and we saw they were icebergs towering many feet in the air, huge,

glistening masses, deadly white, still, and peaked in a way that had easily suggested a schooner. We glanced

round the horizon and there were others wherever the eye could reach. The steamer we had to reach was

surrounded by them and we had to make a detour to reach her, for between her and us lay another huge berg."

Speaking of the moment when the Carpathia was sighted. Mrs. J. J. Brown, who had cowed the driveling

"Then, knowing that we were safe at last, I looked about me. The most wonderful dawn I have ever seen

came upon us. I have just returned from Egypt. I have been all over the world, but I have never seen anything

like this. First the gray and then the flood of light. Then the sun came up in a ball of red fire. For the first time

we saw where we were. Near us was open water, but on every side was ice. Ice ten feet high was everywhere,

and to the right and left and back and front were icebergs. Some of them were mountain high. This sea of ice

was forty miles wide, they told me. We did not wait for the Carpathia to come to us, we rowed to it. We were

lifted up in a sort of nice little sling that was lowered to us. After that it was all over. The passengers of the

Carpathia were so afraid that we would not have room enough that they gave us practically the whole ship to

It had been learned that some of the passengers, in fact all of the women passengers of the Titanic who were

rescued, refer to "Lady Margaret," as they called Mrs. Brown as the strength of them all.

Officers of the Carpathia report that when they reached the scene of the Titanic's wreck there were fifty

bodies or more floating in the sea. Only one mishap attended the transfer of the rescued from the lifeboats.

One large collapsible lifeboat, in which thirteen persons were seated, turned turtle just as they were about to

Not the least among the heroes of the Titanic disaster was Rigel, a big black Newfoundland dog, belonging to

the first officer, who went down with the ship. But for Rigel the fourth boat picked up might have been run

down by the Carpathia. For three hours he swam in the icy water where the Titanic went down, evidently

looking for his master, and was instrumental in guiding the boatload of survivors to the gangway of the

Jonas Briggs, a seaman abroad the Carpathia, now has Rigel and told the story of the dog's heroism. The

Carpathia was moving slowly about, looking for boats, rafts or anything which might be afloat. Exhausted

with their efforts, weak from lack of food and exposure to the cutting wind and terror stricken, the men and

women in the fourth boat had drifted under the Carpathia's starboard bow. They were dangerously close to

The boat might not have been seen were it not for the sharp barking of Rigel, who was swimming ahead of

the craft, and valiantly announcing his position. The barks attracted the attention of Captain Rostron; and he

went to the starboard end of the bridge to see where they came from and saw the boat. He immediately

Care was taken to get Rigel aboard, but he appeared little affected by his long trip through the icecold water.

He stood by the rail and barked until Captain Rostron called Briggs and had him take the dog below.

Mr. Wallace Bradford, of San Francisco, a passenger aboard the Carpathia, gave the following thrilling

"Since halfpast four this morning I have experienced one of those nevertobeforgotten circumstances that

weighs heavy on my soul and which shows most awfully what poor things we mortals are. Long before this

reaches you the news will be flashed that the Titanic has gone down and that our steamer, the Carpathia,

caught the wireless message when seventyfive miles away, and so far we have picked up twenty boats

"None of us can tell just how many, as they have been hustled to various staterooms and to the dining saloons

to be warmed up. I was awakened by unusual noises and imagined that I smelled smoke. I jumped up and

looked out of my porthole, and saw a huge iceberg looming up like a rock off shore. It was not white, and I

was positive that it was a rock, and the thought flashed through my mind, how in the world can we be near a

rock when we are four days out from New York in a southerly direction and in midocean.

"When I got out on deck the first man I encountered told me that the Titanic had gone down and we were

rescuing the passengers. The first two boats from the doomed vessel were in sight making toward us. Neither

of them was crowded. This was accounted for later by the fact that it was impossible to get many to leave the

steamer, as they would not believe that she was going down. It was a glorious, clear morning and a quiet sea.

Off to the starboard was a white area of ice plain, from whose even surface rose mammoth forts, castles and

pyramids of solid ice almost as real as though they had been placed there by the hand of man.

"Our steamer was hove to about two and a half miles from the edge of this huge iceberg. The Titanic struck

about 11.20 P. M. and did not go down until two o'clock. Many of the passengers were in evening dress when

they came aboard our ship, and most of these were in a most bedraggled condition. Near me as I write is a

girl about eighteen years old in a fancy dress costume of bright colors, while in another seat near by is a

"As the boats came alongside after the first two all of them contained a very large proportion of women. In

fact, one of the boats had women at the oars, one in particular containing, as near as I could estimate, about

fortyfive women and only about six men. In this boat two women were handling one of the oars. All of the

engineers went down with the steamer. Four bodies have been brought aboard. One is that of a fireman, who

is said to have been shot by one of the officers because he refused to obey orders. Soon after I got on deck I

could, with the aid of my glasses, count seven boats headed our way, and they continued to come up to half

past eight o'clock. Some were in sight for a long time and moved very slowly, showing plainly that the oars

"No baggage of any kind was brought by the survivors. In fact, the only piece of baggage that reached the

Carpathia from the Titanic is a small closed trunk about twentyfour inches square, evidently the property of

an Irish female immigrant. While some seemed fully dressed, many of the men having their overcoats and the

women sealskin and other coats, others came just as they had jumped from their berths, clothed in their

Of the survivors in general it may be said that they escaped death and they gained life. Life is probably sweet

to them as it is to everyone, but what physical and mental torture has been the price of life to those who were

brought back to land on the Carpathiathe hours in lifeboats, amid the crashing of ice, the days of anguish

that have succeeded, the horrors of body and mind still experienced and never to he entirely absent until death

The thought of the nation today is for the living. They need our sympathy, our consolation more than do the

dead, and, perhaps, in the majority of the cases they need our protecting care as well.

IF the scenes in the lifeboats were tearbringing, hardly less so was the arrival of the boats at the Carpathia

with their bands of terrorstricken, griefridden survivors, many of them too exhausted to know that safety

"The first lifeboat reached the Carpathia about halfpast five o'clock in the morning," recorded one of the

passengers on the Carpathia. "And the last of the sixteen boats was unloaded before nine o'clock. Some of the

lifeboats were only half filled, the first one having but two men and eleven women, when it had

accommodations for at least forty. There were few men in the boats. The women were the gamest lot I have

ever seen. Some of the men and women were in evening clothes, and others among those saved had nothing

After the Carpathia had made certain that there were no more passengers of the Titanic to be picked up, she

threaded her way out of the ice fields for fifty miles. It was dangerous work, but it was managed without

The shrieks and cries of the women and men picked up in lifeboats by the Carpathia were horrible. The

women were clothed only in night robes and wrappers. The men were in their night garments. One was lifted

on board entirely nude. All the passengers who could bear nourishment were taken into the dining rooms and

cabins by Captain Rostron and given food and stimulants. Passengers of the Carpathia gave up their berths

As soon as they were landed on the Carpathia many of the women became hysterical, but on the whole they

behaved splendidly. Men and women appeared to be stunned all day Monday, the full force of the disaster not

reaching them until Tuesday night. After being wrapped up in blankets and filled with brandy and hot coffee,

the first thoughts were for their husbands and those at home. Most of them imagined that their husbands had

been picked up by other vessels, and they began flooding the wireless rooms with messages. It was almost

One of the most seriously injured was a woman who had lost both her children. Her limbs had been severely

In the first cabin library women of wealth and refinement mingled their grief and asked eagerly for news of

the possible arrival of a belated boat, or a message from other steamers telling of the safety of their husbands.

Mrs. Henry B. Harris, wife of a New York theatrical manager, checked her tears long enough to beg that

some message of hope be sent to her fatherinlaw. Mrs. G. Thorne, Miss Marie Young, Mrs Emil Taussig

and her daughter, Ruth, Mrs. Martin Rothschild, Mrs. William Augustus Spencer, Mrs. J. Stewart White and

Mrs. Walter M. Clark were a few of those who lay back, exhausted, on the leather cushions and told in

Mrs. John Jacob Astor and the Countess of Rothes had been taken to staterooms soon after their arrival on

Before noon, at the captain's request, the first cabin passengers of the Titanic gathered in the saloon and the

passengers of other classes in corresponding places on the rescue ship. Then the collecting of names was

begun by the purser and the stewards. A second table was served in both cabins for the new guests, and the

Carpathia's second cabin, being better filled than its first, the second class arrivals had be to sent to the

Mrs. Jacques Futrelle, wife of the novelist, herself a writer of note, sat dry eyed in the saloon, telling her

friends that she had given up hope for her husband. She joined with the rest in inquiries as to the chances of

rescue by another ship, and no one told her what soon came to be the fixed opinion of the menthat all those

Among the men conversation centered on the accident and the responsibility for it. Many expressed the belief

that the Titanic, in common with other vessels, had had warning of the ice packs, but that in the effort to

establish a record on the maiden run sufficient heed had not been paid to the warnings

"God knows I'm not proud to be here," said a rich New York man. "I got on a boat when they were about to

lower it and when, from delays below, there was no woman to take the vacant place. I don't think any man

who was saved is deserving of censure, but I realize that, in contrast with those who went down, we may be

As the day passed the fore part of the ship assumed some degree of order and comfort, but the crowded

second sabin and rear decks gave forth the incessant sound of lamentation. A bride of two months sat on the

floor and moaned her widowhood. An Italian mother shrieked the name of her lost son.

A girl of seven wept over the loss of her Teddy bear and two dolls, while her mother, with streaming eyes,

dared not tell the child that her father was lost too, and that the money for which their home in England had

been sold had gone down with him. Other children clung to the necks of the fathers who, because carrying

In the hospital and the public rooms lay, in blankets, several others who had been benumbed by the water.

Mrs. Rosa Abbott, who was in the water for hours, was restored during the day. K. Whiteman, the Titanic's

barber, who declared he was blown off the ship by the second of the two explosions after the crash, was

treated for bruises. A passenger, who was thoroughly ducked before being picked up, caused much

amusement on this ship, soon after the doctors were through with him, by demanding a bath.

Storekeeper Prentice, the last man off the Titanic to reach this ship, was also soon over the effects of his long

The physicians of the Carpathia were praised, as was Chief Steward Hughes, for work done in making the

Monday night on the Carpathia was one of rest. The wailing and sobbing of the day were hushed as widows

and orphans slept. Tuesday, save for the crowded condition of the ship, matters took somewhat their normal

The second cabin dining room had been turned into a hospital to care for the injured, and the first, second and

third class dining rooms were used for sleeping rooms at night for women, while the smoking rooms were set

aside for men. All available space was used, some sleeping in chairs and some on the floor, while a few found

Every cabin had been filled, and women and children were sleeping on the floors in the dining saloon, library

and smoking rooms. The passengers of the Carpathia had divided their clothes with the shipwrecked ones

until they had at least kept warm. It is true that many women had to appear on deck in kimonos and some in

underclothes with a coat thrown over them, but their lives had been spared and they had not thought of dress.

Some children in the second cabin were entirely without clothes, but the women had joined together, and with

needles and thread they could pick up from passenger to passenger, had made warm clothes out of the

The women aboard the Carpathia did what they could by word and act to relieve the sufferings of the rescued.

Most of the survivors were in great need of clothing, and this the women of the Carpathia supplied to them as

J. A. Shuttleworth, of Louisville, Ky., befriended Mrs. Lucien Smith, whose husband went down with the

Titanic. Mrs. Smith was formerly Miss Eloise Hughes, daughter of Representative and Mrs. James A.

Hughes, of Huntington, W. Va., and was on her wedding trip. Mr. Shuttleworth asked her if there wasn't

something he could do for her. She said that all the money she had was lost on the Titanic, so Mr.

Two of the rescued from the Titanic died from shock and exposure before they reached the Carpathia, and

another died a few minutes after being taken on board. The dead were W. H. Hoyte, first cabin; Abraham

Hormer, third class, and S. C. Sirbert, steward, and they were buried at sea the morning of April 15th, latitude

41.14 north, longitude 51.24 west. P. Lyon, able seaman, died and was buried at sea the following morning.

An assistant steward lost his mind upon seeing one of the Titanic's rescued firemen expire after being lifted to

An Episcopal bishop and a Catholic priest from Montreal read services of their respective churches over the

The bodies were sewed up in sacks, heavily weighted at the feet, and taken to an opening in the side of the

ship on the lower deck not far above the water line. A long plank tilted at one end served as the incline down

"After we got the Titanic's passengers on board our ship," said one of the Carpathia's officers, "it was a

question as to where we should take them. Some said the Olympic would come out and meet us and take

them on to New York, but others said they would die if they had to be lowered again into small boats to be

taken up by another, so we finally turned toward New York, delaying the Carpathia's passengers eight days in

There were several children on board, who had lost their parentsone baby of eleven months with a nurse

who, coming on board the Carpathia with the first boat, watched with eagerness and sorrow for each

There was a woman in the second cabin who lost seven children out of ten, and there were many other losses

Among the rescued ones who came on board the Carpathia was the president of the White Star Line.

"Mr. Ismay reached the Carpathia in about the tenth lifeboat," said an officer. "I didn't know who he was,

but afterward heard the others of the crew discussing his desire to get something to eat the minute he put his

foot on deck. The steward who waited on him, McGuire, from London, says Mr. Ismay came dashing into the

dining room, and throwing himself in a chair, said: `Hurry, for God's sake, and get me something to eat; I'm

"McGuire brought Mr. Ismay a load of stuff and when he had finished it, he handed McGuire a two dollar

bill. `Your money is no good on this ship,' McGuire told him. `Take it,' insisted Mr. Ismay, shoving the bill in

McGuire's hand. I am well able to afford it. I will see to it that the boys of the Carpathia are well rewarded for

this night's work.' This promise started McGuire making inquiries as to the identity of the man he had waited

on. Then we learned that he was Mr. Ismay. I did not see Mr. Ismay after the first few hours. He must have

A passenger on the Carpathia said there was no wonder that none of the wireless telegrams addressed to Mr.

Ismay were answered until the one that he sent yesterday afternoon to his line, the White Star.

"Mr. Ismay was beside himself," said this woman passenger, "and on most of the voyage after we had picked

"Five women saved their pet dogs, carrying them in their arms. Another woman saved a little pig, which she

said was her mascot. Though her husband is an Englishman and she lives in England she is an American and

was on her way to visit her folks here. How she cared for the pig aboard ship I do not know, but she carried it

up the side of the ship in a big bag. I did not mind the dogs so much, but it seemed to me to be too much

"It was not until noon on Monday that we cleared the last of the ice, and Monday night a dense fog came up

and con tinued until the following morning, then a strong wind, a heavy sea, a thunderstorm and a dense fog

Tuesday night, caused some uneasiness among the more unnerved, the fog continuing all of Tuesday.

"A number of whales were sighted as the Carpathia was clearing the last of the ice, one large one being close

"On Tuesday afternoon a meeting of the uninjured survivors was called in the main saloon for the purpose of

devising means of assisting the more unfortunate, many of whom had lost relatives and all their personal

belongings, and thanking Divine Providence for their deliverance. The meeting was called to order and Mr.

Samuel Goldenberg was elected chairman. Resolutions were then passed thanking the officers, surgeons,

passengers and crew of the Carpathia for their splendid services in aiding the rescued and like resolutions for

"A committee was then appointed to raise funds on board the Carpathia to relieve the immediate wants of the

destitute and assist them in reaching their destinations and also to present a loving cup to the officers of the

"Mr. T. G. Frauenthal, of New York, was made chairman of the Committee on Subscriptions.

"A committee, consisting of Mrs. J. J. Brown, Mrs William Bucknell and Mrs. George Stone, was appointed

to look after the destitute. There was a subscription taken up and up to Wednesday the amount contributed

"The work of the crew on board the Carpathia in rescuing was most noble and remarkable, and these four

days that the ship has been overcrowded with its 710 extra passengers could not have been better handled.

The stewards have worked with undying strengthalthough one was overcome with so much work and died

"I have never seen or felt the benefits of such royal treatment. I have heard the captain criticised because he

did not answer telegrams, but all that I can say is that he showed us every possible courtesy, and if we had

been on our own boats, having paid our fares there, we could not have had better food or better

"Men who had paid for the best staterooms on the Carpathia left their rooms so that we might have them.

They fixed up beds in the smoking rooms, and mattresses everywhere. All the women who were rescued were

given the best staterooms, which were surrendered by the regular passengers. None of the regular passengers

grumbled because their trip to Europe was interrupted, nor did they complain that they were put to the

"The women on board the Carpathia were particularly kind. It shows that for every cruelty of nature there is a

kindness, for every misfortune there is some goodness. The men and women took up collections on board for

the rescued steerage passengers. Mrs. Astor, I believe, contributed $2000, her check being cashed by the

Carpathia. Altogether something like $15,000 was collected and all the women were provided with sufficient

Under any other circumstances the suffering would have been intolerable. But the Good Samaritans on the

The spectacle on board the Carpathia on the return trip to New York at times was heartrending, while at other

NEW YORK CITY, touched to the heart by the great ocean calamity and desiring to do what it could to

lighten the woes and relieve the sufferings of the pitiful little band of men and women rescued from the

The most careful and systematic plans were made for the reception and transfer to homes, hotels or

institutions of the Titanic's survivors. Mayor Gaynor, with Police Commissioner Waldo, arranged to go down

the bay on the police boat Patrol, to come up with the Carpathia and take charge of the police arrangements at

In anticipation of the enormous number that would, for a variety of reasons, creditable or otherwise, surge

about the Cunard pier at the coming of the Carpathia, Mayor Gaynor and the police commissioner had seen to

it that the streets should be rigidly sentineled by continuous lines of policemen Under Inspector George

McClusky, the man of most experience, perhaps, in handling large crowds, there were 200 men, including

twelve mounted men and a number in citizens' clothes. For two blocks to the north, south and east of the

docks lines were established through which none save those bearing passes from the Government and the

With all arrangements made that experience or information could suggest, the authorities settled down to

await the docking of the Carpathia. No word had come to either the White Star Line or the Cunard Line, they

said, that any of the Titanic's people had died on that ship or that bodies had been recovered from the sea, but

in the afternoon Mayor Gaynor sent word to the Board of Coroners that it might be well for some of that body

to meet the incoming ship. Coroners Feinberg and Holtzhauser with Coroner's Physician Weston arranged to

go down the bay on the Patrol, while Coroner Hellenstein waited at the pier. An undertaker was notified to be

Every possible measure of relief for the survivors that could be thought of by officials of the city, of the

Federal Government, by the heads of hospitals and the Red Cross and relief societies was arranged for. The

Municipal Lodging House, which has accommodations for 700 persons, agreed to throw open its doors and

furnish lodging and food to any of the survivors as long as they should need it. Commis sioner of Charities

Drummond did not know, of course, just how great the call would be for the services of his department. He

went to the Cunard pier to direct his part of the work in person. Meanwhile he had twenty ambulances ready

for instant movement on the city's pier at the foot of East Twentysixth Street. They were ready to take

patients to the reception hospital connected with Bellevue or the Metropolitan Hospital on Blackwell's Island.

Ambulances from the Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn were also there to do their share. All the other

hospitals in the city stood ready to take the Titanic's people and those that had ambulances promised to send

them. The Charities ferryboat, Thomas S. Brennan, equipped as a hospital craft, lay off the department pier

with nurses and physicians ready to be called to the Cunard pier on the other side of the city. St. Vincent's

Hospital had 120 beds ready, New York Hospital twelve, Bellevue and the reception hospital 120 and Flower

The House of Shelter maintained by the Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society announced that it was

able to care for at least fifty persons as long as might be necessary. The German Society of New York, the

Irish Immigrant Society, the Italian Society, the Swedish Immigrant Society and the Young Men's Christian

Association were among the organizations that also offered to see that no needy survivor would go without

Mrs. W. A. Bastede, whose husband is a member of the staff of St. Luke's Hospital, offered to the White Star

Line the use of the newly opened ward at St. Luke's, which will accommodate from thirty to sixty persons.

She said the hospital would send four ambulances with nurses and doctors and that she had collected clothing

enough for fifty persons. The line accepted her offer and said that the hospital would be kept informed as to

what was needed. A trustee of Bellevue also called at the White Star offices to offer ambulances. He said that

five or six, with two or three doctors and nurses on each, would be sent to the pier if required.

Many other hospitals as well as individuals called at the mayor's office, expressing willingness to take in

anybody that should be sent to them. A woman living in Fiftieth Street just off Fifth Avenue wished to put

her home at the disposal of the survivors. D. H. Knott, of 102 Waverley Place, told the mayor that he could

take care of 100 and give them both food and lodging at the Arlington, Holly and Earl Hotels. Commissioner

Drummond visited the City Hall and arranged with the mayor the plans for the relief to be extended directly

by the city. Mr. Drummond said that omnibuses would be provided to transfer passengers from the ship to the

Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt, Jr., spent the day telephoning to her friends, asking them to let their automobiles be

used to meet the Carpathia and take away those who needed surgical care. It was announced that as a result of

Mrs. Vanderbilt's efforts 100 limousine automobiles and all the Fifth Avenue and Riverside Drive automobile

Immigration Commissioner Williams said that he would be at the pier when the Carpathia came in. There

was to be no inspection of immigrants at Ellis Island. Instead, the commissioner sent seven or eight

inspectors to the pier to do their work there and he asked them to do it with the greatest possible speed and

the least possible bother to the shipwrecked aliens. The immigrants who had no friends to meet them were to

be provided for until their cases could be disposed of. Mr. Williams thought that some of them who had lost

everything might have to be sent back to their homes. Those who were to be admitted to the United States

Robert W. de Forest, chairman of the Red Cross Relief Committee of the Charity Organization Society, after

conferring with Mayor Gaynor, said that in addition to an arrangement that all funds received by the mayor

should be paid to Jacob H. Schiff, the New York treasurer of the American Red Cross, the committee had

decided that it could turn over all the immediate relief work to the Women's Relief Committee.

The Red Cross Committee announced that careful plans had been made to provide for every possible

The emergency committee received a telegram that Ernest P. Bicknell, director of the American Red Cross,

was coming from Washington. The Red Cross Emergency Relief Committee was to have several

representatives at the pier to look out for the passengers on the Carpathia. Mr. Persons and Dr. Devine were

The Salvation Army offered, through the mayor's office, accommodation for thirty single men at the

Industrial Home, 533 West Fortyeighth Street, and for twenty others at its hotel, 18 Chatham Square. The

army's training school at 124 West Fourteenth Street was ready to take twenty or thirty survivors. R. H.

Farley, head of the White Star Line's third class department, said that the line would give all the steerage

Mayor Gaynor estimated that more than 5000 persons could be accommodated in quarters offered through his

orders. Most of these offers of course would have to be rejected. The mayor also said that Colonel Conley of

the Sixtyninth Regiment offered to turn out his regiment to police the pier, but it was thought that such

Long before dark on Thursday night a few people passed the police lines and with a yellow card were

allowed to go on the dock; but reports had been published that the Carpathia would not be in till midnight,

and by 8 o'clock there were not more than two hundred people on the pier. In the next hour the crowd with

passes trebled in number. By 9 o'clock the pier held half as many as it could comfortably contain. The early

crowd did not contain many women relatives of the survivors. Few nervous people could be seen, but here

and there was a woman, usually supported by two male escorts, weeping softly to herself.

On the whole it was a frantic, griefcrazed crowd. Laborers rubbed shoulders with millionaires.

The relatives of the rich had taxicabs waiting outside the docks. The relatives of the poor went there on foot

A special train was awaiting Mrs. Charles M. Hays, widow of the president of the Grand Trunk Railroad. A

Among the first to arrive at the pier was a committee from the Stock Exchange, headed by R. H. Thomas, and

composed of Charles Knoblauch, B. M. W. Baruch, Charles Holzderber and J. Carlisle. Mr. Thomas carried a

long black box which contained $5000 in small bills, which was to be handed out to the needy steerage

With the early arrivals at the pier were the relatives of Frederick White, who was not reported among the

survivors, though Mrs. White was; Harry Mock, who came to look for a brother and sister; and Vincent

Astor, who arrived in a limousine with William A. Dobbyn, Colonel Astor's secretary, and two doctors. The

limousine was kept waiting outside to take Mrs. Astor to the Astor home on Fifth Avenue.

The WaldorfAstoria had sent over eight limousine car to convey to the hotel these survivors:

Mrs. Mark Fortune and three daughters, Mrs. Lucien P. Smith, Mrs. J. Stewart White, Mrs. Thornton

Davidson, Mrs. George C. Douglass, Mrs. George D. Widener and maid, Mrs. George Wick, Miss Bonnell,

Miss E. Ryerson, Mrs. Susan P. Ryerson, Mrs. Arthur Ryerson, Miss Mary Wick, the Misses Howell, Mrs.

At one time there were thirtyfive ambulances drawn up; outside the Cunard pier. Every hospital in

Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx was represented. Several of the ambulances came from as far north as

Accompanying them were seventy internes and surgeons from the staffs of the hospitals, and more than 125

St. Vincent's sent the greatest number of ambulances, at one time, eight of them from this hospital being in

Miss Eva Booth, direct head of the Salvation Army, was at the pier, accompanied by Miss Elizabeth Nye and

a corps of her officers, ready to aid as much as possible. The Sheltering Society and various other similar

organizations also were represented, all ready to take care of those who needed them.

An officer of the Sixtyninth Regiment, N. G. N. Y., offered the White Star Line officials, the use of the

Mrs. Thomas Hughes, Mrs. August Belmont and Mgrs. Lavelle and McMahon, of St. Patrick's Cathedral,

together with a score of blackrobed Sisters of Charity, representing the Association of Catholic Churches,

were on the pier long before the Carpathia was made fast, and worked industriously in aiding the injured and

The Rev. Dr. William Carter, pastor of the Madison Avenue Reformed Church, was one of those at the pier

with a private ambulance awaiting Miss Sylvia Caldwell, one of the survivors, who is known in church

The Pennsylvania Railroad sent representatives to the pier, who said that the railroad had a special train of

nine cars in which it would carry free any passenger who wanted to go immediately to Philadelphia or points

west. The Pennsylvania also had eight taxicabs at the pier for conveyance of the rescued to the Pennsylvania

Among those who later arrived at the pier before the Carpathia docked were P. A. B. Widener, of

Philadelphia, two women relatives of J. B. Thayer, William Harris, Jr., the theatrical man, who was

Commander Booth, of the Salvation Army, was there especially to meet Mrs. Elizabeth Nye and Mrs. Rogers

Abbott, both Titanic survivors. Mrs. Abbott's two sons were supposed to be among the lost. Miss Booth had

received a cablegram from London saying that other Salvation Army people were on the Titanic. She was

Also on the pier was Major Blanton, U. S. A., stationed at Washington, who was waiting for tidings of Major

Senator William A. Clark and Mrs. Clark were also in the company. Dr. John R. MacKenty was waiting for

Mr. and Mrs. Henry S. Harper. Ferdinand W. Roebling and Carl G. Roebling, cousins of Washington A.

Roebling, Jr., whose name is among the list of dead, went to the pier to see what they could learn of his fate.

J. P. Morgan, Jr., arrived at the pier about half an hour before the Carpathia docked. He said he had many

Fire Commissioner Johnson was there with John Peel, of Atlanta, Gal, a brother of Mrs. Jacques Futrelle.

Mrs. Futrelle has a son twelve years old in Atlanta, and a daughter Virginia, who has been in school in the

North and is at present with friends in this city, ignorant of her father's death.

There was one man in that sad waiting company who startled those near him about 9 o'clock by dancing

across the pier and back. He seemed to be laughing, but when he was stopped it was found that he was

sobbing. He said that he had a relative on the Titanic and had lost control of his nerves.

H. H. Brunt, of Chicago, was at the gangplank waiting for A. Saalfeld, head of the wholesale drug firm of

Sparks, White Co., of London, who was coming to this country on the Titanic on a business trip and whose

During the afternoon and evening tugboats, motor boats and even sailing craft, had been waiting off the

Some of the waiting craft contained friends and anxious relatives of the survivors and those reported as

The sea was rough and choppy, and a strong east wind was blowing. There was a light fog, so that it was

possible to see at a distance of only a few hundred yards. This lifted later in the evening.

First to discover the incoming liner with her pitiful cargo was one of the tugboats. From out of the mist there

"She must be the Carpathia," said the captain, and then he turned the nose of his boat toward the spot on t he

The announcement sent a thrill through those who heard it. Here, at the gate of New York, was a ship whose

IT was a solemn moment when the Carpathia heaved in sight. There she rested on the water, a blur of

black huge, mysterious, aweinspiringand yet withal a thing to send thrills of pity and then of

It was a few minutes after seven o'clock when she arrived at the entrance to Ambrose Channel. She was

coming fast steaming at better than fifteen knots an hour, and she was sighted long before she was expected.

Except for the usual side and masthead lights she was almost dark, only the upper cabins showing a glimmer

Then began a period of waiting, the suspense of which proved almost too much for the hundreds gathered

there to greet friends and relatives or to learn with certainty at last that those for whom they watched would

There was almost complete silence on the pier. Doctors and nurses, members of the Women's Relief

Committee, city and government officials, as well as officials of the line, moved nervously about.

Seated where they had been assigned beneath the big customs letters corresponding to the initials of the

Women wept, but they wept quietly, not hysterically, and the sound of the sobs made many times less noise

than the hum and bustle which is usual on the pier among those awaiting an incoming liner.

Slowly and majestically the ship slid through the water, still bearing the details of that secret of what

Convoying the Carpathia was a fleet of tugs bearing men and women anxious to learn the latest news. The

Cunarder had been as silent for days as though it, too, were a ship of the dead. A list of survivors had been

given out from its wireless station and that was all. Even the approximate time of its arrival had been kept a

There was no response to the hail from one tug, and as others closed in, the steamship quickened her speed a

There was an exploding of flashlights from some of the tugs, answered seemingly by sharp stabs of lightning

in the northwest that served to accentuate the silence and absence of light aboard the rescue ship. Five or six

persons, apparently members of the crew or the ship's officers, were seen along the rail; but otherwise the

Off quarantine the Carpathia slowed down and, hailing the immigration inspection boat, asked if the health

officer wished to board. She was told that he did, and came to a stop while Dr. O'Connell and two assistants

climbed on board. Again the newspaper men asked for some word of the catastrophe to the Titanic, but there

As she passed the revenue cutter Mohawk and the derelict destroyer Seneca anchored off Tompkinsville the

wireless on the Government vessels was seen to flash, but there was no answering spark from the Carpathia.

Entering the North River she laid her course close to the New Jersey side in order to have room to swing into

By this time the rails were lined with men and women. They were very silent. There were a few requests for

The liner began to slacken her speed, and the tugboat soon was alongside. Up above the inky blackness of the

hull figures could be made out, leaning over the port railing, as though peering eagerly at the little craft which

Some of them, perhaps, had passed through that inferno of the deep sea which sprang up to destroy the

"Thank you, no," was the answer in a tone that carried emotion with it. Meantime the tugboat was getting

nearer and nearer to the Carpathia, and soon the faces of those leaning over the railing could be distinguished.

A woman who called to a man on the tugboat was asked? "Are you one the Titanic survivors?"

"Yes. There was some trouble in manning them. They were not far enough away from her."

All of this questioning and receiving replies was carried on with the greatest difficulty. The pounding of the

liner's engines, the washing of the sea, the tugboat's engines, made it hard to understand the woman's replies.

"Oh, yes," came the shrill reply. "The men were brave very brave." Here her voice broke and she turned

"What name?" was asked. She shouted a name that could not be understood, and, apparently believing that it

"Nearly all of us are very ill," cried another woman. Here several other tugboats appeared, and those standing

"Did the crash come without warning?" a voice on one of the smaller boats megaphoned.

"Yes," a woman answered. "Most of us had retired. We saved a few of our belongings."

"Not long," came the reply? "The crew and the men were very brave. Oh, it is dreadfuldreadful to think

Questions of this kind were showered at the few survivors who stood at the railing, but they seemed too

confused to answer them intelligibly, and after replying evasively to some they would disappear.

"Are you going to anchor for the night?" Captain Rostron was asked by megaphone as his boat approached

"We tried to learn when she would dock," said Dr. Walter Kennedy, head of the big ambulance corps on the

mist shrouded pier, "and we were told it would not be before midnight and that most probably it would not

be before dawn tomorrow. The childish deception that has been practiced for days by the people who are

responsible for the Titanic has been carried up to the very moment of the landing of the survivors."

She proceeded past the Cunard pier, where 2000 persons were waiting her, and steamed to a spot opposite the

The ports in the big inclosed pier of the Cunard Line were opened, and through them the waiting hundreds,

almost frantic with anxiety over what the Carpathia might reveal, watched her as with nervedestroying

leisure she swung about in the river, dropping over the lifeboats of the Titanic that they might be taken to

It was dark in the river, but the lowering away of the life boats could be seen from the Carpathia's pier, and

a deep sigh arose from the multitude there as they caught this first glance of anything associated with the

Then the Carpathia started for her own pier. As she approached it the ports on the north side of pier 54 were

closed that the Carpathia might land there, but through the two left open to accommodate the forward and

after gangplanks of the big liner the watchers could see her looming larger and larger in the darkness till

As the boats were towed away the picture taking and shouting of questions began again. John Badenoch, a

buyer for Macy Co., called down to a representative of the firm that neither Mr. nor Mrs. Isidor Straus were

among the rescued on board the Carpathia. An officer of the Carpathia called down that 710 of the Titanic's

The heavy hawsers were made fast without the customary shouting of ship's officers and pier hands. From the

crowd on the pier came a long, shuddering murmur. In it were blended sighs and hundreds of whispers. The

About each gangplank a portable fence had been put in place, marking off some fifty feet of the pier, within

which stood one hundred or more customs officials. Next to the fence, crowded close against it, were anxious

men and women, their gaze strained for a glance of the first from the ship, their mouths opened to draw their

breaths in spasmodic, quivering gasps, their very bodies shaking with suppressed excitement, excitement

These were the husbands and wives, children, parents, sweethearts and friends of those who had sailed upon

They pressed to the head of the pier, marking the boats of the wrecked ship as they dangled at the side of the

Carpathia and were revealed in the sudden flashes of the photographers upon the tugs. They spoke in

whispers, each group intent upon its own sad business. Newspaper writers, with pier passes showing in their

A sailor hurried outside the fence and disappeared, apparently on a mission for his company. There was a

deep drawn sigh as he walked away, shaking his head toward those who peered eagerly at him. Then came a

man and woman of the Carpathia's own passengers, as their orderly dress showed them to be.

Again a sigh like a sob swept over the crowd, and again they turned back to the canopied gangplank.

Several minutes passed and then out of the first cabin gangway; tunneled by a somber awning, streamed the

first survivors. A young woman, hatless, her light brown hair disordered and the leaden weight of crushing

sorrow heavy upon eyes and sensitive mouth, was in the van. She stopped, perplexed, almost ready to drop

"A survivor?" he questioned rapidly, and a nod of the head answering him, he demanded:

The answer given, he started to lead her toward that section of the pier where her friends would be waiting.

When she stepped from the gangplank there was quiet on the pier. The answers of the woman could almost

be heard by those fifty feet away, but as she staggered, rather than walked, toward the waiting throng outside

"Dorothy, Dorothy!" cried a man from the number. He broke through the double line of customs inspectors as

though it was composed of wooden toys and caught the woman to his breast. She opened her lips

inarticulately, weakly raised her arms and would have pitched forward upon her face had she not been

supported. Her fair head fell weakly to one side as the man picked her up in his arms, and, with tears

streaming down his face, stalked down the long avenue of the pier and down the long stairway to a waiting

The wailing of the crowdits cadences, wild and weird grew steadily louder and louder till they

culminated in a mighty shriek, which swept the whole big pier as though at the direction of some master

The arrival of the Carpathia was the signal for the most sensational rumors to circulate through the crowd on

First, Mrs. John Jacob Astor was reported to have died at 8.06 o'clock, when the Carpathia was on her way up

Captain Smith and the first engineer were reported to have shot themselves when they found that the Titanic

was doomed to sink. Afterward it was learned that Captain Smith and the engineer went down with their ship

Major Archibald Butt, President Taft's military aide, was said to have entered into an agreement with George

D. Widener, Colonel John Jacob Astor and Isidor Straus to kill them first and then shoot himself before the

boat sank. It was said that this agreement had been carried out. Later it was shown that, like many other men

Magistrate Cornell's wife and her two sisters were among the first to leave the ship. They were met at the first

cabin pier entrance by Magistrate Cornell and a party of friends. None of the three women had hats. One of

those who met them was Magistrate Cornell's son. One of Mrs. Cornell's sisters was overheard to remark that

The three women appeared to be in a very nervous state. Their hair was more or less dishevelled. They were

apparently fully dressed save for their hats. Clothing had been supplied them in their need and everything had

been done to make them comfortable. One of the party said that the collision occurred at 9.45.

Following closely the Cornell party was H. J. Allison of Montreal, who came to meet his family. One of the

party, who was weeping bitterly as he left the pier, explained that the only one of the family that was rescued

In a few minutes young Mrs. Astor with her maid appeared. She came down the gangplank unassisted. She

was wearing a white sweater. Vincent Astor and William Dobbyn, Colonel Astor's secretary, greeted her and

hurried her to a waiting limousine which contained clothing and other necessaries of which it was thought she

might be in need. The young woman was whitefaced and silent. Nobody cared to intrude upon her thoughts.

Her stepson said little to her. He did not feel like questioning her at such a time, he said.

Walter M. Clark, a nephew of the senator, said that he had seen Colonel Astor put his wife in a boat, after

assuring her that he would soon follow her in another. Mr. Clark and others said that Colonel and Mrs. Astor

were in their suite when the crash came, and that they appeared quietly on deck a few minutes afterward.

Here and there among the passengers of the Carpathia and from the survivors of the Titanic the story was

gleaned of the rescue. Nothing in life will ever approach the joy felt by the hundreds who were waiting in

little boats on the spot where the Titanic foundered when the lights of the Carpathia were first distinguished.

Efforts were made to learn from Dr. Henry Franenthal{sic} something about the details of how he was

rescued. Just then, or as he was leaving the pier, beaming with evident delight, he was surrounded by a big

All the doctor's face that wasn't covered with red beard was aglow with smiles as his friends hugged him and

slapped him on the back. They rushed him off bodily through the crowd and he too was whirled home.

How others followedhow heartrending stories of partings and of thrilling rescues were poured out in an

amazing stream this has all been told over and over again in the news that for days amazed, saddened and

angered the entire world. It is the story of a disaster that nations, it is hoped, will make impossible in the

In the stream of survivors were a peer of the realm, Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon, and his secretary, side by side

with plain Jack Jones, of Birmingham, able seaman, millionaires and paupers, women with bags of jewels

More than seventy widows were in the weeping company. The only large family that was saved in its entirety

was that of the Carters, of Philadelphia. Contrasting with this remarkable salvage of wealthy Pennsylvanians

was the sleeping elevenmonthsold baby of the Allisons, whose father, mother and sister went down to

Millionaire and pauper, titled grandee and weeping immigrant, Ismay, the head of the White Star Company,

and Jack Jones from the stoke hole were surrounded instantly. Some would gladly have escaped observation.

Every man among the survivors acted as though it were first necessary to explain how he came to be in a

lifeboat. Some of the stories smacked of Munchausen. Others were as plain and unvarnished as a pike staff.

Those that were most sincere and trustworthy had to be fairly pulled from those who gave their sad

Far into the night the recitals were made. They were told in the rooms of hotels, in the wards of hospitals and

upon trains that sped toward saddened homes. It was a symposium of horror and heroism, the like of which

has not been known in the civilized world since man established his dominion over the sea.

The two hundred and more steerage passengers did not leave the ship until 11 o'clock. They were in a sad

condition. The women were without wraps and the few men there were wore very little clothing. A poor

Syrian woman who said she was Mrs. Habush, bound for Youngstown, Ohio, carried in her arms a

sixyearold baby girl. This woman had lost her husband and three brothers. "I lost four of my men folks,"

Among the survivors who elicited a large measure of sympathy were two little French boys who were

dropped, almost naked, from the deck of the sinking Titanic into a lifeboat. From what place in France did

they come and to what place in the New World were they bound? There was not one iota of information to be

The two baby boys, two and four years old, respectively, were in charge of Miss Margaret Hays, who is a

fluent speaker of French, and she had tried vainly to get from the lisping lips of the two little ones some

Miss Hays, also a survivor of the Titanic, took charge of the almost naked waifs on the Carpathia. She

became warmly attached to the two boys, who unconcernedly played about, not understanding the great

The two little curlyheads did not understand it all. Had not their pretty nineteenyearold foster mother

provided them with pretty suits and little white shoes and playthings aplenty? Then, too, Miss Hays had a

Pom dog that she brought with her from Paris and which she carried in her arms when she left the Titanic and

held to her bosom through the long night in the lifeboat, and to which the children became warmly attached.

Miss Hays, unable to learn the names of the little fellows, had dubbed the older Louis and the younger

"Lump." "Lump" was all that his name implies, for he weighed almost as much as his brother. They were

darkeyed and brown curlyhaired children, who knew how to smile as only French children can.

On the fateful night of the Titanic disaster and just as the last boats were pulling away with their human

freight, a man rushed to the rail holding the babes under his arms. He cried to the passengers in one of the

boats and held the children aloft. Three or four sailors and passengers held up their arms. The father dropped

the older boy. He was safely caught. Then he dropped the little fellow and saw him folded in the arms of a

The last seen of the father, whose last living act was to save his babes, he was waving his hand in a final

Still more pitiable in one way was the lot of the baby survivor, elevenmonthsold Travers Allison, the only

member of a family of four to survive the wreck. His father, H. J. Allison, and mother and Lorraine, a child of

three, were victims of the catastrophe. Baby Travers, in the excitement following the crash, was separated

from the rest of the family just before the Titanic went down. With the party were two nurses and a maid.

Major Arthur Peuchen, of Montreal, one of the survivors, standing near the little fellow, who, swathed in

blankets, lay blinking at his nurse, described the death of Mrs. Allison. She had gone to the deck without her

husband, and, frantically seeking him, was directed by an officer to the other side of the ship.

She failed to find Mr. Allison and was quickly hustled into one of the collapsible lifeboats, and when last

seen by Major Peuchen she was toppling out of the halfswamped boat. J. W. Allison, a cousin of H. J.

Allison, was at the pier to care for Baby Travers and his nurse. They were taken to the Manhattan Hotel.

Describing the details of the perishing of the Allison family, the rescued nurse said they were all in bed when

"We did not get up immediately," said she, "for we had not thought of danger. Later we were told to get up,

and I hurriedly dressed the baby. We hastened up on deck, and confusion was all about. With other women

and children we clambered to the lifeboats, just as a matter of precaution, believing that there was no

immediate danger. In about an hour there was an explosion and the ship appeared to fall apart. We were in

Probably few deaths have caused more tears than Arthur Ryerson's, in view of the sad circumstances which

called him home from a lengthy tour in Europe. Mr. Ryerson's eldest son, Arthur Larned Ryerson, a Yale

A cablegram announcing the death plunged the Ryerson family into mourning and they boarded the first

steamship for this country. If{sic} happened to be the Titanic, and the death note came near being the cause

The children who accompanied them were Miss Susan P. Ryerson, Miss Emily B. Ryerson and John

They did not know their son intended to spend the Easter holidays at their home at Haverford, Pa. until they

were informed of his death. John Lewis Hoffman, also of Haverford and a student of Yale, was killed with

The two were hurrying to Philadelphia to escort a fellow student to his train. In turning out of the road to

pass a cart the motor car crashed into a pole in front of the entrance to the estate of Mrs. B. Frank Clyde. The

G. Heide Norris of Philadelphia, who went to New York to meet the surviving members of the Ryerson

family, told of a happy incident at the last moment as the Carpathia swung close to the pier. There had been

no positive information that young "Jack" Ryerson was among those saved indeed, it was feared that he

Mr. Norris spoke of the feeling of relief that came over him as, watching from the pier, he saw "Jack"

Ryerson come from a cabin and stand at the railing. The name of the boy was missing from some of the lists

Less than 24 hours after the Cunard Line steamship Carpathia came in as a rescue ship with survivors of the

Titanic disaster, she sailed again for the Mediterranean cruise which she originally started upon last week.

Just before the liner sailed, H. S. Bride, the second Marconi wireless operator of the Titanic, who had both of

his legs crushed on a lifeboat, was carried off on the shoulders of the ship's officers to St. Vincent's

Captain A. H. Rostron, of the Carpathia, addressed an official report, giving his account of the Carpathia's

rescue work, to the general manager of the Cunard Line, Liverpool. The report read: "I beg to report that at

12.35 A. M. Monday 18th inst. I was informed of urgent message from Titanic with her position. I

immediately ordered ship turned around and put her in course for that position, we being then 58 miles S.

52E. `T' from her; had heads of all departments called and issued what I considered the necessary orders,

"At 2.40 A. M. saw flare half a point on port bow. Taking this for granted to be ship, shortly after we sighted

our first iceberg. I had previously had lookouts doubled, knowing that Titanic had struck ice, and so took

every care and precaution. We soon found ourselves in a field of bergs, and had to alter course several times

to clear bergs; weather fine, and clear, light air on sea, beautifully clear night, though dark.

"We stopped at 4 A. M., thus doing distance in three hours and a half, picking up the first boat at 4.10 A. M.;

boat in charge of officer, and he reported that Titanic had foundered. At 8.30 A. M. last boat picked up. All

survivors aboard and all boats accounted for, viz., fifteen lifeboats, one boat abandoned, two Berthon boats

alongside (saw one floating upwards among wreckage), and according to second officer (senior officer saved)

one Berthon boat had not been launched, it having got jammed, making sixteen lifeboats and four Berthon

boats accounted for. By the time we had cleared first boat it was breaking day, and I could see all within area

of four miles. We also saw that we were surrounded by icebergs, large and small, huge field of drift ice with

large and small bergs in it, the ice field trending from N. W. round W. and S. to S. E., as far as we could see

"At 8 A. M. the Leyland S. S. California came up. I gave him the principal news and asked him to search and

I would proceed to New York; at 8.50 proceeded full speed while researching over vicinity of disaster, and

while we were getting people aboard I gave orders to get spare hands along and swing in all our boats,

disconnect the fall and hoist up as many Titanic boats as possible in our davits; also get some on forecastle

heads by derricks. We got thirteen lifeboats, six on forward deck and seven in davits. After getting all

survivors aboard and while searching I got a clergyman to offer a short prayer of thankfulness for those

"Before deciding definitely where to make for, I conferred with Mr. Ismay, and as he told me to do what I

thought best, I informed him, I considered New York best. I knew we should require clean blankets,

provisions and clean linen, even if we went to the Azores, as most of the passsengers{sic} saved were women

and children, and they hysterical, not knowing what medical attention they might require. I thought it best to

go to New York. I also thought it would be better for Mr. Ismay to go to New York or England as soon as

possible, and knowing I should be out of wireless communication very soon if I proceeded to Azores, it left

"Again, the passengers were all hysterical about ice, and I pointed out to Mr. Ismay the possibilities of seeing

ice if I went to Halifax. Then I knew it would be best to keep in touch with land stations as best I could. We

have experienced great difficulty in transmitting news, also names of survivors. Our wireless is very poor,

and again we have had so many interruptions from other ships and also messages from shore (principally

press, which we ignored). I gave instructions to send first all official messages, then names of passengers,

then survivors' private messages. We had haze early Tuesday morning for several hours; again more or less

all Wednesday from 5.30 A. M. to 5 P. M.; strong southsouthwesterly winds and clear weather Thursday,

"I am pleased to say that all survivors have been very plucky. The majority of women, first, second and third

class, lost their husbands, and, considering all, have been wonderfully well. Tuesday our doctor reported all

survivors physically well. Our first class passengers have behaved splendidly, given up their cabins

voluntarily and supplied the ladies with clothes, etc. We all turned out of our cabins and gave them to

survivorssaloon, smoking room, library, etc., also being used for sleeping accommodation. Our crew, also

turned out to let the crew of the Titanic take their quarters. I am pleased to state that owing to preparations

made for the comfort of survivors, none were the worse for exposure, etc. I beg to specially mention how

willing and cheerful the whole of the ship's company behaved, receiving the highest praise from everybody.

The following list of the survivors and dead contains the latest revisions and corrections of the White Star

A list of surviving third cabin passengers and crew is omitted owing to the impossibility

The total death list was 1635. Third cabin passengers and crew are not included in the list here given owing to

THE Story of how the Titanic sank is told by Charles F. Hurd, who was a passenger on the Carpathia.

He praised highly the courage of the crew, hundreds of whom gave their lives with a heroism which equaled

but could not exceed that of John Jacob Astor, Henry B. Harris, Jacques Futrelle and others in the long list of

"The crash against the iceberg, which had been sighted at only a quarter mile distance, came almost

simultaneously with the click of the levers operated from the bridge, which stopped the engines and closed

the watertight doors. Captain Smith was on the bridge a moment later, summoning all on board to put on

"The first boats had more male passengers, as the men were the first to reach the deck. When the rush of

frightened men and women and crying children to the decks began, the `women first' rule was rigidly

"Officers drew revolvers, but in most cases there was no use for them. Revolver shots heard shortly before

the Titanic went down caused many rumors, one that Captain Smith had shot himself, another that First

Officer Murdock had ended his life, but members of the crew discredit these rumors.

"Captain Smith was last seen on the bridge just before the ship sank, leaping only after the decks had been

"What became of the men with the lifepreservers was a question asked by many since the disaster. Many of

these with lifepreservers were seen to go down despite the preservers, and dead bodies floated on the

"Facts which I have established by inquiries on the Carpathia, as positively as they could be established in

"That the Titanic's officers knew, several hours before the crash, of the possible nearness of the icebergs.

"That the number of lifeboats on the Titanic was insufficient to accommodate more than onethird of the

passengers, to say nothing of the crew. Most members of the crew say there were sixteen lifeboats and two

collapsibles; none say there were more than twenty boats in all. The 700 escaped filled most of the sixteen

lifeboats and the one collapsible which got away, to the limit of their capacity.

"Had the ship struck the iceberg head on at whatever peed and with whatever resulting shock, the bulkhead

system of watertight compartments would probably have saved the vessel. As one man expressed it, it was

the impossible that happened when, with a shock unbelievably mild, the ship's side was torn for a length

"Some of the boats, crowded too full to give rowers a chance, drifted for a time. Few had provisions or water,

there was lack of covering from the icy air, and the only lights were the still undimmed arcs and

incandescents of the settling ship, save for one of the first boats. There a steward, who explained to the

passengers that he had been shipwrecked twice before, appeared carrying three oranges and a green light.

"That green light, many of the survivors say, was to the shipwrecked hundreds as the pillar of fire by night.

Long after the ship had disappeared, and while confusing false lights danced about the boats, the green

"As the end of the Titanic became manifestly but a matter of moments, the oarsmen pulled their boats away,

and the chilling waters began to echo splash after splash as passengers and sailors in lifepreservers leaped

"Only the hardiest of constitutions could endure for more than a few moments such a numbing bath. The first

vigor ous strokes gave way to heartbreaking cries of `Help! Help!' and stiffened forms were seen floating

"Led by the green light, under the light of the stars, the boats drew away, and the bow, then the quarter, then

the stacks and at last the stern of the marvelship of a few days before, passed beneath the waters. The great

force of the ship's sinking was unaided by any violence of the elements, and the suction, not so great as had

been feared, rocked but mildly the group of boats now a quarter of a mile distant from it.

"Early dawn brought no ship, but not long after 5 A. M. the Carpathia, far out of her path and making

eighteen knots, instead of her wonted fifteen, showed her single red and black smokestack upon the horizon.

"Soon afterward Captain Rostron and Chief Steward Hughes were welcoming the chilled and bedraggled

"Terrible as were the San Francisco, Slocum and Iroquois disasters, they shrink to local events in comparison

"True, there were others of greater qualifications and longer experience than I nearer the tragedybut they,

by every token of likelihood, have become a part of the tragedy. The honoredmust I say the

lamentedStead, the adroit Jacques Futrelle, what might they not tell were their hands able to hold pencil?

"The silence of the Carpathia's engines, the piercing cold, the clamor of many voices in the companionways,

caused me to dress hurriedly and awaken my wife, at 5.40 A. M. Monday. Our stewardess, meeting me

outside, pointed to a wailing host in the rear dining room and said. `From the Titanic. She's at the bottom of

"At the ship's side, a moment later, I saw the last of the line of boats discharge their loads, and saw women,

some with cheap shawls about their heads, some with the costliest of fur cloaks, ascending the ship's side.

And such joy as the first sight of our ship may have given them had disappeared from their faces, and there

were tears and signs of faltering as the women were helped up the ladders or hoisted aboard in swings. For

lack of room to put them, several of the Titanic's boats, after unloading, were set adrift.

"At our north was a broad ice field, the length of hundreds of Carpathias. Around us on other sides were

sharp and glistening peaks. One black berg, seen about 10 A. M., was said to be that which sunk the Titanic."

AMONG the most connected and interesting stories related by the survivors was the one told by L. Beasley,

"The voyage from Queenstown had been quite uneventful; very fine weather was experienced, and the sea

was quite calm. The wind had been westerly to southwesterly the whole way, but very cold, particularly the

last day; in fact after dinner on Saturday evening it was almost too cold to be out on deck at all.

"I had been in my berth for about ten minutes, when, at about 11.15 P. M., I felt a slight jar, and then soon

after a second one, but not sufficiently violent to cause any anxiety to anyone, however nervous they may

have been. However, the engines stopped immediately afterward, and my first, thought was, `She has lost a

"I went up on the top (boat) deck in a dressing gown, and found only a few persons there, who had come up

similarly to inquire why we had stopped, but there was no sort of anxiety in the minds of anyone.

"We saw through the smoking room window a game of cards going on, and went in to inquire if they knew

anything; it seems they felt more of the jar, and, looking through the window, had seen a huge iceberg go by

close to the side of the boat. They thought we had just grazed it with a glancing blow, and that the engines

had been stopped to see if any damage had been done. No one, of course, had any conception that the vessel

"The game went on without any thought of disaster and I retired to my cabin, to read until we went on again.

"A little later, hearing people going upstairs, I went out again and found everyone wanting to know why the

engines had stopped. No doubt many were awakened from sleep by the sudden stopping of a vibration to

which they had become accustomed during the four days we had been on board. Naturally, with such

powerful engines as the Titanic carried, the vibration was very noticeable all the time, and the sudden

stopping had something the same effect as the stopping of a loudticking grandfather's clock in a room.

"On going on deck again I saw that there was an undoubted list downward from stern to bows, but, knowing

nothing of what had happened, concluded some of the front compartments had filled and weighed her down. I

went down again to put on warmer clothing, and as I dressed heard an order shouted, `All passengers on deck

"We all walked slowly up, with the belts tied on over our clothing, but even then presumed this was only a

wise precaution the captain was taking, and that we should return in a short time and retire to bed.

"There was a total absence of any panic or any expressions of alarm, and I suppose this can be accounted for

"The ship was absolutely still, and except for a gentle tilt downward, which I don't think one person in ten

would have noticed at that time, no signs of the approaching disaster were visible. She lay just as if she were

"But in a few moments we saw the covers lifted from the boats and the crews allotted to them standing by

and coiling up the ropes which were to lower them by the pulley blocks into the water.

"We then began to realize it was more serious than had been supposed, and my first thought was to go down

and get some more clothing and some money, but, seeing people pouring up the stairs, decided it was better

" `All men stand back away from the boats, and all ladies retire to next deck below'the smokingroom

"The men all stood away and remained in absolute silence leaning against the end railings of the deck or

"The boats were swung out and lowered from A deck. When they were to the level of B deck, where all the

women were collected, they got in quietly, with the exception of some who refused to leave their husbands.

"In some cases they were torn from them and pushed into the boats, but in many instances they were allowed

"Looking over the side, one saw boats from aft already in the water, slipping quietly away into the darkness,

and presently the boats near me were lowered, and with much creaking as the new ropes slipped through the

pulley blocks down the ninety feet which separated them from the water. An officer in uniform came up as

one boat went down and shouted, "When you are afloat row round to the companion ladder and stand by with

" `Aye, aye, sir,' came up the reply; but I don't think any boat was able to obey the order. When they were

afloat and had the oars at work, the condition of the rapidly settling boat was so much more a sight for alarm

for those in the boats than those on board, that in common prudence the sailors saw they could do nothing but

row from the sinking ship to save at any rate some lives. They no doubt anticipated that suction from such an

enormous vessel would be more dangerous than usual to a crowded boat mostly filled with women.

"All this time there was no trace of any disorder; no panic or rush to the boats and no scenes of women

sobbing hysterically, such as one generally pictures as happening at such times everyone seemed to realize so

slowly that there was imminent danger. When it was realized that we might all be presently in the sea with

nothing but our lifebelts to support us until we were picked up by passing steamers, it was extraordinary

"One by one, the boats were filled with women and children, lowered and rowed away into the night.

Presently the word went round among the men, `the men are to be put in boats on the starboard side.'

"I was on the port side, and most of the men walked across the deck to see if this was so I remained where I

"Looking over the side of the ship, I saw the boat, No. 13, swinging level with B deck, half full of ladies.

"I dropped in, and fell in the bottom, as they cried `lower away.' As the boat began to descend two ladies

were pushed hurriedly through the crowd on B deck and heaved over into the boat, and a baby of ten months

passed down after them. Down we went, the crew calling to those lowering each end to `keep her level,' until

we were some ten feet from the water, and here occurred the only anxious moment we had during the whole

"Immediately below our boat was the exhaust of the condensers, a huge stream of water pouring all the time

from the ship's side just above the water line. It was plain we ought to be quickly away from this, not to be

"We had no officer aboard, nor petty officer or member of the crew to take charge. So one of the stokers

shouted: `Someone find the pin which releases the boat from the ropes and pull it up!' No one knew where it

was. We felt on the floor and sides, but found nothing, and it was hard to move among so many peoplewe

"Down we went and presently floated, with our ropes still holding us, the exhaust washing us away from the

side of the vessel and the swell of the sea urging us back against the side again. The result of all these forces

was an impetus which carried us parallel to the ship's side and directly under boat 14, which had filled rapidly

with men and was coming down on us in a way that threatened to submerge our boat.

" `Stop lowering 14,' our crew shouted, and the crew of No. 14, now only twenty feet above, shouted the

same. But the distance to the top was some seventy feet and the creaking pulleys must have deadened all

sound to those above, for down she came, fifteen feet, ten feet, five feet and a stoker and I reached up and

touched her swinging above our heads. The next drop would have brought her on our heads, but just before

" `One,' I heard him say, `two,' as his knife cut through the pulley ropes, and the next moment the exhaust

stream had carried us clear, while boat 14 dropped into the water, into the space we had the moment before

"We drifted away easily, as the oars were got out, and headed directly away from the ship. The crew seemed

to me to be mostly stewards or cooks in white jackets, two to an oar, with a stoker at the tiller. There was a

certain amount of shouting from one end of the boat to the other, and discussion as to which way we should

go, but finally it was decided to elect the stoker, who was steering, as captain, and for all to obey his orders.

He set to work at once to get into touch with the other boats, calling to them and getting as close as seemed

wise, so that when the search boats came in the morning to look for us, there would be more chance for all to

"It was now about 1 A. M.; a beautiful starlight night, with no moon, and so not very light. The sea was as

calm as a pond, just a gentle heave as the boat dipped up and down in the swell; an ideal night, except for the

bitter cold, for anyone who had to be out in the middle of the Atlantic ocean in an open boat. And if ever

there was a time when such a night was needed, surely it was now, with hundreds of people, mostly women

"The captainstoker told us that he had been at sea twenty six years, and had never yet seen such a calm

night on the Atlantic. As we rowed away from the Titanic, we looked back from time to time to watch her,

"In the distance it looked an enormous length, its great bulk outlined in black against the starry sky, every

porthole and saloon blazing with light. It was impossible to think anything could be wrong with such a

leviathan, were it not for that ominous tilt downward in the bows, where the water was by now up to the

"Presently, about 2 A. M., as near as I can remember, we observed it settling very rapidly, with the bows and

the bridge completely under water, and concluded it was now only a question of minutes before it went; and

Mr. Beasley went on to tell of the spectacle of the sinking of the Titanic, the terrible experiences of the

survivors in the lifeboats and their final rescue by the Carpathia as already related.

ONE of the calmest of the passengers was: young Jack Thayer, the seventeenyearold son of Mr. and Mrs.

John B. Thayer. When his mother was put into the lifeboat he kissed her and told her to be brave, saying

that he and his father would be all right. He and Mr. Thayer stood on the deck as the small boat in which Mrs.

Thayer was a passenger made off from the side of the Titanic over the smooth sea.

The boy's own account of his experience as told to one of his rescuers is one of the most remarkable of all the

"Father was in bed, and mother and myself were about to get into bed. There was no great shock, I was on my

feet at the time and I do not think it was enough to throw anyone down. I put on an overcoat and rushed up on

A deck on the port side. I saw nothing there. I then went forward to the bow to see if I could see any signs of

ice. The only ice I saw was on the well deck. I could not see very far ahead, having just come out of a

"I then went down to our room and my father and mother came on deck with me, to the starboard side of A

deck. We could not see anything there. Father thought he saw small pieces of ice floating around, but I could

not see any myself. There was no big berg. We walked around to the port side, and the ship had then a fair list

to port. We stayed there looking over the side for about five minutes. The list seemed very slowly to be

"We then went down to our rooms on C deck, all of us dressing quickly, putting on all our clothes. We all put

on lifepreservers, and over these we put our overcoats. Then we hurried up on deck and walked around,

looking out at different places until the women were all ordered to collect on the port side.

"Father and I said goodbye to mother at the top of the stairs on A deck. She and the maid went right out on

A deck on the port side and we went to the starboard side. As at this time we had no idea the boat would sink

we walked around A deck and then went to B deck. Then we thought we would go back to see if mother had

gotten off safely, and went to the port side of A deck. We met the chief steward of the main dining saloon and

"Father and mother went ahead and I followed. They went down to B deck and a crowd got in front of me

and I was not able to catch them, and lost sight of them. As soon as I could get through the crowd I tried to

find them on B deck, but without success. That is the last time I saw my father. This was about one half an

hour before she sank. I then went to the starboard side, thinking that father and mother must have gotten off

in a boat. All of this time I was with a fellow named Milton C. Long, of New York, whom I had just met that

"On the starboard side the boats were getting away quickly. Some boats were already off in a distance. We

thought of getting into one of the boats, the last boat to go on the forward part of the starboard side, but there

seemed to be such a crowd around I thought it unwise to make any attempt to get into it. He and I stood by

the davits of one of the boats that had left. I did not notice anybody that I knew except Mr. Lindley, whom I

had also just met that evening. I lost sight of him in a few minutes. Long and I then stood by the rail just a

"The list to the port had been growing greater all the time. About this time the people began jumping from the

stern. I thought of jumping myself, but was afraid of being stunned on hitting the water. Three times I made

up my mind to jump out and slide down the davit ropes and try to make the boats that were lying off from the

ship, but each time Long got hold of me and told me to wait a while. He then sat down and I stood up waiting

"I got a sight on a rope between the davits and a star and noticed that she was gradually sinking. About this

time she straightened up on an even keel and started to go down fairly fast at an angle of about 30 degrees. As

she started to sink we left the davits and went back and stood by the rail about even with the second funnel.

"Long and myself said goodbye to each other and jumped up on the rail. He put his legs over and held on a

minute and asked me if I was coming. I told him I would be with him in a minute. He did not jump clear, but

"About five seconds after he jumped I jumped out, feet first. I was clear of the ship; went down, and as I

came up I was pushed away from the ship by some force. I came up facing the ship, and one of the funnels

seemed to be lifted off and fell towards me about 15 yards away, with a mass of sparks and steam coming out

of it. I saw the ship in a sort of a red glare, and it seemed to me that she broke in two just in front of the third

"This time I was sucked down, and as I came up I was pushed out again and twisted around by a large wave,

coming up in the midst of a great deal of small wreckage. As I pushed my hand from my head it touched the

cork fender of an over turned lifeboat. I looked up and saw some men on the top and asked them to give

me a hand. One of them, who was a stoker, helped me up. In a short time the bottom was covered with about

"The stern then seemed to rise in the air and stopped at about an angle of 60 degrees. It seemed to hold there

for a time and then with a hissing sound it shot right down out of sight with people jumping from the stern.

The stern either pivoted around towards our boat, or we were sucked towards it, and as we only had one oar

we could not keep away. There did not seem to be very much suction and most of us managed to stay on the

"We were then right in the midst of fairly large wreckage, with people swimming all around us. The sea was

very calm and we kept the boat pretty steady, but every now and then a wave would wash over it.

"The assistant wireless operator was right next to me, holding on to me and kneeling in the water. We all sang

a hymn and said the Lord's Prayer, and then waited for dawn to come. As often as we saw the other boats in a

distance we would yell, `Ship ahoy!' But they could not distinguish our cries from any of the others, so we all

gave it up, thinking it useless. It was very cold and none of us were able to move around to keep warm, the

"Toward dawn the wind sprang up, roughening up the water and making it difficult to keep the boat balanced.

The wireless man raised our hopes a great deal by telling us that the Carpathia would be up in about three

hours. About 3.30 or 4 o'clock some men on our boat on the bow sighted her mast lights. I could not see

them, as I was sitting down with a man kneeling on my leg. He finally got up and I stood up. We had the

second officer, Mr. Lightoller, on board. We had an officer's whistle and whistled for the boats in the distance

"It took about an hour and a half for the boats to draw near. Two boats came up. The first took half and the

other took the balance, including myself. We had great difficulty about this time in balancing the boat, as the

men would lean too far, but we were all taken aboard the already crowded boat, and in about a half or

"I have noticed Second Officer Lightoller's statement that `J. B. Thayer was on our overturned boat,' which

would give the impression that it was father, when he really meant it was I, as he only learned my name in a

SURROUNDED by his wife and members of his family, James McGough, of Philadelphia, a buyer for the

Gimbel Brothers, whose fate had been in doubt, recited a most thrilling and graphic picture of the disaster.

As the Carpathia docked, Mrs. McGough, a brother and several friends of the buyer, met him, and after the

Vivid in detail, Mr. McGough's story differs essentially from one the imagination would paint. He declared

that the boat was driving at a high rate of speed at the time of the accident, and seemed impressed by the

calmness and apathy displayed by the survivors as they tossed on the frozen seas in the little lifeboats until

The Titanic did not plunge into the water suddenly, he declared, but settled slowly into the deep with its

"The collision occurred at 20 minutes of 12," said Mr. McGough. "I was sleeping in my cabin when I felt a

"It seemed to me to be nothing more serious than the racing of the screw, which often occurs when a ship

plunges her bow deep into a heavy swell, raising the stern out of water. We dressed hurriedly and ran to the

"The promenade decks being higher from the base of the ship and thus more insecure, strained and creaked;

so we went to the lower decks. By this time the engines had been reversed, and I could feel the ship backing

off. Officers and stewards ran through the corridors, shouting for all to be calm, that there was no danger. We

were warned, however, to dress and put lifepreservers on us. I had on what clothing I could find and had

"As I passed the gymnasium I saw Colonel Astor and his young wife together. She was clinging to him,

piteously pleading that he go into the lifeboat with her. He refused almost gruffly and was attempting to

calm her by saying that all her fears were groundless, that the accident she feared would prove a farce. It

"None, I believe, knew that the ship was about to sink. I did not realize it just then. When I reached the upper

deck and saw tons of ice piled upon our crushed bow the full realization came to me.

"Officers stood with drawn guns ordering the women into the boats. All feared to leave the comparative

safety of a broad and firm deck for the precarious smaller boats. Women clung to their husbands, crying that

"On one point all the women were firm. They would not enter a Lifeboat until men were in it first. They

feared to trust themselves to the seas in them. It required courage to step into the frail crafts as they swung

from the creaking davits. Few men were willing to take the chance. An officer rushed behind me and shouted:

" `You're big enough to pull an oar. Jump into this boat or we'll never be able to get the women off.' I was

forced to do so, though I admit that the ship looked a great deal safer to me than any small boat.

"Our boat was the second off. Forty or more persons were crowded into it, and with myself and members of

the crew at the oars, were pulled slowly away. Huge icebergs, larger than the Pennsylvania depot at New

York, surrounded us. As we pulled away we could see boat after boat filled and lowered to the waves.

Despite the fact that they were new and supposedly in excellent working order, the blocks jammed in many

instances, tilting the boats, loaded with people, at varying angles before they reached the water.

"As the lifeboats pulled away the officers ordered the bands to play, and their music did much to quell

panic. It was a heartbreaking sight to us tossing in an eggshell threefourths of a mile away, to see the great

ship go down. First she listed to the starboard, on which side the collision had occurred, then she settled

"The Titanic was all aglow with lights as if for a function. First we saw the lights of the lower deck snuffed

out. A while later and the second deck illumination was extinguished in a similar manner. Then the third and

upper decks were darkened, and without plunging or rocking the great ship disappeared slowly from the

"People were crowded on each deck as it lowered into the water, hoping in vain that aid would come in time.

"The sea was calmcalm as the water in a tumbler. But it was freezing cold. None had dressed heavily, and

all, therefore, suffered intensely. The women did not shriek or grow hysterical while we waited through the

awful night for help. We men stood at the oars, stood because there was no room for us to sit, and kept the

boat headed into the swell to prevent her capsizing. Another boat was at our side, but all the others were

"Finally, shortly before 6 o'clock, we saw the lights of the Carpathia approaching. Gradually she picked up

the survivors in the other boats and then approached us. When we were lifted to the deck the women fell

helpless. They were carried to whatever quarters offered themselves, while the men were assigned to the

"Of the misery and suffering which was witnessed on the rescue ship I know nothing. With the other men

survivors I was glad to remain in the smoking room until New York was reached, trying to forget the awful

"To us aboard the Carpathia came rumors of misstatements which were being made to the public. The details

"Let me emphasize that the night was not foggy or cloudy. There was just the beginning of the new moon, but

every star in the sky was shining brightly, unmarred by clouds. The boats were lowered from both sides of the

ONE of the most connected and detailed accounts of the horrible disaster was that told by Harold Bride, the

"I was standing by Phillips, the chief operator, telling him to go to bed, when the captain put his head in the

" `We've struck an iceberg,' the captain said, `and I'm having an inspection made to tell what it has done for

us. You better get ready to send out a call for assistance. But don't send it until I tell you.'

"The captain went away and in ten minutes, I should estimate the time, he came back. We could hear a

terrific confusion outside, but there was not the least thing to indicate that there was any trouble. The wireless

" `Send the call for assistance,' ordered the captain, barely putting his head in the door.

"Then the captain was gone Phillips began to send `C. Q. D.' He flashed away at it and we joked while he did

"The Carpathia answered our signal. We told her our position and said we were sinking by the head. The

operator went to tell the captain, and in five minutes returned and told us that the captain of the Carpathia,

"Our captain had left us at this time and Phillips told me to run and tell him what the Carpathia had answered.

I did so, and I went through an awful mass of people to his cabin. The decks were full of scrambling men and

"I came back and heard Phillips giving the Carpathia fuller directions. Phillips told me to put on my clothes.

"I went to my cabin and dressed. I brought an overcoat to Phillips. It was very cold. I slipped the overcoat

"Every few minutes Phillips would send me to the captain with little messages. They were merely telling how

"I noticed as I came back from one trip that they were putting off women and children in lifeboats. I noticed

"Phillips told me the wireless was growing weaker. The captain came and told us our engine rooms were

taking water and that the dynamos might not last much longer. We sent that word to the Carpathia.

"I went out on deck and looked around. The water was pretty close up to the boat deck. There was a great

scramble aft, and how poor Phillips worked through it right to the end I don't know.

"He was a brave man. I learned to love him that night and I suddenly felt for him a great reverence to see him

standing there sticking to his work while everybody else was raging about. I will never live to forget the work

"I thought it was about time to look about and see if there was anything detached that would float. I

remembered that every member of the crew had a special lifebelt and ought to know where it was. I

remembered mine was under my bunk. I went and got it. Then I thought how cold the water was.

"I remembered I had an extra jacket and a pair of boots, and I put them on. I saw Phillips standing out there

"We picked up the Olympic and told her we were sinking by the head and were about all down. As Phillips

was sending the message I strapped his lifebelt to his back. I had already put on his overcoat. Every minute

"From aft came the tunes of the band. It was a ragtime tune, I don't know what. Then there was `Autumn.'

"I went to the place where I had seen a collapsible boat on the boat deck, and to my surprise I saw the boat

and the men still trying to push it off. I guess there wasn't a sailor in the crowd. They couldn't do it. I went up

"The big wave carried the boat off. I had hold of a row lock and I went off with it. The next I knew I was in

"But that was not all. I was in the boat and the boat was upside down and I was under it. And I remember

realizing I was wet through, and that whatever happened I must not breathe, for I was under water.

"I knew I had to fight for it and I did. How I got out from under the boat I do not know, but I felt a breath of

"There were men all around me hundreds of them. The sea was dotted with them, all depending on their

lifebelts. I felt I simply had to get away from the ship. She was a beautiful sight then.

"Smoke and sparks were rushing out of her funnel, and there must have been an explosion, but we had heard

none. We only saw the big stream of sparks. The ship was gradually turning on her nose just like a duck does

that goes down for a dive. I had one thing on my mindto get away from the suction. The band was still

"They were playing `Autumn' then. I swam with all my might. I suppose I was 150 feet away when the

Titanic, on her nose, with her afterquarter sticking straight up in the air, began to settle slowly.

"When at last the waves washed over her rudder there wasn't the least bit of suction I could feel. She must

"I forgot to mention that, besides the Olympic and Carpathia, we spoke some German boat, I don't know

which, and told them how we were. We also spoke the Baltic. I remembered those things as I began to figure

"I felt, after a little while, like sinking. I was very cold. I saw a boat of some kind near me and put all my

strength into an effort to swim to it. It was hard work. I was all done when a hand reached out from the boat

"There was just room for me to roll on the edge. I lay there, not caring what happened. Somebody sat on my

legs; they were wedged in between slats and were being wrenched. I had not the heart left to ask the man to

"I lay where I was, letting the man wrench my feet out of shape. Others came near. Nobody gave them a

hand. The bottomup boat already had more men than it would hold and it was sinking.

"At first the larger waves splashed over my head and I had to breathe when I could.

"Some splendid people saved us. They had a rightside up boat, and it was full to its capacity. Yet they

came to us and loaded us all into it. I saw some lights off in the distance and knew a steamship was coming to

"I didn't care what happened. I just lay, and gasped when I could and felt the pain in my feet. At last the

Carpathia was alongside and the people were being taken up a rope ladder. Our boat drew near, and one b{y}

"The way the band kept playing was a noble thing. I heard it first while we were working wireless, when

there was a ragtime tune for us, and the last I saw of the band, when I was floating out in the sea, with my

lifebelt on, it was still on deck playing `Autumn.' How they ever did it I cannot imagine.

"That and the way Phillips kept sending after the captain told him his life was his own, and to look out for

SOME of the most thrilling incidents connected with the rescue of the Titanic's survivors are told in the

following account given by a man trained to the sea, a steward of the rescue ship Carpathia:

"At midnight on Sunday, April 14th, I was promenading the deck of the steamer Carpathia, bound for the

Mediterranean and three days out from New York, when an urgent summons came to my room from the chief

steward, E. Harry Hughes. I then learned that the White Star liner Titanic, the greatest ship afloat, had struck

"We were then already steaming at our greatest power to the scene of the disaster, Captain Rostron having

immediately given orders that every man of the crew should stand by to exert his utmost efforts. Within a

very few minutes every preparation had been made to receive two or three thousand persons. Blankets were

placed ready, tables laid with hot soups and coffee, bedding, etc., prepared, and hospital supplies laid out

"The men were then mustered in the saloon and addressed by the chief steward. He told them of the disaster

and appealed to them in a few words to show the world what stuff Britishers were made of, and to add a

glorious page to the history of the empire; and right well did the men respond to the appeal. Every lifeboat

was manned and ready to be launched at a moment's notice. Nothing further could be done but anxiously wait

"Our Marconi operator, whose unceasing efforts for many hours deserve the greatest possible praise, was

unable at this time to get any reply to the urgent inquiries he was sending out, and he feared the worst.

"At last a blue flare was observed, to which we replied with a rocket. Day was just dawning when we

"Eastward on the horizon a huge iceberg, the cause of the disaster, majestically reared two noble peaks to

heaven. Rope ladders were already lowered and we hove to near the lifeboat, which was now approaching

us as rapidly as the nearly exhausted efforts of the men at the oars could bring her.

"Under the command of our chief officer, who worked indefatigably at the noble work of rescue, the

survivors in the boat were rapidly but carefully hauled aboard and given into the hands of the medical staff

"We then learned the terrible news that the gigantic vessel, the unsinkable Titanic, had gone down one hour

"From this time onward lifeboats continued to arrive at frequent intervals. Every man of the Carpathia's

crew was unsparing in his efforts to assist, to tenderly comfort each and every survivor. In all, sixteen

boatloads were receives, containing altogether 720 persons, many in simply their night attire, others in

evening dress, as if direct from an afterdinner reception, or concert. Most conspicuous was the coolness and

"Pathetic and heartrending incidents were many. There was not a man of the rescue party who was not moved

almost to tears. Women arrived and frantically rushed from one gangway to another eagerly scanning the

"One boat arrived with the unconscious body of an English colonel. He had been taking out his mother on a

visit, to three others of her sons. He had succeeded in getting her away in one of the boats and he himself had

found a place in another. When but a fewyards from the illfated ship the boat containing his mother

"Immediately he dived into the water and commenced a frantic search for her. But in vain. Boat after boat

endeavored to take him aboard, but he refused to give up, continuing to swim for nearly three hours until

even his great strength of body and mind gave out and he was hauled unconscious into a passing boat and

"There were, I understand, twelve newly married couples aboard the big ship. The twelve brides have been

saved, but of the husbands all but one have perished. That one would not have been here, had he not been

urged to assist in manning a lifeboat. Think of the selfsacrifice of these eleven heroes, who stood on the

doomed vessel and parted from their brides forever, knowing full well that a few brief minutes would end all

"Many similar pathetic incidents could be related. Sad eyed women roam aimlessly about the ship still

looking vainly for husband, brother or father. To comfort them is impossible. All human efforts are being

exerted on their behalf. Their material needs are satisfied in every way. But who can cure a broken heart?

"One of the earliest boats to arrive was seen to contain a woman tenderly clasping a pet Pomeranian. When

assisted to the rope ladder and while the rope was being fastened around her she emphatically refused to give

up for a second the dog which was evidently so much to her. He is now receiving as careful and tender

"A survivor informs me that there was on the ship a lady who was taking out a huge great Dane dog. When

the boats were rapidly filling she appeared on deck with her canine companion and sadly entreated that he

should be taken off with her. It was impossible. Human lives, those of women and children, were the first

consideration. She was urged to seize the opportunity to save her own life and leave the dog. She refused to

"One elderly lady was bewailing to a steward that she had lost everything. He indignantly replied that she

should thank God her life was spared, never mind her replaceable property. The reply was pathetic:

"One incident that impressed me perhaps more than any other was the burial on Tuesday afternoon of four of

the poor fellows who succeeded in safely getting away from the doomed vessel only to perish later from

exhaustion and exposure as a result of their gallant efforts to bring to safety the passengers placed in their

"The sailor and steward were unfortunately dead when taken aboard. The passengers lived but a few minutes

after. They were treated with the greatest attention. The funeral service was conducted amid profound silence

and attended by a large number of survivors and rescuers. The bodies, covered by the national flag, were

reverently consigned to the mighty deep from which they had been, alas, vainly, saved.

"Most gratifying to the officers and men of the Carpathia is the constantly expressive appreciation of the

He then told of the meeting of the survivors in the cabin of the Carpathia and of the resolution adopted, a

YOUNG and old, rich and poor were prostrated by the news of the disaster. Even Wall Street was neglected.

Nor was the grief confined to America. European nations felt the horror of the calamity and sent expressions

of sympathy. President Taft made public cablegrams received from the King and Queen of England, and the

King of Belgium, conveying their sympathy to the American people in the sorrows which have followed the

Titanic disaster. The President's responses to both messages were also made public.

"The Queen and I are anxious to assure you and the American nation of the great sorrow which we

experienced at the terrible loss of life that has occurred among the American citizens, as well as among my

own subjects, by the foundering of the Titanic. Our two countries are so intimately allied by ties of friendship

and brotherhood that any mis fortunes which affect the one must necessarily affect the other, and on the

"In the presence of the appalling disaster to the Titanic the people of the two countries are brought into

community of grief through their common bereavement. The American people share in the sorrow of their

kinsmen beyond the sea. On behalf of my countrymen I thank you for your sympathetic message.

"I beg Your Excellency to accept my deepest condolences on the occasion of the frightful catastrophe to the

"I deeply appreciate your sympathy with my fellowcountrymen who have been stricken with affliction

"We have learned with profound grief of the catastrophe to the Titanic, which has plunged the American

nation in mourning. We send you our sincerest condolence, and wish to assure you and your nation of the

The many expressions of grief to reach President Taft included one signed jointly by the three American

Cardinals, who were in New York attending the meeting of the trustees of the Catholic University. It said:

"The archbishops of the country, in joint session with the trustees of the Catholic University of America, beg

to offer to the President of the United States their expression of their profound grief at the awful loss of

human lives attendant upon the sinking of the steamship Titanic, and at the same time to assure the relatives

of the victims of this horrible disaster of our deepest sympathy and condolence.

"They wish also to attest hereby to the hope that the law makers of the country will see in this sad accident

the obvious necessity of legal provisions for greater security of ocean travel. "JAMES CARDINAL

GIBBONS," Archbishop of Baltimore. "JOHN CARDINAL FARLEY," Archbishop of New York.

Formal tribute to the Titanic's dead was paid by the House of Representatives when it adjourned for

The prayer of the Rev. Henry N. Couden in opening the House session was, in part:

"We thank Thee that though in the ordinary circumstances of life selfishness and greed seem to be in the

ascendancy, yet in times of distress and peril, then it is that the nobility of soul, the Godlike in man, asserts

The flags on the White House and other Government buildings throughout the country were at halfstaff.

A special telegram from Rome stated that one of the victims most regretted was Major Butt, whose jovial,

bright character made many friends there. Besides autograph letters from the Pope and Cardinal Merry del

VaI{sic?} to President Taft, the major had with him a signed photograph of the Pontiff, given by him

Cardinal Merry del Val had several conversations with Major Butt, who declared that the cardinal was "the

first gentleman of Europe." Shortly before he was leaving Rome, regretting that he had not a signed picture of

Cardinal Merry del Val, Major Butt entrusted a friend to ask for one. The cardinal willingly put an autograph

British indignation, which is not easily excited, was aroused over the knowledge that an antiquated law

enables steamship companies to fail to provide sufficient lifeboats to accommodate the passengers and crew

of the largest liners in the event of such a disaster as that which occurred to the Titanic. It will be insisted that

there be an investigation of the loss of life in the Titanic and that the shortage of boats be gone into

The newspapers commented adversely on the lack of boats and their views were emphasized by the

knowledge that no attempt has been made to change the regulations in the face of the fact that the inadequacy

of boats in such an emergency was called to the attention of Parliament at the time of the collision between

the White Star liner Olympic and the cruiser Hawke. It was pointed out at this time that German vessels,

much smaller in size than the Olympic, carried more boats and also that these boats were of greater capacity.

T. W. Moore, Secretary of the Merchant Service Guild, when seen at the guild's rooms in Liverpool, said:

"The Titanic disaster is an example, on a colossal scale, of the pernicious and supine system of officials, as

represented by the Board of Trade. Modern liners are so designed that they have no accommodations for

more lifeboats. Among practical seamen it has long been recognized that the modern passenger ship has

"The Board of Trade has its own views, and the shipowners also have their views, which are largely based

upon the economical factor. The naval architects have their opinions, but the practical merchant seaman is not

"The Titanic disaster is a complete substantiation of the agitation that our guild has carried on for nearly

twenty years against the scheme that has precluded practical seamen from being consulted with regard to boat

Immediate and searching inquiry into the Titanic disaster was promised on the floor of the House of

Commons April 18th, by President Sidney Buxton, of the Board of Trade, which controls all seagoing

Buxton, in discussing the utterly inadequate lifesaving equipment of the big liner, declared that the

committee of the board in charge of lifesaving precautions had recently recommended increased lifeboats,

rafts and lifepreservers on all big ships, but that the requirements had been found unsatisfactory and had not

been put in force. He frankly admitted the necessity for increased equipment without delay.

The board, he said, was utterly unable to compel the transatlantic vessels to reduce their speed in the contest

for "express train" ships. He also said the board could not force ships to take the southerly passage in the

The regulations under which the Titanic carried lifeboat accommodations for only about onethird of her

passengers and crew had not been revised by the committee since 1894. At that time the regulations were

made for ships of "10,000 tons or more." The Titanic's tonnage was 45,000, for which the present

Several foreign governments telegraphed to the British Government messages of condolence for the sufferers.

The King sent a donation of $2625 to the Mansion House fund. Queen Mary donated $1310 and Queen

Oscar Hammerstein proffered, and the lord mayor accepted, the use of his opera house for an entertainment in

The Shipping Federation donated $10,500 to the Mayor of Southampton's fund, taking care to explain that the

Some public institutions also offered to take care of the orphaned children of the crew.

Large firms contributed liberally to the various relief funds, while Covent Garden and other leading theaters

All Germany as well as England was stunned and grieved by the magnitude of the horror of the Titanic

catastrophe. AngloGerman recriminations for the moment ceased, as far as the Fatherland was concerned,

and profound and sincere compassion for the nation on whom the blow had fallen more heavily was the

The Kaiser, with his characteristic promptitude, was one of the first to communicate his sympathy by

telegraph to King George and to the White Star Line. Admiral Prince Henry of Prussia did likewise, and the

first act of the Reichstag, after reassembling on Tuesday, was to pass a standing vote of condolence with the

The German laws, governing the safety appliances on board transoceanic vessels, seem to be as archaic and

inadequate as those of the British Board of Trade. The maximum provision contained in the German statutes

refers to vessels with the capacity of 50,000 cubic metres, which must carry sixteen lifeboats. The law also

says that if this number of lifeboats be insufficient to accommodate all the persons on board, including the

crew, there shall be carried elsewhere in the vessel a correspondingly additional number of collapsible

lifeboats, suitable rafts, floating deckchairs and lifebuoys, as well as a generous supply of lifebelts.

A vessel of 10,000 tons was a "leviathan" in the days when the German law was passed, and it appears to

have undergone no change to meet the conditions, imposed by the construction of vessels twice or three times

10,000 tons, like the HamburgAmerican Kaiserin Auguste Victoria, or the North German Lloyd George

Washington, to say nothing of the 50,000ton Imperator, which is to be added to the Hamburg fleet next

The German lines seem, like the White Star Company, to have reckoned simply with the practical

Although Germany's and Berlin's direct interest in the passengers aboard the Titanic was less than that of

Ambassador Leishman and other members of the American Embassy were particularly interested in hearing

about Major "Archie" Butt, who passed through Berlin, less than a month before the disaster, en route from

Russia and the Far East. Vicepresident John B. Thayer and family, of Philadelphia, were also in Berlin a

fortnight ago and were guests of the American Consul General and Mrs. Thackara. A score of other lesser

known passengers had recently stayed in Berlin hotels, and it was local friends or kinsmen of theirs who were

Their anxiety was aggravated by the oldfogey methods of the German newspapers, which are invariably

twelve or fifteen hours later than journals elsewhere in Europe on world news events. Although New York,

London and Paris had the cruel truth with their morning papers on Tuesday, it was not until the middle of the

William T. Stead was well and favorably known in Germany, and his fate was keenly and particularly

mourned. Germans have also noted that many Americans of direct Teutonic ancestry or origin were among

the shining marks in the death list. Colonel John Jacob Astor is claimed as of German, extraction, as well as

Isidor Straus, Benjamin Guggenheim, Washington Roebling and Henry B. Harris. All of them had been in

Only one wellknown resident of Berlin was aboard the Titanic, Frau Antoinette Flegenheim, whose name

IN the anxious hours of uncertainty, when the air cracked and flashed with the story of disaster, there was

never doubt in the minds of men ashore about the master of the Titanic. Captain Smith would bring his ship

into port if human power could mend the damage the sea had wrought, or if human power could not stay the

disaster he would never come to port. There is something Calvinistic about such men of the oldsea breed.

Into the last lifeboat that was launched from the ship Captain Smith with his own hand lifted a small child

into a seat beside its mother. As the gallant, officer performed his simple act of humanity several who were

already in the boat tried to force the captain to join them, but he turned away resolutely toward the bridge.

That act was significant. Courteous, kindly, of quiet demeanor and soft words, he was known and loved by

When the English firm, A. Gibson Co.9 of Liverpool, purchased the American clipper, Senator Weber, in

1869, Captain Smith, then a boy, sailed on her. For seven years he was an apprentice on the Senator Weber,

leaving that vessel to go to the Lizzie Fennell, a square rigger, as fourth officer. From there he went to the old

Celtic of the White Star Line as fourth officer and in 1887 he became captain of that vessel. For a time he was

in command of the freighters Cufic and Runic; then he became skipper of the old Adriatic. Subsequently he

assumed command of the Celtic, Britannic, Coptic (which was in the Australian trade), Germanic, Baltic,

Majestic, Olympic and Titanic, an illustrious list of vessels for one man to have commanded during his

It was not easy to get Captain Smith to talk of his experiences. He had grown up in the service, was his

comment, and it meant little to him that he had been transferred from a small vessel to a big ship and then to a

"One might think that a captain taken from a small ship and put on a big one might feel the transition," he

once said. "Not at all. The skippers of the big vessels have grown up to them, year after year, through all

these years. First there was the sailing vessel and then what we would now call small shipsthey were big in

Only once during all his long years of service was he in trouble, when the Olympic, of which he was in

command, was rammed by the British cruiser Hawke in the Solent on September 20, 1911. The Hawke came

steaming out of Portsmouth and drew alongside the giantess. According to some of the passengers on the

Olympic the Hawke swerved in the direction of the big liner and a moment later the bow of the Hawke was

crunching steel plates in the starboard quarter of the Olympic, making a thirtyfoot hole in her. She was

The result of a naval court inquiry was to put all the blame for the collision on the Olympic. Captain Smith,

in his testimony before the naval court, said that he was on the bridge when he saw the Hawke overhauling

him. The Olympic began to draw ahead later or the Hawke drop astern, the captain did not know which. Then

the cruiser turned very swiftly and struck the Olympic at right angles on the quarter. The pilot gave the signal

for the Olympic to port, which was to minimize the force of the collision. The Olympic's engines had been

Up to the moment the Hawke swerved, Captain Smith said, he had no anxiety. The pilot, Bowyer,

corroborated the testimony of Captain Smith. That the line did not believe Captain Smith was at fault,

notwithstanding the verdict of the board of naval inquiry, was shown by his retention as the admiral of the

Up to the time of the collision with the Hawke Captain Smith when asked by interviewers to describe his

experiences at sea would say one word, "uneventful." Then he would add with a smile and a twinkle of his

"Of course there have been winter gales and storms and fog and the like in the forty years I have been on the

seas, but I have never been in an accident worth speaking of. In all my years at sea (he made this comment a

few years ago) I have seen but one vessel in distress. That was a brig the crew of which was taken off in a

boat by my third officer. I never saw a wreck. I never have been wrecked. I have never been in a predicament

Once the interviewer stopped asking personal questions, Captain Smith would talk of the sea, of his love for

"The love of the ocean that took me to sea as a boy has never died." he once said. "When I see a vessel

plunging up and down in the trough of the sea, fighting her way through and over great waves, and keeping

her keel and going on and onthe wonder of the thing fills me, how she can keep afloat and get safely to

When he was in command of the Adriatic, which was built before the Olympic, Captain Smith said he did not

"I cannot conceive of any vital disaster happening to the Adriatic," he said. "Modern shipbuilding has gone

beyond that. There will be bigger boats. The depth of harbors seems to be the great drawback at present. I

cannot say, of course, just what the limit will be, but the larger boat will surely come. But speed will not

"The traveling public prefers the large comfortable boat of average speed, and anyway that is the boat that

pays. High speed eats up money mile by mile, and extreme high speed is suicidal. There will be high speed

boats for use as transports and a wise government will assist steamship companies in paying for them, as the

English Government is now doing in the cases of the Lusitania and Mauretania, twenty five knot boats; but

And though the ship turned out to be sinkable, the captain, by many acts of bravery in the face of death,

Captain Inman Sealby, commander of the steamer Republic, which was the first vessel to use the wireless

telegraph to save her passengers in a collision, spoke highly of the commander of the wrecked Titanic, calling

"I am sure that Captain Smith did everything in his power to save his passengers. The disaster is one about

which he could have had no warning. Things may happen at sea that give no warning to ships' crews and

commanders until the harm comes. I believe from what I read that the Titanic hit an iceberg and glanced off,

Many survivors have mentioned the captain's name and narrated some incident to bring out his courage and

helpfulness in the emergency; but it was left to a fireman on board the Titanic to tell the story of his death and

to record his last message. This man had gone down with the White Star giantess and was clinging to a piece

of wreckage for about half an hour before he finally joined several members of the Titanic's company on the

bottom of a boat which was floating about among other wreckage near the Titanic.

Harry Senior, the fireman, with his eight or nine companions in distress, had just managed to get a firm hold

in the upturned boat when they saw the Titanic rearing preparatory to her final plunge. At that moment,

according to the fireman's story, Captain Smith jumped into the sea from the promenade deck of the Titanic

with a little girl clutched in his arms. It took only a few strokes to bring him to the upturned boat, where a

dozen hands were stretched out to take the little child from his arms and drag him to a point of safety.

"Captain Smith was dragged onto the upturned boat," said the fireman. "He had a lifebuoy and a

lifepreserver. He clung there for a moment and then he slid off again. For a second time he was dragged

from the icy water. Then he took off his lifepreserver, tossed the lifebuoy on the inky waters, and slipped

Nor was the captain the only faithful man on the ship. Of the many stories told by survivors all seem to agree

that both officers and crew behaved with the utmost gallantry and that they stuck by the ship nobly to the last.

"Immediately after the Titanic struck the iceberg," said one of the survivors, "the officers were all over the

ship reassuring the passengers and calming the more excitable. They said there was no cause for alarm. When

everything was quieted they told us we might go back to bed, as the ship was safe. There was no confusion

"We did not know that the ship was in danger until a comparatively short time before she sank. Then we were

"The behavior of the ship's officers at this time was wonderful. There was no panic, no scramble for places in

Later there was confusion, and according to most of the passengers' narratives, there were more than fifty

shots fired upon the deck by officers or others in the effort to maintain the discipline.

A young English woman who requested that her name be omitted told a thrilling story of her experience in

one of the collapsible boats which had been manned by eight of the crew from the Titanic. The boat was in

command of the fifth officer, H. Lowe, whose actions she described as saving the lives of many people.

Before the lifeboat was launched he passed along the port deck of the steamer, commanding the people not

to jump in the boats, and otherwise restraining them from swamping the craft. When the collapsible was

launched Officer Lowe succeeded in putting up a mast and a small sail. He collected the other boats together,

in some cases the boats were short of adequate crews, and he directed an exchange by which each was

adequately manned. He threw lines connecting the boats together, two by two, and thus all moved together.

Later on he went back to the wreck with the crew of one of the boats and succeeded in picking up some of

those who had jumped overboard and were swimming about. On his way back to the Carpathia he passed one

of the collapsible boats which was on the point of sinking with thirty passengers aboard, most of them in

There were brave men below deck, too. "A lot has been printed in the papers about the heroism of the

officers," said one survivor, "but little has been said of the bravery of the men below decks. I was told that

seventeen enginemen who were drowned side by side got down on their knees on the platform of the engine

room and prayed until the water surged up to their necks. Then they stood up, clasped hands so as to form a

circle and died together. All of these men helped rake the fires out from ten of the forward boilers after the

crash. This delayed the explosion and undoubtedly permitted the ship to remain afloat nearly an hour longer,

In the list of heroes who went down on the Titanic the names of her engineers will have a high place, for not

a single engineer was saved. Many of them, no doubt, could not get to the deck, but they had equally as good

The supposition of those who manned the Titanic was that the engineers, working below, were the first to

know the desperate character of the Titanic's injury. The watch called the others, and from that time until the

vessel was ready for her last plunge they were too hard at work to note more than that there was a constant

It was engineers who kept the lights going, saw to the proper closing of bulkhead doors and kept the stoke

hole at work until the uselessness of the task was apparent. Most of them probably died at their post of duty.

The Titanic carried a force of about sixty engineers, and in addition she had at least twentyfive "guarantee"

engineers, representatives of Harland and Wolff, the builders, and those who had the contract for the

engineering work. This supplementary force was under Archie Frost, the builders' chief engineer, and the

On the line's ships there is the chief engineer, senior and junior second, senior and junior third, and senior and

junior fourth engineers. The men are assigned each to his own task. There are hydraulic, electric, pump and

steam packing men, and the "guarantee" engineers, representing the builders and the contractors.

The duty of the "guarantee" engineers is to watch the working of the great engines, and to see that they are

tuned up and in working order. They also watch the working of each part of the machinery which had nothing

to do with the actual speed of the ship, principally the electric light dynamos and the refrigerating plant.

This question was asked again and again by all who read the story of the Titanic's sinking and of how the

brave musicians played to the last, keeping up the courage of those who were obliged to go down with the

Many efforts were made to find out who the men were, but little was made public until the members of the

orchestra of the steamship Celtic reached shore for the first time after the disaster. One of their first queries

was about the musicians of the Titanic. Their anxiety was greater than that of any New Yorker, for the

members of the band of the Celtic knew intimately the musicians of the illfated liner.

"Not one of them saved!" cried John S. Carr, 'cellist on the Celtic. "It doesn't seem possible they have all

"We knew most of them well. They were Englishmen, you knowevery one of them, I think. Nearly all the

steamship companies hire their musicians abroad, and the men interchange between the ships frequently, so

we get a chance to know one another pretty well. The musicians for the Titanic were levied from a number of

other White Star ships, but most of the men who went down with the Titanic had bunked with us at some

"The thing I can't realize is that happy `Jock' Hume is dead," exclaimed Louis Cross, a player of the bass viol.

"He was the merriest, happiest young Scotchman you ever saw. His family have been making musical

instruments in Scotland for generations. I heard him say once that they were minstrels in the old days. It is

certainly hard to believe that he is not alive and having his fun somewhere in the world."

A FEW days after the disaster the cable steamer Mackay Bennett was sent out by the White Star Line to

Two wireless messages addressed to J. Bruce Ismay, president of the International Mercantile Marine

Company, were received on April 21st at the offices of the White Star Line from the cable ship

MackayBennett, via Cape Race, one of which reported that the steamship Rhein had sighted bodies near the

scene of the Titanic wreck. The first message, which was dated April 20th, read:

"Steamer Rhein reports passing wreckage and bodies 42.1 north, 49.13 west, eight miles west of three big

icebergs. Now making for that position. Expect to arrive 8 o'clock tonight. (Signed)

"Received further information from Bremen (presumably steamship Bremen) and arrived on ground at 8

o'clock P. M. Start on operation tomorrow. Have been considerably delayed on passage by dense fog.

"The cable ship MackayBennett has been chartered by the White Star Line and ordered to proceed to the

scene of the disaster and do all she could to recover the bodies and glean all information possible.

"Every effort will be made to identify bodies recovered, and any news will be sent through immediately by

wireless. In addition to any such message as these, the MackayBennett will make a report of its activities

each morning by wireless, and such reports will be made public at the offices of the White Star Line.

"The cable ship has orders to remain on the scene of the wreck for at least a week, but should a large number

of bodies be recovered before that time she will return to Halifax with them. The search for bodies will not be

"The MackayBennett will not make any soundings, as they would not serve any useful purpose, because the

On April 22d the first list of twentyseven names of bodies recovered was made public. It contained that of

Frederick Sutton, a wellknown member of the Union League of Philadelphia. It did not contain the name of

any other prominent man who perished, although it was thought that the name "George W. Widen" might

refer to George D. Widener, son of P. A. B. Widener, of Philadelphia. The original passenger lists of the

Titanic did not mention "Widen," which apparently established the identity of the body as that of Mr.

The wireless message, after listing the names, concluded, "All preserved," presumably referring to the

A number of the names in the list did not check up with the Titanic's passenger list, which led to the belief

At noon, April 23d, there was posted on the bulletin in the White Star office this message from the

"Latitude, 41.58; longitude, 49.21. Heavy southwest swell has interfered with operations. Seventyseven

bodies recovered. All not embalmed will be buried at sea at 8 o'clock tonight with divine service. Can bring

To Captain Lardner, master of the MackayBennett, P. A. S. Franklin, vicepresident of the White Star Line,

sent an urgent message asking that the company be advised at once of all particulars concerning the bodies

identified, and also given any information that might lead to the identification of others. He said it was very

important that every effort be made to bring all of the bodies possible to port.

Mr. Franklin then directed A. G. Jones, the Halifax agent of the White Star Line, to charter the Minia and

send her to the assistance of the MackayBennett. Mr. Jones answered this telegram, and said that the Minia

was ready to proceed to sea, but that a southeast gale, which generally brings fog, might delay her departure.

On April 24th no wireless message was received from the MackayBennett, but the White Star Line officials

and telegraphers familiar with the wireless alphabet were busy trying to reconcile some of the names received

with those of persons who went down on the Titanic. That the body of William T. Stead, the English

journalist and author, had been recovered by the MackayBennett, but through a freakish error in wireless

transmission the name of another was reported instead, was one of the theories advanced by persons familiar

When the German liner Bremen reached New York the account of its having sighted bodies of the Titanic

From the bridge, officers of the ship saw more than a hun dred bodies floating on the sea, a boat upside

down, together with a number of small pieces of wood, steamer chairs and other wreckage. As the cable ship

MackayBennett was in sight, and having word that her mission was to look for bodies, no attempt was made

In the vicinity was seen an iceberg which answered the description of the one the Titanic struck. Smaller

bergs were sighted the same day, but at some distance from where the Titanic sank.

The officers of the Bremen did not care to talk about the tragic spectacle, but among the passengers several

were found who gave accounts of the dismal panorama through which their ship steamed.

Mrs. Johanna Stunke, a firstcabin passenger, described the scene from the liner's rail.

"It was between 4 and 5 o'clock, Saturday, April 20th," she said, "when our ship sighted an iceberg off the

bow to the starboard. As we drew nearer, and could make out small dots floating around in the sea, a feeling

"We passed within a hundred feet of the southernmost drift of the wreckage, and looking down over the rail

we distinctly saw a number of bodies so clearly that we could make out what they were wearing and whether

"We saw one woman in her night dress, with a baby clasped closely to her breast. Several women passengers

screamed and left the rail in a fainting condition. There was another woman, fully dressed, with her arms tight

"The bodies of three men in a group, all clinging to one steamship chair, floated near by, and just beyond

them were a dozen bodies of men, all of them encased in lifepreservers, clinging together as though in a last

desperate struggle for life. We couldn't see, but imagined that under them was some bit of wreckage to which

they all clung when the ship went down, and which didn't have buoyancy enough to support them.

"Those were the only bodies we passed near enough to distinguish, but we could see the white lifepreservers

of many more dotting the sea, all the way to the iceberg. The officers told us that was probably the berg hit by

Mrs. Stunke said a number of the passengers demanded that the Bremen stop and pick up the bodies, but the

officers assured them that they had just received a wireless message saying the cable ship MackayBennett

was only two hours away fron{sic} the spot, and was coming for that express purpose.

On April 25th the White Star Line officials issued a corrected list of the identified dead. While the corrected

list cleared up two or more of the wireless confusions that caused so much speculation in the original list,

there still remained a few names that so far as the record of the Titanic showed were not on board that ship

The new list, however, established the fact that the body of George D. Widener, of Philadelphia, was among

those on the MackayBennett, and two of the bodies were identified as those of men named Butt.

After completing her search the MackayBennett steamed for Halifax, reaching that port on Tuesday, April

30th. With her flag at half mast, the death ship docked slowly. Her crew manned the rails with bared heads,

and on the aft deck were stacked the caskets with the dead. The vessel carried on board 190 bodies, and

Everybody picked up had been in a lifebelt and there were no bullet holes in any. Among those brought to

When at last the Minia turned her bow toward shore only thirteen additional bodies had been recovered,

Further search seemed futile. Not only had the two vessels gone thoroughly over as wide a field as might

likely prove fruitful, but, in addition, the time elapsed made it improbable that other bodies, if found, could

be brought to shore. Thus did the waves completely enforce the payment of their terrible toll.

FROM the moment that Bruce Ismay's name was seen among those of the survivors of the Titanic he became

the object of acrid attacks in every quarter where the subject of the disaster was discussed. Bitter criticism

His critics insisted that as managing director of the White Star Line his responsibility was greater even than

Captain Smith's, and while granting that his survival might still be explained, they condemned his apparent

lack of heroism. Even in England his survival was held to be the one great blot on an otherwise noble display

A prominent official of the White Star Line shook his head meaningly when asked what he thought of

Ismay's escape with the women and children. The general feeling seemed to be that he should have stayed

aboard the sinking vessel, looking out for those who were left, playing the man like Major Butt and many

He was also charged with urging a speed record and with ignoring information received with regard to

The belief in England was that the captain of the Carpathia had acted under Ismay's influence in refusing to

permit any account of the disaster to be transmitted previous to the arrival of the vessel in New York. Ismay's

telegram making arrangements for the immediate deportation of the survivors among the Titanic's crew was

taken to be part of the same scheme to delay if not to prevent their stories of the wreck from being obtained in

Another circumstance which created a damaging impression was Ismay's failure to give the names of the

surviving crew, whose distraught families were entitled to as much consideration as those whose relatives

occupied the most expensive suites on the Titanic. The anguish endured by the families of members of the

crew was reported as indescribable, and Southampton was literally turned into a city of weeping and tragic

Mr. Ismay's actions while on the Carpathia were also criticised as selfish and unwarrantable.

"For God's sake get me something to eat, I'm starved. I don't care what it costs or what it is. Bring it to me."

This was the first statement made by Mr. Ismay a few minutes after he was landed on the Carpathia. It is

vouched for by an officer of the Carpathia who requested that his name be withheld. This officer gave one of

the most complete stories of the events that took place on the Carpathia from the time she received the

Titanic's appeal for assistance until she landed the survivors at the Cunard Line pier.

"Ismay reached the Carpathia in about the seventh life boat," said the officer. "I didn't know who he was,

but afterward I heard the other members of the crew discussing his desire to get something to eat the minute

he put his foot on deck. The steward who waited on him reported that Ismay came dashing into the dining

" `Hurry, for God's sake, and get me something to eat, I'm starved. I don't care what it costs or what it is.

"The steward brought Ismay a load of stuff and when he had finished it he handed the man a two dollar bill.

" `Take it,' insisted Ismay. `I am well able to afford it. I will see to it that the boys of the Carpathia are well

"This promise started the steward making inquiries as to the identity of the man he had waited on. Then we

learned that he was Ismay. I did not see Ismay after the first few hours. He must have kept to his cabin."

Mr. Ismay's plans had been to return immediately to England, and he had wired that the steamer Cedric be

held for himself and officers and members of the crew; but public sentiment and subpoenas of the Senate's

investigating committee prevented. In the face of the criticism aimed against him Mr. Ismay issued a long

statement in which he not only disclaimed responsibility for the Titanic's fatal collision, but also sought to

clear himself of blame for everything that happened after the big ship was wrecked.

He expressed astonishment that his own conduct in the disaster had been made the subject of inquiry. He

denied that he gave any order to Captain Smith. His position aboard was that of any other first cabin

passenger, he insisted, and he was never consulted by the captain. He denied telling anyone that he wished

the ship to make a speed record. He called attention to the routine clause in the instructions to White Star

captains ordering them to think of safety at all times. He did not dine with the captain, he said, and when the

The managing director added that he was in his stateroom when the collision occurred. He told of helping to

send women and children away in lifeboats on the starboard side, and said there was no woman in sight on

deck when he and William E. Carter, of Bryn Mawr, Pa., entered the collapsible boatthe last small craft

left on that side of the vessel. He asserted that he pulled an oar and denied that in sending the three messages

from the Carpathia, urging the White Star officials to hold the Cedric for the survivors of the Titanic's

officers and crew, he had any intention to block investigation of the tragedy. Ismay asserted that he did not

Mr. William E. Carter, of Bryn Mawr, who, with his family, was saved, confirmed Mr. Ismay's assertions.

"Mr. Ismay's statement is absolutely correct," said Mr. Carter. "There were no women on the deck when that

boat was launched. We were the very last to leave the deck, and we entered the lifeboat because there were

"The deck was deserted when the boat was launched, and Mr. Ismay and myself decided that we might as

well enter the boat and pull away from the wreck. If he wants me, I assume that he will write to me.

"I can say nothing, however, that he has not already said, as our narratives are identical; the circumstances

under which we were rescued from the Titanic were similar. We left the boat together and were picked up

"I am ready to go to Washington to testify to the truth of Mr. Ismay's statement, and also to give my own

account at any time I may be called upon. If Mr. Ismay writes to me, asking that I give a detailed account of

SO great was the interest in the tragedy and so profound the grief at the tremendous loss of life that for a time

the financial loss was not considered. It was, however, the biggest ever suffered by marine insurance brokers.

The value of the policy covering the vessel against all ordinary risks was $5,000,000, but the whole of this

amount was not insured, because British and Continental markets were not big enough to swallow it. The

actual amount of insurance was $3,700,000, of which the owners themselves held $750,000.

As to the cargo, it was insured by the shippers. The company has nothing to do with the insurance of the

cargo, which, according to the company's manifest, was conservatively estimated at about $420,000. Cargo,

however, was a secondary matter, so far as the Titanic was concerned. The ship was built for highpriced

passengers, and what little cargo she carried was also of the kind that demanded quick transportation. The

Titanic's freight was for the most part what is known as highclass package freight, consisting of such articles

Prior to the sailing of the vessel the postal authorities of Southampton cabled the New York authorities that

"In a load of 3500 bags," said Postmaster Morgan, of New York, "it is a safe estimate to say that 200

contained registered mail. The size of registered mail packages varies greatly, but 1000 packages for each

mail bag should be a conservative guess. That would mean that 200,000 registered packages and letters went

"This does not mean, however, that Great Britain will be held financially responsible for all these losses.

There were probably thousands of registered packages from the Continent, and in such cases the countries of

origin will have to reimburse the senders. Moreover, in the case of money being sent in great quantities, it is

usual to insure the registry over and above the limit of responsibility set by the country of origin.

"Probably if there were any shipping of securities mounting up to thousands of dollars, it will be the

insurance companies which will bear the loss, and not the European post offices at all."

In the case of money orders, the postmaster explained, there would be no loss, except of time, as duplicates

The postmaster did not know the exact sum which the various European countries set as the limit of their

Underwriters will probably have to meet heavy claims of passengers for luggage, including jewelry. Pearls of

The Titanic and her valuable cargo can never be recovered, said the White Star Line officials.

"Sinking in midocean, at the depth which prevails where the accident occurred," said Captain James Parton,

In the life insurance offices there was much figuring over the lists of those thought to be lost aboard the

Titanic. Nothing but rough estimates of the company's losses through the wreck were given out.

The loss to the Carpathia, too, was considerable. It is, of course, the habit of all good steamship lines to go

out of their way and cheerfully submit to financial loss when it comes to succoring the distressed or the

imperiled at sea. Therefore, the Cunard line in extending the courtesies of the sea to the survivors of the

Titanic asked for nothing more than the mere acknowledgment of the little act of kindness. The return of the

She was delayed on her way to the Mediterranean at least ten days and was obliged to coal and provision

again, as the extra 800 odd passengers she was carrying reduced her large allowance for her long voyage to

THE tremendous loss of life necessarily aroused a discussion as to the cause of the disaster, and the

prevailing opinion seemed to be that the present tendency in shipbuilding was to sacrifice safety to luxury.

Captain Roden, a wellknown Swedish navigator, had written an article maintaining this theory in the Navy,

a monthly service magazine, in November, 1910. With seeming prophetic insight he had mentioned the

Titanic by name and portrayed some of the dangers to which shipbuilding for luxury is leading.

He pointed out that the new steamships, the Olympic and Titanic, would be the finest vessels afloat, no

expense being spared to attain every conceivable comfort for which men or women of means could possibly

askstaterooms with private showerbaths, a swimming pool large enough for diving, a ballroom covering

an entire upper deck, a gymnasium, elaborate cafes, a sun deck representing a flower garden, and other

After forcibly pointing out the provisions that should be made for the protection of life, Captain Roden wrote

"If the men controlling passenger ships, from the ocean liner down to the excursion barge, were equally

disposed to equip their vessels with the best safety appliances as they are to devise and adopt implements of

comfort and luxury, the advantage to themselves as well as to their patrons would be plainly apparent."

Lewis Nixon, the eminent naval architect and designer of the battleship Oregon, contributed a very interesting

"Here was a vessel presumed, and I think rightly so, to be the perfection of the naval architect's art, yet sunk

"An unsinkable ship is possible, but it would be of little use except for flotation. It may be said that vessels

"We might very greatly subdivide the forward compartments, where much space is lost at best, making the

forward end, while amply strong for navigation purposes, of such construction that it would collapse and take

up some of the energy of impact; then tie this to very much stronger sections farther aft. Many such plans will

be proposed by those who do not realize the momentum of a great vessel which will snap great cables like

"The proper plan is to avoid the accident, and if an accident is unavoidable to minimize the loss of life and

The Titanic disaster was discussed by Robert H. Kirk, who installed the compartment doors in the ships of

"The Titanic's disaster will cause endless speculation as to how similar disasters may be avoided in the future.

"The Titanic had bulkheads, plenty of them, for the rules of the British Board of Trade and of Lloyds are very

specific and require enough compartments to insure floating of the ship though several may be flooded. She

also had doors in the bulkheads, and probably plenty of them, for she was enormous and needed easy access

from one compartment to another. It will probably never be known how _FEW_ of these doors were closed

when she struck the iceberg, but the probability is that many were open, for in the confusion attending such a

crash the crews have a multitude of duties to perform, and closing a door with water rushing through it is

"A Lloyds surveyor in testing one of these handoperated doors started two men on the main deck to close it.

They worked four hours before they had carried out his order. If all the doors on the ship had worked as badly

General Adolphus W. Greely, U. S. A., noted American traveler and Arctic explorer, vehemently denounced

the sinking of the Titanic and the loss of over 1600 souls as a terrible sacrifice to the American mania for

speed. He gave his opinion that the Titanic came to grief through an attempt on the part of the steamship

The Titanic, General Greely declared, had absolutely no business above Cape Race and north of Sable Island

on the trip on which she went to her doom. Choosing the northern route brought about the dire disaster, in his

mind, and it was the saving of three hours for the sake of a new record that ended in the collision with the

It was the opinion of General Greely, capable of judging after his many trips in quest of the pole, that neither

Captain Smith nor any of his officers saw the giant iceberg which encompassed their ruin until they were

right upon it. Then, the ship was plunging ahead at such frightful velocity that the Titanic was too close to

THE danger of collision with icebergs has always been one of the most deadly that confront the mariner.

Indeed, so well recognized is this peril of the Newfoundland Banks, where the Labrador current in the early

spring and summer months floats southward its ghostly argosy of icy pinnacles detached from the polar ice

caps, that the government hydrographic offices and the maritime exchanges spare no pains to collate and

A most remarkable case of an iceberg collision is that of the Guion Liner, Arizona, in 1879. She was then the

greyhound of the Atlantic, and the largest ship afloat5750 tons except the Great Eastern. Leaving New

York in November for Liverpool, with 509 souls aboard, she was coursing across the Banks, with fair

weather but dark, when, near midnight, about 250 miles east of St. John's, she rammed a monster ice island at

The welcome word was passed along that the ship, though sorely stricken, would still float until she could

make harbor. The vast white terror had lain across her course, stretching so far each way that, when

described, it was too late to alter the helm. Its giant shape filled the foreground, towering high above the

masts, grim and gaunt and ghastly, immovable as the adamantine buttresses of a frowning seaboard, while the

liner lurched and staggered like a wounded thing in agony as her engines slowly drew her back from the

She was headed for St. John's at slow speed, so as not to strain the bulkhead too much, and arrived there

thirtysix hours later. That little portthe crippled ship's hospital has seen many a strange sight come in

from the sea, but never a more astounding spectacle than that which the Arizona presented the Sunday

"Begob, captain!" said the pilot, as he swung himself over the rail. "I've heard of carrying coals to Newcastle,

but this is the first time I've seen a steamer bringing a load of ice into St. John's."

They are a grim race, these sailors, and, the danger over, the captain's reply was: "We were lucky, my man,

But to the one wounded ship that survives collision with a berg, a dozen perish. Presumably, when the shock

comes, it loosens their bulkheads and they fill and founder, or the crash may injure the boilers or engines,

which explode and tear out the sides, and the ship goes down like a plummet. As long ago as 1841, the

steamer President, with 120 people aboard, crossing from New York to Liverpool in March, vanished from

human ken. In 1854, in the same month, the City of Glasgow left Liverpool for Philadelphia with 480 souls,

and was never again heard of. In February, 1856, the Pacific, from Liverpool for New York, carrying 185

persons, passed away down to a sunless sea. In May, 1870, the City of Boston, from that port for Liverpool,

mustering 191 souls, met a similar fate. It has always been thought that these ships were sunk by collision

with icebergs or floes. As shipping traffic has expanded, the losses have been more frequent. In February,

1892, the Naronic, from Liverpool for New York; in the same month in 1896, the State of Georgia, from

Aberdeen for Boston; in February, 1899, the Alleghany, from New York for Dover; and once more in

February, 1902, the Huronian, from Liverpool for St. John'sall disappeared without leaving a trace.

Between February and May, the Grand Banks are most infested with ice, and collision therewith is' the most

likely explanation of the loss of these steamers, all well manned and in splendid trim, and meeting only the

1866, Jan. 11.Steamer London, on her way to Melbourne, foundered in the Bay of Biscay; 220 lives lost.

1866, Oct. 3.Steamer Evening Star, from New York to New Orleans, foundered; about 250 lives lost.

1867, Oct. 29.Royal Mail steamers Rhone and Wye and about fifty other vessels driven ashore and

1873, Jan. 22.British steamer Northfleet sunk in collision off Dungeness; 300 lives lost

1873, Nov. 23.White Star liner Atlantic wrecked off Nova Scotia; 547 lives lost.

1873, Nov. 23.French line Ville du Havre, from New York to Havre, in collision with ship Locharn and

1874, Dec. 24.Emigrant vessel Cospatrick took fire and sank off Auckland; 476 lives lost.

1875, May 7.Hamburg Mail steamer Schiller wrecked in fog on Scilly Islands; 200 lives lost.

1875, Nov. 4.American steamer Pacific in collision thirty miles southwest of Cape Flattery; 236 lives lost.

1878, March 24.British training ship Eurydice, a frigate, foundered near the Isle of Wight; 300 lives lost.

1878, Sept. 3.British iron steamer Princess Alice sunk in the Thames River; 700 lives lost.

1878, Dec. 18.French steamer Byzantin sunk in collision in the Dardanelles with the British steamer

1880, Jan. 31.British trading ship Atlanta left Bermuda with 290 men and was never heard from.

1884, Jan. 18.American steamer City of Columbus wrecked off Gay Head Light, Massachusetts; 99 lived

1884, July 23.Spanish steamer Gijon and British steamer Lux in collision off Finisterre; 150 lives lost.

1887, Jan. 29.Steamer Kapunda in collision with bark Ada Melore off coast of Brazil; 300 lives lost.

1887, Nov. 15.British steamer Wah Young caught fire between Canton and Hong Kong; 400 lives lost.

1888, Sept. 13.Italian steamship Sud America and steamer La France in collision near the Canary Islands;

1889, March 16.United States warships Trenton, Vandalia and Nipsic and German ships Adler and Eber

1890, March 1.British steamship Quetta foundered in Torres Straits; 124 lives lost.

1891, March 17.Anchor liner Utopia in collision with British steamer Anson off Gibraltar and sunk; 574

1894, June 25.Steamer Norge, wrecked on Rockall Reef, in the North Atlantic; nearly 600 lives lost.

1895, Jan. 30.German steamer Elbe sunk in collision with British steamer Crathie in North Sea; 335 lives

1898, July 4.French line steamer La Bourgogne in collision with British sailing vessel Cromartyshire; 571

1898, Nov. 27.American steamer Portland, wrecked off Cape Cod, Mass.; 157 lives lost.

1901, April 1.Turkish transport Aslam wrecked in the Red Sea; over 180 lives lost.

1902, July 21.Steamer Primus sunk in collision with the steamer Hansa on the Lower Elbe; 112 lives lost.

1903, June 7.French steamer Libau sunk in collision with steamer Insulerre near Marseilles; 150 lives lost.

1904, June 15. General Slocum, excursion steamboat, took fire going through Hell Gate, East River; more

1906, Jan. 21.Brazilian battleship Aquidaban sunk near Rio Janeiro by an explosion of the powder

1906, Jan. 22.American steamer Valencia lost off Cloose, Pacific Coast; 140 lives lost.

1906, Aug. 4.Italian emigrant ship Sirio struck a rock off Cape Palos; 350 lives lost.

1906, Oct. 21.Russian steamer Variag, on leaving Vladivostock, struck by a torpedo and sunk; 140 lives

1907, Feb. 12.American steamer Larchmond sunk in collision off Rhode Island coast; 131 lives lost.

1907, July 20.American steamers Columbia and San Pedro collided on the Californian coast; 100 lives

1907, Nov. 26.Turkish steamer Kaptain foundered in the North Sea; 110 lives lost.

1908, March 23.Japanese steamer Mutsu Maru sunk in collision near Hakodate; 300 lives lost.

1908, April 30.Japanese training cruiser Matsu Shima sunk off the Pescadores owing to an explosion; 200

1909, Jan. 24.Collision between the Italian steamer Florida and the White Star liner Republic, about 170

miles east of New York during a fog; a large number of lives were saved by the arrival of the steamer Baltic,

which received the "C. Q. D.," or distress signal sent up by wireless by the Republic January 22. The

1911, Sept. 25.French battleship Liberte sunk by explosion in Toulon harbor; 223 lives lost.

THE origin of travel on water dates back to a very early period in human history, men beginning with the log,

the inflated skin, the dugout canoe, and upwards through various methods of flotation; while the paddle, the

oar, and finally the sail served as means of propulsion. This was for inland water travel, and many centuries

The paintings and sculptures of early Egypt show us boats built of sawn planks, regularly constructed and

moved both by oars and sails. At a later period we read of the Phoenicians, the most daring and enterprising

of ancient navigators, who braved the dangers of the open sea, and are said by Herodotus to have

circumnavigated Africa as early as 604 B. C. Starting from the Red Sea, they followed the east coast, rounded

the Cape, and sailed north along the west coast to the Mediterranean, reaching Egypt again in the third year of

The Carthaginians and Romans come next in the history of shipbuilding, confining themselves chiefly to the

Mediterranean, and using oars as the principal means of propulsion. Their galleys ranged from one to five

banks of oars. The Roman vessels in the first Punic war were over 100 feet long and had 300 rowers, while

they carried 120 soldiers. They did not use sails until about the beginning of the fourteenth century B. C.

Portugal was the first nation to engage in voyages of discovery, using vessels of small size in these

adventurous journeys. Spain, which soon became her rival in this field, built larger ships and long held the

lead. Yet the ships with which Columbus made the discovery of America were of a size and character in

England was later in coming into the field of adventurous navigation, being surpassed not only by the

Europe long held the precedence in shipbuilding and enterprise in navigation, but the shores of America had

not long been settled before the venturous colonists had ships upon the seas. The first of these was built at the

mouth of the Kennebec River in Maine. This was a staunch little two masted vessel, which was named the

Virginia, supposed to have been about sixty feet long and seventeen feet in beam. Next in time came the

Restless, built in 1614 or 1615 at New York, by Adrian Blok, a Dutch captain whose ships had been burned

while lying at Manhattan Island. This vessel, thirtyeight feet long and of eleven feet beam, was employed

With the advent of the nineteenth century a new ideal in naval architecture arose, that of the ship moved by

steam power instead of windpower, and fitted to combat with the seas alike in storm and calm, with little

heed as to whether the wind was fair or foul. The steamship appeared, and grew in size and power until such

giants of the wave as the Titanic and Olympic were set afloat. To the development of this modern class of

As the reckless cowboy of the West is fast becoming a thing of the past, so is the daring seaman of fame and

story. In his place is coming a class of men miscalled sailors, who never reefed a sail or coiled a cable, who

do not know how to launch a lifeboat or pull an oar, and in whose career we meet the ridiculous episode of

the lifeboats of the Titanic, where women were obliged to take the oars from their hands and row the boats.

Thus has the oldtime hero of the waves been transformed into one fitted to serve as a clown of the

The advent of steam navigation came early in the nineteenth century, though interesting steps in this direction

were taken earlier. No sooner was the steamengine developed than men began to speculate on it as a moving

power on sea and land. Early among these were several Americans, Oliver Evans, one of the first to project

steam railway travel, and James Rumsey and John Fitch, steamboat inventors of early date. There were

several experimenters in Europe also, but the first to produce a practical steamboat was Robert Fulton, a

native of Pennsylvania, whose successful boat; the Clermont, made its maiden trip up the Hudson in 1807. A

crude affair was the Clermont, with a top speed of about seven miles an hour; but it was the dwarf from

Boats of this type quickly made their way over the American rivers and before 1820 regular lines of

steamboats were running between England and Ireland. In 1817 James Watt, the inventor of the practical

steamengine, crossed in a steamer from England to Belgium. But these short voyages were far surpassed by

an American enterprise, that of the first ocean steamship, the Savannah, which crossed the Atlantic from

Twelve years passed before this enterprise was repeated, the next steam voyage being in 1831, when the

Royal William crossed from Quebec to England. She used coal for fuel, having utilized her entire hold to

store enough for the voyage. The Savannah had burned pitchpine under her engines, for in America wood

was long used as fuel for steammaking purposes. As regards this matter, the problem of fuel was of leading

importance, and it was seriously questioned if a ship could be built to cross the Atlantic depending solely

upon steam power. Steamengines in those days were not very economical, needing four or five times as

It was not until 1838 that the problem was solved. On April 23d of that year a most significant event took

place. Two steamships dropped anchor in the harbor of New York, the Sirius and the Great Western. Both of

these had made the entire voyage under steam, the Sirius, in eighteen and a half and the Great Western in

fourteen and a half days, measuring from Queenstown. The Sirius had taken on board 450 tons of coal, but all

this was burned by the time Sandy Hook was reached, and she had to burn her spare spars and fortythree

barrels of rosin to make her way up the bay. The Great Western, on the contrary, had coal to spare.

Two innovations in shipbuilding were soon introduced. These were the building of iron instead of wooden

ships and the replacing of the paddle wheel by the screw propeller. The screwpropeller was first

successfully introduced by the famous Swede, John Ericsson, in 1835. His propeller was tried in a small

vessel, fortyfive feet long and eight wide, which was driven at the rate of ten miles an hour, and towed a

large packet ship at fair speed. Ericsson, not being appreciated in England, came to America to experiment.

Their experiments attracted the attention of Isambard Brunel, one of the greatest engineers of the period, who

was then engaged in building a large paddlewheel steamer, the Great Britain. Appreciating the new idea, he

had the engines of the new ship changed and a screw propeller introduced. This ship, a great one for the time,

322 feet long and of 3443 tons, made her first voyage from Liverpool to New York in 1845, her average

speed being 12 1/4 knots an hour, the length of the voyage 14 days and 21 hours.

By the date named the crossing of the Atlantic by steamships had become a common event. In 1840 the

British and Royal Mail Steam Packet Company was organized, its chief promoter being Samuel Cunard, of

The first fleet of the Cunard Line comprised four vessels, the Britannia, Acadia, Caledonia and Columbia.

The Unicorn, sent out by this company as a pioneer, entered Boston harbor on June 2, 1840, being the first

steamship from Europe to reach that port. Regular trips began with the Britannia, which left Liverpool on

July 4, 1840. For a number of years later this line enjoyed a practical monopoly of the steam carrying trade

between England and the United States. Then other companies came into the field, chief among them being

the Collins Line, started in 1849, and of short duration, and the Inman Line, instituted in 1850.

We should say something here of the comforts and conveniences provided for the passengers on these early

lines. They differed strikingly from those on the leviathans of recent travel and were little, if any, superior to

those on the packet ships, the active rivals at that date of the steamers. Then there were none of the

comfortable smoking rooms, well filled libraries, drawing rooms, electric lights, and other modern

improvements. The saloons and staterooms were in the extreme after part of the vessel, but the stateroom of

that day was little more than a closet, with two berths, one above the other, and very little standing room

between these and the wall. By paying nearly double fare a passenger might secure a room for himself, but

the room given him did not compare well even with that of small and unpretentious modern steamers.

Other ocean steamship companies gradually arose, some of which are still in existence. But no especial

change in ship building was introduced until 1870, when the Oceanic Company, now known as the White

Star Line, built the Britannic and Germanic. These were the largest of its early ships. They were 468 feet long

and 35 feet wide, constituting a new type of extreme length as compared with their width. In the first White

Star ship, the Oceanic, the improvements above mentioned were introduced, the saloons and staterooms being

brought as near as possible to the center of the ship. All the principal lines built since that date have followed

Speed and economy in power also became features of importance, the tubular boiler and the compound

engine being introduced. These have developed into the cylindrical, multitubular boiler and the triple

expansion engine, in which a greater percentage of the power of the steam is utilized and four or five times

the work obtained from coal over that of the old system. The sidewheel was continued in use in the older

It has been said that the life of iron ships, barring disasters at sea, is unlimited, that they cannot wear out. This

statement has not been tested, but the fact remains that the older passenger ships have gone out of service and

Something should also be said here of the steam turbine engine, recently introduced in some of the greatest

liners, and of proven value in several particulars, an important one of these being the doing away with the

vibration, an inseparable accompaniment of the old style engines. The Olympic and Titanic engines were a

combination of the turbine and reciprocating types. In regard to the driving power, one of the recent

introductions is that of the multiple propeller. The twin screw was first applied in the City of New York, of

the Inman line, and enabled her to make in 1890 an average speed of a little over six days from New York to

Queenstown. The best record up to October, 1891, was that of the Teutonic, of five days, sixteen hours, and

thirty minutes. Triplescrew propellers have since then been introduced in some of the greater ships, and the

record speed has been cut down to the four days and ten hours of the Lusitania in 1908 and the four days, six

The Titanic was not built especially for speed, but in every other way she was the master product of the

shipbuilders' art. Progress through the centuries has been steady, and perhaps the twentieth century will

prepare a vessel that will be unsinkable as well as magnificent. Until the fatal accident the Titanic and

Olympic were considered the last words on ship building; but much may still remain to be spoken.

THE fact that there are any survivors of the Titanic left to tell the story of the terrible catastrophe is only

another of the hundreds of instances on record of the value of wireless telegraphy in saving life on shipboard.

Without Marconi's invention it is altogether probable that the world would never have known of the nature of

the Titanic's fate, for it is only barely within the realm of possibility that any of the Titanic's passengers'

poorly clad, without proper provisions of food and water, and exposed in the open boats to the frigid weather,

would have survived long enough to have been picked up by a transatlantic liner in ignorance of the accident

Speaking (since the Titanic disaster) of the part which wireless telegraphy has played in the salvation of

distressed ships, Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of this wonderful science, has said:

"Fifteen years ago the curvature of the earth was looked upon as the one great obstacle to wireless telegraphy.

By various experiments in the Isle of Wight and at St. John's I finally succeeded in sending the letter S 2000

"We have since found that the fog and the dull skies in the vicinity of England are exceptionally favorable for

Then the inventor told of wireless messages being transmitted 2500 miles across the Abyssinian desert, and

"The one necessary requirement for continued success is that governments keep from being enveloped in

"The fact that a message can be flashed across the wide expanse of ocean in ten minutes has exceeded my

fondest expectations. Some idea of the progress made may be had by citing the fact that in eleven years the

"Not once has wireless telegraphy failed in calling and securing help on the high seas. A recognition of this is

shown in the attitude of the United States Government in compelling all passengercarrying vessels entering

"I know you will all understand when I say that I entertain a deep feeling of gratitude because of the fact that

One of the most essential factors in making ships safe is the construction of proper bulkheads to divide a ship

into watertight compartments in case of injury to her hull. Of the modern means of forming such

compartments, and of the complete and automatic devices for operating the watertight doors which connect

them, a full explanation has already been given in the description of the Titanic's physical features, to which

the reader is referred. A wise precaution usually taken in the case of twin and triple screw ships is to arrange

the bulkheads so that each engine is in a separate compartment, as is also each boiler or bank of boilers and

Then there are submarine signals to tell of nearby vessels or shores. This signal arrangement includes a

small tank on either side of the vessel, just below the water line. Within each is a microphone with wires

leading to the bridge. If the vessel is near any other or approaching shore, the sounds; conveyed through the

water from the distant object are heard through the receiver of the microphone. These arrangements are called

the ship's ears, and whether the sounds come from one side of the vessel or the other, the officers can tell the

location of the shore or ship near by. If both ears record, the object is ahead.

The construction of lifeboats adapts them for very rough weather. The chief essentials, of course, are ease in

launching, strength in withstanding rough water and bumping when beached; also strength to withstand

striking against wreckage or a ship's side; carrying capacity and lightness. Those carried on board ship are

lighter than those used in lifesaving service on shore. Safety is provided by airtight tanks which insure

buoyancy in case the boat is filled with water. They have also selfrighting power in case of being

overturned; likewise selfemptying power. Lifeboats are usually of the whaleboat type, with copper

Lifeboats range from twentyfour to thirty feet in length and carry from thirty to sixty persons. The rafts

carry from twenty to forty persons. The oldfashioned round bar davits can be got for $100 to $150 a set. The

According to some naval constructors, an ocean steamship can carry in davits enough boats to take care of all

the passengers and crew, it being simply a question as to whether the steamship owners are willing to take up

that much deck room which otherwise would be used for lounging chairs or for a promenade.

Nowadays all lifeboats are equipped with air tanks to prevent sinking, with the result that metal boats are as

unsinkable as wooden ones. The metal boats are considered in the United States Navy as superior to wooden

ones, for several reasons: They do not break or collapse; they do not, in consequence of long storage on deck,

open at the seams and thereby spring a leak; and they are not eaten by bugs, as is the case with wooden boats.

Comparatively few of the transatlantic steamships have adopted metal lifeboats. Most of the boats are of

wood, according to the official United States Government record of inspection. The records show that a

considerable proportion of the entire number of socalled "lifeboats" carried by Atlantic Ocean liners are

not actually lifeboats at all, but simply open boats, without air tanks or other special equipment or

Liferafts are of several kinds. They are commonly used on large passenger steamers where it is difficult to

carry sufficient lifeboats. In most cases they consist of two or more hollow metal or inflated rubber floats

which support a wooden deck. The small rafts are supplied with lifelines and oars, and the larger ones with

The collapsible feature of the Chambers raft consists of canvascovered steel frames extending up

twentyfive inches from the sides to prevent passengers from being pitched off. When the rafts are not in use

The collapsible rafts are favored by the shipowners because such boats take up less room; they do not have

to be carried in the davits, and they can be stowed to any number required. Some of the German lines stack

Lewis Nixon, the wellknown ship designer, suggests the construction of a pontoon to be carried on the after

end of the vessel and to be made of sectional airtight compartments. One compartment would accommodate

the wireless outfit. Another compartment would hold drinking water, and still another would be filled with

The pontoon would follow the line of the ship and seem to be a part of it. The means for releasing it before

the sinking of the vessel present no mechanical problem. It would be too large and too buoyant to be sucked

The pontoon would accommodate, not comfortably but safely, all those who failed to find room in the

It is Mr. Nixon's plan to instal a gas engine in one of the compartments. With this engine the wireless

instrument would remain in commission and direct the rescuers after the ship itself had gone down.

Lifepreservers are chiefly of the belt or jacket type, made to fit about the body and rendered buoyant by

slabs of cork sewed into the garment, or by rubberlined airbags. The use of cork is usually considered

preferable, as the inflated articles are liable to injury, and jackets are preferable to belts as they can be put on

Lifebuoys are of several types, but those most common are of the ring type, varying in size from the small

one designed to be thrown by hand to the large hollow metal buoy capable of supporting several people. The

latter are usually carried by seagoing vessels and are fitted with lamps which are automatically lighted when

American oceangoing steamers are required to have some approved means of firing lines to the shore.

Cunningham rockets and the Hunt gun are largely used. The inaccuracy of the rocket is of less importance

IT is a long time since any modern vessel of importance has gone down under Nature's attack, and in general

the floating city of steel laughs at the wind and waves. She is not, however, proof against disaster. The danger

lies in her own powerin the tens of thousands of horse power with which she may be driven into another

ship or into an iceberg standing cold and unyielding as a wall of granite. In view of this fact it is of the utmost

importance that presentday vessels should be thoroughly provided with the most efficient lifesaving

devices. These would seem more important than fireplaces, squashcourts and many other luxuries with

which the Titanic was provided. The comparatively few survivors of the illfated Titanic were saved by the

lifeboats. The hundreds of others who went down with the vessel perished because there were no lifeboats

The survivors urge the need of reform. In a resolution drawn up after the disaster they said:

"We feel it our duty to call the attention of the public to what we consider the inadequate supply of

lifesaving appliances provided for the modern passenger steamships and recommend that immediate steps

be taken to compel passenger steamers to carry sufficient boats to accommodate the maximum number of

people carried on board. The following facts were observed and should be considered in this connection: The

insufficiency of lifeboats, rafts, etc.; lack of trained seamen to man same (stokers, stewards, etc., are not

efficient boat handlers); not enough officers to carry out emergency orders on the bridge and superintend the

"The Board of Trade allows for entirely too many people in each boat to permit the same to be properly

handled. On the Titanic the boat deck was about seventyfive feet from the water and consequently the

passengers were required to embark before lowering the boats, thus endangering the operation and preventing

the taking on of the maximum number the boats would hold. Boats at all times should be properly equipped

with provisions, water, lamps, compasses, lights, etc. Lifesaving boat drills should be more frequent and

thoroughly carried out and officers should be armed at both drills. There should be greater reduction of speed

"In conclusion we suggest that an international conference be called to recommend the passage of identical

laws providing for the safety of all at sea, and we urge the United States Government to take the initiative as

That ocean liners take chances with their passengers, though known to the well informed, is newly revealed

and comes with a shock of surprise and dismay to most people. If boats are unsinkable as well as fireproof

there is no need of any lifeboats at all. But no such steamship has ever been constructed.

That it is realized that lifeboats may be necessary on the best and newest steamships is proved by the fact

that they carry them even beyond the law's requirements. But if lifeboats for onethird of those on the ship

are necessary, lifeboats for all on board are equally necessary. The law of the United States requires this, but

the law and trade regulations of England do not, and these controlled the Titanic and caused the death of over

True, a steamship is rarely crowded to her capacity, and ordinarily accommodations in lifeboats for a full

list would not be needed. But that is no argument against maximum safety facilities, for when disaster comes

it comes unexpectedly, and it might come when every berth was occupied. So there must be lifeboats for use

in every possible emergency. Places must be found for them and methods for handling them promptly.

Suppose a vessel to be thus equipped, would safety be insured? In calm weather such as the Titanic had, yes,

for all that would be needed would be to keep the small boats afloat until help came. The Titanic could have

saved everyone aboard. In heavy weather, no. As at present arranged, if a vessel has a list, or, in nonnautical

language, has tipped over on one side, only the boats upon the lower side can be dropped, for they must be

So there is a problem which it is the duty of marine designers to solve. They have heretofore turned their

attention to the invention of some new contrivance for comfort and luxury. Now let them grasp the far more

important question of taking every soul from a sinking ship. They can do it, and while they are about it, it

We like to think and to say that nothing is impossible in these days of ceaseless and energetic progress.

Certainly it is possible for the brains of marine designers to find a better way for rescue work. Lewis Nixon,

shipbuilder and designer for years, is sure that we can revolutionize safety appliances. He has had a plan for

a long time for the construction of a considerable section of deck that could be detached and floated off like

an immense raft. He figures that such a deck raft could be made to carry the bulk of the passengers.

That may seem a bit chimerical to laymen, but Nixon is no layman. His ideas are worthy of every

consideration. Certain it is that something radical must be done, and that the maritime nations must get

together, not only in the way of providing more lifesaving facilities, but in agreeing upon navigation routes

Captain William S. Sims, of the United States Navy, who is in a position to know what he is talking about,

"The truth of the matter is that in case any large passenger steamship sinks, by reason of collision or other

fatal damage to her flotability, more than half of her passengers are doomed to death, even in fair weather,

and in case there is a bit of a sea running none of the loaded boats can long remain afloat, even if they

succeed in getting safely away from the side, and one more will be added to the long list of `the ships that

"Most people accept this condition as one of the inevitable perils of the sea, but I believe it can be shown that

the terrible loss of life occasioned by such disasters as overtook the Bourgogne and the Titanic and many

other ships can be avoided or at least greatly minimized. Moreover, it can be shown that the steamship

owners are fully aware of the danger to their passengers; that the laws on the subject of lifesaving

appliances are wholly inadequate; that the steamship companies comply with the law, though they oppose

any changes therein, and that they decline to adopt improved appliances; because there is no public demand

for them, the demand being for high schedule speed and luxurious conditions of travel.

"In addition to installing efficient lifesaving appliances, if the great steamship lines should come to an

agreement to fix a maximum speed for their vessels of various classes and fix their dates and hours of

steaming so that they would cross the ocean in pairs within supporting distances of each other, on routes clear

"The shortest course between New York and the English Channel lies across Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.

Consequently the shortest water route is over seas where navigation is dangerous by reason of fog and ice. It

is a notorious fact that the transatlantic steamships are not navigated with due regard to safety; that they

steam at practically full speed in the densest fogs. But the companies cannot properly be blamed for this

practice, because if the `blue liners' slow down in a fog or take a safe route, clear of ice, the public will take

passage on the `green liners,' which take the shortest route, and keep up their schedule time; regardless of the

The terrible sacrifice of the Titanic, however, is to have its fruit in safety for the future. The official

announcement is made by the International Mercantile Marine that all its ships will be equipped with

sufficient lifeboats and rafts for every passenger and every member of the crew, without regard to the

regulations in this country and England or Belgium. One of the German liners already had this complement

of lifeboats, though the German marine as a whole is sufficiently deficient at this point to induce the

Prompt, immediate and gratifying reform marks this action of the International Mercantile Marine. It is

doubtless true that this precaution ought to have been taken without waiting for a loss of life such as makes

all previous marine disasters seem trivial. But the public itself has been inert. For thirty years, since Plimsoll's

day, every intelligent passenger knew that every British vessel was deficient in life boats, but neither public

opinion nor the public press took this matter up. There were no questions in Parliament and no measures

introduced in Congress. Even the legislation by which the United States permitted English vessels reaching

American ports to avoid the legal requirements of American statute law (which requires a seat in the

lifeboats for every passenger and every member of the crew) attracted no public attention, and occasional

But this is past. Those who died bravely without complaint and with sacrificing regard for others did not lose

their lives in vain. The safety of all travelers for all times to come under every civilized flag is to be greater

through their sac rifice. Under modern conditions life can be made as safe at sea as on the land. It is

heartrending to stop and think that thirtytwo more lifeboats, costing only about $16,000, which could have

been stowed away without being noticed on the broad decks of the Titanic, would have saved every man,

woman and child on the steamer. There has never been so great a disaster in the history of civilization due to

It would be idle to think that this was due simply to parsimony. It was really due to the false and vicious

notion that life at sea must be made showy, sumptuous and magnificent. The absence of lifeboats was not

due to their cost, but to the demand for a great promenade deck, with ample space to look out on the sea with

which a continuous row of lifeboats would have interfered, and to the general tendency to lavish money on

PUBLIC sentiment with regard to the Titanic disaster was reflected in the prompt action of the United States

On April 17th the Senate, without a dissenting vote, ordered an investigation of the wreck of the Titanic, with

particular reference to the inadequacy of lifesaving boats and apparatus. The resolution also directed inquiry

into the use by the Titanic of the northern course "over a route commonly regarded as dangerous from

Besides investigating the disaster, the committee was directed to look into the feasibility of international

The Senate Committee on Commerce, in whose charge the investigation was placed, immediately appointed

the following subcommittee to conduct the gathering of evidence and the examination of witnesses:

Senator William Alden Smith of Michigan, chairman; Senator Francis Newlands of Nevada, Senator

Jonathan Bourne, Jr., of Oregon, Senator George C. Perkins of California, Senator Theodore E. Burton of

Ohio, Senator Furnifold McL. Simmons of North Carolina and Senator Duncan U. Fletcher of Florida.

The Senate Committee began its investigation in New York on Friday, April 19th, the morning after the

Ismay, the first witness, came to the witness chair with a smile upon his face. He was sworn and then told the

committee that he made the voyage on the Titanic only as a voluntary passenger. Nobody designated him to

come to see how the newly launched monster would behave on the initial trip. He said that no money was

spared in the construction, and as she was built on commission there was no need for the builders to slight the

work for their own benefit. The accident had happened on Sunday night, April 14th.

"I was in bed and asleep," he said. "The ship was not going at full speed, as has been printed, because full

speed would be from seventyeight to eighty revolutions, and we were making only seventyfive. After the

impact with the iceberg I dressed and went on deck. I asked the steward what the matter was and he told me.

Then I went to Captain Smith and asked him if the ship was in danger and he told me he thought she was."

Ismay said that he went on the bridge and remained there for some time and then lent a hand in getting the

Ismay said that no other executive officer of the steamship company was on board, which practically made

him the sole master of the vessel the minute it passed beyond the control of the captain and his

fellowofficers. But Ismay, seeming to scent the drift of the questions, said that he never interfered in any

Ismay was asked to give more particulars about his departure from the ship. He said:

"The boat was ready to be lowered away and the officer called out if there were any more women or children

Captain Rostron, of the Carpathia, followed Mr. Ismay. He said the first message received from the Titanic

was that she was in immediate danger. "I gave the order to turn the ship around as soon as the Titanic had

given her position. I set a course to pick up the Titanic, which was fiftyeight miles west of my position. I

sent for the chief engineer, told him to put on another watch of stokers and make all speed for the Titanic. I

told the first officer to stop all deck work, get out the lifeboats and be ready for any emergency. The chief

steward and doctors of the Carpathia I called to my office and instructed as to their duties. The English doctor

was assigned to the first class dining room, the Italian doctor to the second class dining room, the Hungarian

doctor to the third class dining room. They were instructed to be ready with all supplies necessary for any

The captain told in detail of the arrangements made to prepare the lifeboats and the ship for the receipt of

Then with tears filling his eyes, Captain Rostron said he called the purser. "I told him," said Captain Rostron,

"I wanted to hold a service of prayerthanksgiving for the living and a funeral service for the dead. I went to

Mr. Ismay. He told me to take full charge. An Episcopal clergyman was found among the passengers and he

Captain Rostron said that the Carpathia had twenty lifeboats of her own, in accordance with the British

"Wouldn't that indicate that the regulations are out of date, your ship being much smaller than the Titanic,

Why so few messages came from the Carpathia was gone into. Captain Rostron declared the first messages,

all substantially the same, were sent to the White Star Line, the Cunard Line and the Associated Press. Then

Senator Smith said some complaint had been heard that the Carpathia had not answered President Taft's

inquiry for Major Butt. Captain Rostron declared a reply was sent, "Not on board."

Captain Rostron declared he issued orders for no messages to be sent except upon orders from him, and for

official business to go first, then private messages from the Titanic survivors in order of filing.

Absolutely no censorship was exercised, he said. The wire less continued working all the way in, the

Marconi said he was chairman of the British Marconi Company. Under instructions of the company, he said,

operators must take their orders from the captain of the ship on which they are employed.

"Do the regulations prescribe whether one or two operators should be aboard the ocean vessels?"

"Yes, on ships like the late Titanic and Olympic two are carried," said Marconi. "The Carpathia, a smaller

boat, carries one. The Carpathia's wireless apparatus is a short distance equipment."

"Do you consider that the Titanic was equipped with the latest improved wireless apparatus?"

"Did you hear the captain of the Carpathia say, in his testimony, that they caught this distress message from

"Yes; but shipowners don't like to carry two operators when they can get along with one. The smaller boat

Charles Herbert Lightoller, second officer of the Titanic, followed Marconi on the stand. Mr. Lightoller said

he understood the maximum speed of the Titanic, as shown by its trial tests, to have been twentytwo and a

half to twenty three knots. Senator Smith asked if the rule requiring life saving apparatus to be in each

"Everything was complete," said Lightoller. "Sixteen lifeboats, of which four were collapsible, were on the

Titanic," he added. During the tests, he said, Captain Clark, of the British Board of Trade, was aboard the

"How thorough are these captains of the Board of Trade in inspecting ships?" asked Senator Smith.

After testifying to the circumstances under which the life boats were filled and lowered, Lightoller

continued. "The boat's deck was only ten feet from the water when I lowered the sixth boat. When we

"If the same course was pursued on the starboard side as you pursued on the port, in filling boats, how do you

"I have inquired especially and have found that for every six persons picked up, five were either firemen or

Thomas Cottam, of Liverpool, the Marconi operator on the Carpathia, was the next witness.

Cottam said that he was about ready to retire Sunday night, having partially removed his clothes, and was

waiting for a reply to a message to the Parisian when he heard Cape Cod trying to call the Titanic. Cottam

called the Titanic operator to inform him of the fact, and received the reply. `Come at once; this is a distress

"I confirmed the distress message by asking the Titanic if I should report the distress message to the captain

"How much time elapsed after you received the Titanic's distress message before you reported it to Captain

When the committee resumed the investigation on April 20th, Cottam was recalled to the stand.

Senator Smith asked the witness if he had received any messages from the time the Carpathia left the scene of

the disaster until it reached New York. The purpose of this question was to discover whether any official had

"No, sir," answered Cottam. "I reported the entire matter myself to the steamship Baltic at 10.30 o'clock

Monday morning. I told her we had been to the wreck and had picked up as many of the passengers as we

Cottam denied that he had sent any message that all passengers had been saved, or anything on which such a

Cottam said he was at work Monday and until Wednesday. He repeated his testimony of the previous day and

said he had been without sleep throughout Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and until late Wednesday afternoon

"Did you or Bride send any message declaring that the Titanic was being towed into Halifax?"

In an effort to determine whether the signal "C. Q. D." might not have been misunderstood by passing ships,

"The `C. Q.,' " said Marconi, "is an international signal which meant that all stations should cease sending

except the one using the call. The `D.' was added to indicate danger. The call, however, now has been

Bride said he knew the Frankfurt was nearer than the Carpathia when he called for assistance, but that he

ceased his efforts to communicate with the former because her operator persisted in asking, "What is the

Time after time Senator Smith asked in varying forms why the Titanic did not explain its condition to the

"Any operator receiving `C. Q. D.' and the position of the ship, if he is on the job," said Bride, "would tell the

Marconi again testified to the distress signals, and said that the Frankfurt was equipped with Marconi

wireless. He said that the receipt of the signal "C. Q. D." by the Frankfurt's operator should have been

Under questioning by Senator Smith, Bride said that undoubtedly the Frankfurt received all of the urgent

The first witness when the investigation was resumed in Washington on April 22d was P. A. S. Franklin,

Franklin testified that he had had no communication with Captain Smith during the Titanic's voyage, nor with

Senator Smith then showed Mr. Franklin the telegram received by Congressman Hughes, of West Virginia,

from the White Star Line, dated New York, April 15th, and addressed to J. A. Hughes, Huntington, W. Va.,

"Titanic proceeding to Halifax. Passengers probably land on Wednesday. All safe. (Signed) "THE WHITE

"I ask you," continued the senator, "whether you know about the sending of that telegram, by whom it was

"I do not, sir," said Franklin. "Since it was mentioned at the Waldorf Saturday we have had the entire

Asked when he first knew that the Titanic had sunk, Franklin said he first knew it about 6.27 P.M., Monday.

Mr. Franklin then produced a thick package of telegrams which he had received in relation to the disaster.

"About twenty minutes of two on Monday morning," said he, "I was awakened by a telephone bell, and was

called by a reporter for some paper who informed me that the Titanic had met with an accident and was

sinking. I asked him where he got the information. He told me that it had come by wireless from the

Mr. Franklin said he called up the White Star docks, but they had no information, and he then appealed to the

Associated Press, and there was read to him a dispatch from Cape Race advising him of the accident.

"I asked the Associated Press," said Mr. Franklin, "not to send out the dispatch until we had more detailed

information, in order to avoid causing unnecessary alarm. I was told, however, that the story already had been

The reassuring statements sent out by the line in the early hours of the disaster next were made the subject of

"Tell the committee on what you based those statements," directed Senator Smith.

"We based them on reports and rumors received at Cape Race by individuals and by the newspapers. They

"At 6.20 or 6.30 Monday evening," Mr. Franklin continued, "a message was received telling the fateful news

that the Carpathia reached the Titanic and found nothing but boats and wreckage; that the Titanic had

foundered at 2.20 A.M. in 41.16 north, 50.14 west; that the Carpathia picked up all the boats and had on

"It was such a terrible shock that it took me several moments to think what to do. Then I went downstairs to

the reporters, I began to read the message, holding it high in my hand. I had read only to the second line,

which said that the Titanic had sunk, when there was not a reporter leftthey were so anxious to get to the

"The Titanic's equipment was in excess of the law," said the witness. "It carried its clearance in the shape of a

certificate from the British Board of Trade. I might say that no vessel can leave a British port without a

certificate that it is equipped to care for human lives aboard in case of accident. It is the law."

"Do you know of anyone, any officer or man or any official, whom you deem could be held responsible for

"Positively not. No one thought such an accident could happen. It was undreamed of. I think it would be

absurd to try to hold some individual responsible. Every precaution was taken; that the precautions were of

"Were there any drills or any inspection before the Titanic sailed?" he was asked.

"Both," said the witness. "The men were mustered and the lifeboats lowered in the presence of the

The witness said he did not know whether the lowering tackle ran free or not on that occasion.

In lowering a lifeboat, he said, first the boat has to be cleared, chocks knocked down and the boat hangs

Boxhall said that under the weather conditions experienced at the time of the collision the lifeboats were

supposed to carry sixtyfive persons. Under the regulations of the British Board of Trade, in addition to the

oars, there were in the boats water breakers, water dippers, bread, bailers, mast and sail and lights and a

supply of oil. All of these supplies, said Boxhall, were in the boats when the Titanic left Belfast. He could not

"Now," repeated Senator Smith, "suppose the weather was clear and the sky unruffled, as it was at the time of

"Really, I don't know. It would depend largely upon the people who were to enter. If they did as they were

Boxhall testified to the sobriety and good habits of his superior and brother officers.

Boxhall said he went down to the steerage, inspected all the decks in the vicinity of where the ship had

struck, found no traces of any damage and went directly to the bridge and so reported.

"The captain ordered me to send a carpenter to sound the ship, but I found a carpenter coming up with the

announcement that the ship was taking water. In the mail room I found mail sacks floating about while the

clerks were at work. I went to the bridge and reported, and the captain ordered the lifeboats to be made

Boxhall testified that at Captain Smith's orders he took word of the ship's position to the wireless operators.

After that Boxhall went back to the lifeboats, where there were many men and women. He said they had

"After that I was on the bridge most of the time sending out distress signals, trying to attract the attention of

boats ahead," he said. "I sent up distress rockets until I left the ship, to try to attract the attention of a ship

directly ahead. I had seen her lights. She seemed to be meeting us and was not far away. She got close

"Suppose you had a powerful search light on the Titanic, could you not have thrown a beam on the vessel and

H. J. Pitman, the third officer of the ship, was the first witness on April 23d. By a series of searching

questions Senator Fletcher brought out the fact that when the collision occurred the Titanic was going at the

greatest speed attained during the trip, even though the ship was entering the Grand Banks and had been

Frederick Fleet, a sailor and lookout man on the Titanic, followed Pitman on the stand. Fleet said he had had

five or six years' experience at sea and was lookout on the Oceanic prior to going on the Titanic. He was in

Fleet stated that he had kept a sharp lookout for ice, and testified to seeing the iceberg and signaling the

Fleet acknowledged that if he had been aided in his observations by a good glass he probably could have

spied the berg into which the ship crashed in time to have warned the bridge to avoid it. Major Arthur

Peuchen, of Toronto, a passenger who followed Fleet on the stand, also testified to the much greater sweep of

vision afforded by binoculars and, as a yachtsman, said he believed the presence of the iceberg might have

been detected in time to escape the collision had the lookout men been so equipped.

It was made to appear that the blame for being without glasses did not rest with the lookout men. Fleet said

they had asked for them at Southampton and were told there were none for them. One glass, in a pinch, would

The testimony before the committee on April 24th showed that the big steamship was on the verge of a field

of ice twenty or thirty miles long, if she had not actually entered it, when the accident occurred.

The committee tried to discover whether it would add to human safety if the ships were fitted with search

lights so that at night objects could be seen at a greater distance. The testimony so far along this line had been

conflicting. Some of the witnesses thought it would be no harm to try it, but they were all skeptical as to its

value, as an iceberg would not be especially distinguishable because its bulk is mostly below the surface.

One of the witnesses said that much dependence is not placed upon the lookout, and that those lookouts who

Harold G. Lowe, fifth officer of the Titanic, told the committee his part in the struggle of the survivors for life

following the catastrophe. The details of this struggle have have already been told in a previous chapter.

In great detail Guglielmo Marconi, on April 25th, explained the operations of his system and told how he had

authorized Operator Bride of the Titanic, and Operator Cottam, of the Carpathia, to sell their stories of the

In allowing the operator's to sell their stories, said Mr. Marconi, there was no question of suppressing or

monopolizing the news. He had done everything he could, he said, to have the country informed as quickly as

possible of the details of the disaster. That was why he was particularly glad for the narratives of such

important witnesses as the operators to receive publication, regardless of the papers that published them.

He repeated the testimony of Cottam that every effort had been made to get legitimate dispatches ashore. The

cruiser Chester, he said, had been answered as fully as possible, though it was not known at the time that its

queries came from the President of the United States. The Salem, he said, had never got in touch with the

Senator Newlands suggested that the telegrams, some signed by the name of Mr. Sammis and some with the

name of Marconi, directing Cottam to "keep his mouth shut" and hold out for four figures on his story, was

sent only as the Carpathia was entering New York harbor, when there was no longer need for sending official

or private messages from the rescuing ship. There had been an impression before, he said, that the messages

had been sent to Cottam when the ship was far at sea, when they might have meant that he was to hold back

Ernest Gill, a donkey engineman on the steamship Californian, was the first witness on April 26th. He said

that Captain Stanley Lord, of the Californian, refused later to go to the aid of the Titanic, the rockets from

which could be plainly seen. He says the captain was apprised of these signals, but made no effort to get up

steam and go to the rescue. The Californian was drifting with the floe. So indignant did he become, said Gill,

that he endeavored to recruit a committee of protest from among the crew, but the men failed him.

Captain Lord entered a sweeping denial of Gill's accusations and read from the Californian's log to support

his contention. Cyril Evans, the Californian's wireless operator, however, told of hearing much talk among

the crew, who were critical of the captain's course. Gill, he said, told him he expected to get $500 for his

Evans told of having warned the Titanic only a brief time before the great vessel crashed into the berg that the

sea was crowded with ice. The Titanic's operators, he said, at the time were working with the wireless station

at Cape Race, and they told him to "shut up" and keep out. Within a half hour the pride of the sea was

Members of the committee who examined individually the British sailors and stewards of the Titanic's crew

prepared a report of their investigations for the full committee. This testimony was ordered to be incorporated

Most of this testimony was but a repetition of experiences similar to the many already related by those who

On April 27th Captain James H. Moore, of the steamship Mount Temple, who hurried to the Titanic in

response to wireless calls for help, told of the great stretch of field ice which held him off. Within his view

from the bridge he discerned, he said, a strange steamship, probably a "tramp," and a schooner which was

making her way out of the ice. The lights of this schooner, he thought, probably were those seen by the

anxious survivors of the Titanic and which they were frantically trying to reach.

Steward Crawford also related a thrilling story in regard to loading the lifeboats with women first. He told

of several instances that came under his observation of women throwing their arms around their husbands and

crying out that they would not leave the ship without them. The pathetic recital caused several women at the

Stories that Mr. Andrews, the designer of the ship, had tried to disguise the extent of danger were absolutely

denied by Henry Samuel Etches, his bedroom steward, who told the committee how Mr. Andrews urged

The steward, whose duty it was to serve Major Butt and his party, told how he did not see the Major at dinner

the evening of the disaster as he was dining with a private party in the restaurant. William Burke, a first class

steward, told of serving dinner at 7.15 o'clock to Mr. and Mrs. Straus, and later Mrs. Straus' refusal to leave

her husband was again told to the committee. A bedroom steward told of a quiet conversation with Benjamin

Guggenheim, Senator Guggenheim's brother, after the accident and shortly before the Titanic settled in the

On April 29th Marconi produced copies of several messages which passed between the Marconi office and

the Carpathia in an effort to get definite information of the wreck and the survivors.

Marconi and F. M. Sammis, chief engineer of the American Marconi Company, both acknowledged that a

mistake had been made in sending messages to Bride and Cottam on board the Carpathia not to give out any

The senatorial committee investigating the Titanic disaster has served several good purposes. It has officially

established the fact that all nations are censurable for insufficient, antiquated safety regulations on ocean

vessels, and it has emphasized the imperative necessity for united action among all maritime countries to

No particular person is named as being responsible, though attention is called to the fact that on the day of the

disaster three distinct warnings of ice were sent to Captain Smith. J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the

White Star Line, is not held responsible for the ship's high speed. In fact, he is barely mentioned in the report.

Ice positions, so definitely reported to the Titanic just preceding the accident, located ice on both sides of the

lane in which she was traveling. No discussion took place among the officers, no conference was called to

consider these warnings, no heed was given to them. The speed was not relaxed, the lookout was not

The supposedly watertight compartments of the Titanic were not water tight, because of the

The steamship Californian, controlled by the same concern as the Titanic, was nearer the sinking steamship

than the nineteen miles reported by her captain, and her officers and crew saw the distress signals of the

Titanic and failed to respond to them in accordance with the dictates of humanity, international usage and the

requirements of law. Had assistance been promptly proffered the Californian might have had the proud

The mysterious lights on an unknown ship, seen by the passengers on the Titanic, undoubtedly were on the

Eight ships, all equipped with wireless, were in the vicinity of the Titanic, the Olympic farthest away512

The full capacity of the Titanic's lifeboats was not utilized, because, while only 705 persons were saved, the

No general alarm was sounded, no whistle blown and no systematic warning was given to the endangered

passengers, and it was fifteen or twenty minutes after the collision before Captain Smith ordered the Titanic's

The Titanic's crew were only meagerly acquainted with their positions and duties in an accident and only one

drill was held before the maiden trip. Many of the crew joined the ship only a few hours before she sailed and

Many more lives could have been saved had the survivors been concentrated in a few lifeboats, and had the

The first official information of the disaster was the message from Captain Haddock, of the Olympic,

received by the White Star Line at 6.16 P. M., Monday, April 15. In the face of this information a message

reporting the Titanic being towed to Halifax was sent to Representative J. A. Hughes, at Huntington, W. Va.,

at 7.51 P. M. that day. The message was delivered to the Western Union office in the same building as the

"Whoever sent this message," says the report, "under the circumstances, is guilty of the most reprehensible

The wireless operator on the Carpathia was not duly vigilant in handling his messages after the accident.

The practice of allowing wireless operators to sell their stories should be stopped.

It is recommended that all ships carrying more than 100 passengers shall have two searchlights.

That a revision be made of steamship inspection laws of foreign countries to conform to the standard

That every ship be required to carry sufficient lifeboats for all passengers and crew.

That the use of wireless be regulated to prevent interference by amateurs, and that all ships have a wireless

Detailed recommendations are made as to watertight bulkhead construction on oceangoing ships.

Bulkheads should be so spaced that any two adjacent compartments of a ship might be flooded without

Transverse bulkheads forward and abaft the machinery should be continued watertight to the uppermost