Open post

“I Didn’t See Much Chance in Living”: Frank Winnold Prentice

"I Didn't See Much Chance in Living": Frank Winnold Prentice

On May 13, 1912, the RMS Oceanic encountered the Lost Lifeboat of Titanic: Collapsible A. Therein, the crew discovered three corpses that had been brutalized by a month of relentless sun and churning sea, as well as a wedding band that had been lost by the dying husband who had taken it from his dead wife.

The recovery of Collapsible A by the RMS Oceanic, May 13, 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

And despite the horror of the discovery by everyone aboard the Oceanic that day, it is sometimes reported that there may have been a single crew member aboard who was undoubtedly affected in an even more profound way than his shipmates.

If true, that gentleman’s name was Frank Winnold Prentice. 

Frank was English-born. According to birth records, he was newly 23 years old when he signed onto Titanic as an Assistant Storekeeper, although he is often reported as having been but 18. On Titanic, he was promised to earn a monthly wage of 3 pounds and 15 pence. He had reportedly transferred from the Celtic.

The SS Celtic circa 1919, courtesy of the Imperial War Museum.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Storekeepers were classed as part of the ship’s Victualling Crew.

At 11:40pm on April 14, 1912, Frank was on E Deck port-side, in the “Storekeepers’ Room”—the cabin that he shared with 5 other storekeepers. He maintained that he did not feel the collision itself, but that he noticed a change in the motion of the ship—likening it to hitting the brakes in one’s car—and the ceasing of the engines.

Frank and two of his mates, fellow shopkeepers Cyril Ricks and Michael Kieran, found their ways up to the well-deck, where they observed that although the iceberg itself had passed into the night, that remnants of it were scattered across the floor.

Photograph taken on the morning of April 15, 1912, by the Chief Steward on the Prinz Alabert, who took the photo because of an unusual red color that appeared like a paint smear. At the time, the Steward did not know about the Titanic disaster.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Frank began assisting passengers with their lifebelts and encouraging them, particularly the ladies, to board the lifeboats, which he said many were outright unwilling to do.

It seems, given the multiple testimonies that Frank gave about Titanic, that a particular meeting haunted his thoughts: that of American wife, Virginia Clark and her husband Walter. 

Before I got my lifebelt on, I met a young couple, and, uh, I’ll tell you her name: it was a Mrs. Clark. They had spent their honeymoon in France and we had picked them up at Cherbourg. And she was having trouble with her lifebelt, so I fixed that onto her. And I said, “I think you’d better get into a lifeboat.” And there was one on the port side… so she said, “No, I don’t want to go; I don’t want to leave my husband.”

So I said, “Well, it’s just a precautionary measure. You get in; your husband will follow later on.” And I got her away, and that was that.

As Frank told it, he, Cyril, and Michael retreated to the stern as the steerage passengers “swarmed the decks,” believing that they had done all in their power.

It is here, so to speak, that Frank earns his distinction, even among Titanic survivors: because he jumped from the stern. 

And somehow survived.

And I was hanging onto a board—we had two boards, starboard and port, which said, 'Keep clear of propeller blades.' And I was hanging onto one of these and I was getting higher and higher into the air; and I thought well, now I’ll go and I dropped in; I had a lifebelt on. And I hit the water with a terrific crack.

Luckily I didn’t hit anything when I dropped in; there were bodies all over the place. And then I looked up at the Titanic.

There it was. The propellers were right out of the water; the rudder was right out. And I could see the bottom.

And then gradually she glided away. And that was that. That was the last of the Titanic.

In a separate interview, Frank described what he met in the ocean below him.

When I dropped down into the water it was among 200 or 300 live or dead bodies… I was lucky when I hit the water that I did not hit anything… I searched for my friend [Cyril Ricks] and he had not been so lucky. He had hit something and was hurt.

Sadly, Cyril had been critically injured in the dive.

I found Ricks. And, uh, he had hurt himself. He’d hurt his legs; he’d dropped on something. And he didn’t say very much… and he died. And… I was eventually—I seemed to be all by myself. The cries for help and prayers had all subsided, and everything was quiet.

And then Frank “paddled off… bumping into bodies all the time.”

In his 1979 interview with the BBC, his account of what followed, although brief, is an emotional moment in which he speaks through welling tears.

I didn’t want to die—I mean, I didn’t see much chance of living, but I was gradually getting frozen up. And, um [holds back tears]… by the Grace of God, I came across a lifeboat, and they pulled me in.

That lifeboat was Lifeboat 4. Along with Frank, the people in this boat picked up seven other crewmen. One of those, a fireman, was trying for some reason to exit the boat; by Frank’s account, the occupants worked together to hold or tie this fireman down. It is unclear whether or not Frank assisted.

Regardless, when Frank found safety in Lifeboat 4, he also found a sad surprise. One that even in his elder years, appeared to moved him dearly.

And I sat down on a seat, and who should be—I sat next to Mrs. Clark…The girl I’d put into a lifeboat. [tears] And she said—the first thing she said, where’s my—I have I seen my—have you seen my husband? So I said, “No, I haven’t, but I expect he’ll be all right.”

Anyway. I was in a pretty bad way then, as you can imagine—frozen solid, almost. And she wrapped me round with her cloak—she had some sort of blanket or a coat on. Anyway, I think ,uh… she probably saved my life—I don’t know. But I saved hers; at least I think I might have done, I think I did. And she saved mine.

Frank returned to the sea shortly thereafter. Records indicate that he signed onto the RMS Oceanic in July of 1912, although that date does not abide Frank’s recollections that he was present for the gruesome discovery of Collapsible A in May of that year. Whether records were incomplete, or Frank Prentice was mistaken, is indiscernible. 

He carried on, serving in the First World War. He was regularly addressed in his interviews as a Major.

Frank granted many interviews in print and video regarding his survival account throughout his life. He regularly recounted hearing “people crying, praying… [and] the band playing Nearer My God to Thee and them singing.” 

And he maintained that Titanic was a victim of J. Bruce Ismay’s pursuit of speed. “That ship,” Frank insisted, “was thrown away.”

"Der Unterbang der Titanic." Engraving by Willy Stower, 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Frank Prentice was likewise adamant that the amount of lifeboats--20, which was in excess of the legal minimum--was criminally insufficient.

She had a lot of people on board… and they must have suffered more than I did, I imagine… some of then didn’t even leave their cabins, even. And they must have died in their cabins—they must have had a lingering death… it was almost like murder, wasn’t it?

Frank also carried with him a lifelong memento of the disaster: his pocket watch, stopped forever at 2:20am—the time that Titanic went under. When asked by his interviewer in his 1979 BBC recording when he entered the water, Frank replied thusly.

I think about two o’clock. I think it lasted… it was frozen up like I was. I think it lasted about twenty minutes in the water.

And when asked if he was “bothered” by the memories of Titanic, Frank answered:

Talking about it, I should probably dream about it tonight. Have another nightmare… [awkward chuckle] You’d think I’m too old for that, but you’d be amazed. You lie in bed at night and the whole thing comes round again… [pauses; tears up]

And that is the point at which the interview footage concludes.

Frank Winnold Prentice was one of the longest-lived surviving crew members of Titanic. 

He died at the age of 93, in 1982.

Open post

“Locker 14, F Deck”: Sidney Sedunary

"Locker 14, F Deck": Sidney Sedunary

Samuel “Sidney” Sedunary signed onto Titanic on April 4, 1912. He hailed from Berkshire, England, and was the eldest of 7 children.

Sidney was assigned as a Second Steward in Third Class. He had only recently been married to his sweetheart, Madge Tizzard, in late 1911. He was 25 years old; she, 24.

And by the time he boarded Titanic, Madge was pregnant.

Even though he was comparatively young at the time of his assignment, but he’d already had 8 years of experience at sea. In April of 1904, at just age 17, Sidney joined the Royal Navy. His record indicates that he was acknowledged for excellent conduct; his appearance is also noted with brown hair, brown eyes, and a tan complexion. 

After 1908, Sidney moved to the private sector, serving on the Adriatic, and then on Titanic’s elder, and practically identical, sister, the RMS Olympic.

A promotional postcard distributed by the White Star Line to advertise the quality of Third-Class accommodations in the Olympic class.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

As the Second Steward in Third Class, Sidney was required to support the Chief Steward, a man named James W. Kieran. 

Most stewards were roomed en masse on F Deck. But Sidney was gifted with a E-Deck cabin shared with only one other crew member: Ludwig Muller, the sole translator hired for the entirety of Third-Class passengers.

A Third-Class passenger cabin on the RMS Olympic, circa 1911 or 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

There is comparatively little information regarding the circumstances of Third Class on the night of the sinking. Much of what is known is ascribed to the testimony of John Hart, one of the eight surviving Third-Class Stewards.

Third-Class evacuation during the sinking was inevitable bedlam. With multiple languages and a single ship translator, confusion was rampant. But it wasn’t just that. Many passengers, even in Third Class, were adamant that it was safer to stay on the ship. John Hart testified that many of the 59 people in his charge “refused to put [lifebelts] on… they said they saw no occasion for putting them on; they did not believe the ship was hurt in any way.” 

John Hart continued.

Some of them went to the boat deck, and found it rather cold, and saw the boats being lowered away, and thought themselves more secure on the ship, and consequently returned to their cabin… I heard two or three say they preferred to remain on the ship than be tossed about on the water like a cockle shell.

During the British Board of Trade Inquiry cited above, John Hart testified to witnessing Sidney working with his superior mid-sinking. (Please do note that Sidney's surname is transcribed phonetically as "Sedginary").

I waited about there with my own people trying to show them that the vessel was not hurt to any extent to my own knowledge, and waited for the chief third class steward, or some other Officer, or somebody in authority to come down and give further orders. Mr. Kieran [id est, the Chief Steward] came back. He had been to sections S, and Q, and R to see that those people also were provided with lifebelts… he had also his assistant with him, one by name, Sedginary. [Sidney Sedunary.]

Immediately thereafter, when asked again, Hart repeated that Sidney had been assisting James Kiernan in distributing lifebelts.

What about the assistant; you say his assistant was with him?

- Yes.

John Hart estimated that he received his initial orders to get lifeboats on his passengers after “three parts of hour” after the iceberg strike at 11:40pm, so he believed it was about 12:30pm. He came across Sidney and Chief Steward James Kieran sometime after that, after they had been to Section S, Q, and R, which were toward the stern and split between three decks: S on G Deck, R on F Deck, Q on E Deck.

G Deck had started to flood at 11:55pm. The forward section F Deck saw water by 12:05am; forward E Deck, around 12:10am, along with water traveling down Scotland Road—the well-known but rarely-named ship-long hallway.

The Chief Steward had to instruct all the other Third-Class stewards throughout the ship. While those stewards receiving instruction were ferrying people in groups up to boat deck—John Hart testified to having taken two or three trips up—the Chief Steward and his assistant were completely embroiled in managing directions on G, F, and E Decks.

The Third-Class General Room, as depicted in a promotional illustration by the White Star Line to advertise Third-Class accommodations in the Olympic class.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Inevitably, since Sidney was in the company of James Kieran or otherwise transmitting his orders to lower Stewards, he presumably moved between the forward (bow) and aft (stern) sections on E, F, and G Decks—which were already flooding to variable degrees.

Segregated in the depths of the ship and at points likely wading through frigid seawater as he acted as Kieran’s right-hand man, Sidney had to have known how frail his chances of survival truly were.

But even as he watched others—colleagues and passengers—move to the upper decks and back again, Sidney was dedicated in his duties as the ship foundered. 

As far as we can deduce from the evidence, he spent the majority of the sinking down below, unlocking cupboards and distributing lifebelts instead of seeking a lifeboat.

A Third-Class Stairwell on C-Deck on the RMS Olympic, circa 1911. Courtesy of Bedford Lemere & Co.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Sidney Sedunary likely did get up to boat deck. Only once it was too late.

And after the exhaustion and adrenaline of the evacuation, he could not survive the cold.

His corpse was the 178th recovered by the crew of the Mackay-Bennett, and was noted thusly.

NO. 178. - MALE. - ESTIMATED AGE, 25. BROWN - HAIR, LIGHT MOUSTACHE.

CLOTHING - Blue serge suit; black boots and socks; uniform coat and waistcoat, with buttons.

TATTOO ON RIGHT ARM - Anchor and rose.

EFFECTS - Gold ring; knife; nickel watch; pawn ticket; pipe; ship's keys; 20s.; $1.40; 8 francs 50.

NO MARKS ON CLOTHING

Sidney Sedunary was buried at sea.

White Star sent Madge a death notice that was cursory at best.

MUCH REGRET SEDUNARY NOT SAVED

With that, they returned his effects to his 24-year-old widow: some change, Sidney’s broken pocket watch, which had frozen shortly after he entered the water and before Titanic went under—and a key with a metal tag that read “Locker 14, F"D"k.”

So this key that had been taken from Sidney’s body and remitted to Madge Sedunary was more than a simple key: it was a tribute to his unsung and steadfast courage on the last night of his life.

Madge gave birth to Sidney’s son and only child at the end of 1912. He was named after his late father. And in 1921, 9 years after Sidney’s death, Madge remarried—to his younger brother Arthur. They  had a son 5 years later, in 1926.

Sid Sedunary, Jr., died in 2010, at the age of 97. He was the last known surviving Titanic orphan.

6 years following Sidney Jr.’s death, the key that had been removed from his father’s body was sold at auction for £85,000.

Open post

“He Kept Bravely On, With Nothing to Guide Him”: David Blair, Titanic’s Lost Officer

"He Kept Bravely On, With Nothing to Guide Him": David Blair, Titanic's Lost Officer

In the course of his civil and military service to the Crown, David Blair was awarded a King’s Gallantry Medal, a British Empire Medal, a Royal Navy Reserve Decoration, the French Cross of Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, and the Officer of the Order of the British Empire Award, bestowed upon him by King George V and signed by Prince Edward.

And yet, David Blair is only remembered as That Guy Who Took That Important Key.

That Guy Who Forgot the Binoculars.

The Man Who Sank Titanic.

And that, dear reader, is horse excrement.

David Blair had originally been assigned as Second Officer on Titanic, and until April 4, that was the circumstance under which the crew operated. This arrangement was in place from the start, and was in operation during Titanic’s sea trials on April 2, 1912.

RMS Titanic docked in Belfast. It is believed that one of the figures standing on the bow is then-Second Officer David Blair.

PUBLIC DOMAIN (Copyright expiration, re: in excess of 70 years after author's death)

The assignments of Titanic’s top officer ranks were as follows:

And yet, whether by White Star’s will or at the behest of Captain Smith himself, Henry Wilde was suddenly lined up to take over as Titanic’s Chief Officer. It’s generally understood that the reasoning was because Mr. Wilde was already Chief on Titanic’s elder sister, Olympic. Since it was temporarily berthed, it seemed like Wilde’s experience could be better used on Titanic’s maiden voyage.

Interestingly, Henry Wilde, although aware of the so-called reshuffle as early as March 30, did not receive a proper telegram until April 9, 5 days after Blair’s notice of reassignment.

Charles Lightoller, who was David’s mate, addressed it in his writings, which were published in 1935.

The ruling lights of the White Star Line thought it would be a good plan to send the Chief Officer of the Olympic [Henry Wilde], just for the one voyage, as Chief Officer of the Titanic, to help, with his experience of her sister ship. This doubtful policy threw both [William] Murdoch and me out of our stride; and, apart from the disappointment of having to step back in our rank, caused quite a little confusion Murdoch from Chief, took over my duties as First I stepped back on Blair's toes, as Second, and picked up the many threads of his job, whilst he - luckily for him as it turned out - was left behind.

© "Titanic and Others Ships," by Charles H. Lightoller, 1935. As cited (in part) in "Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage", by High Brewster, 2012.

So Murdoch and Lightoller were each demoted, and David was pushed off the roster entirely.

He wrote a postcard home to his daughter on April 4, 1912, expressing his disappointment at the decision.

“4th, Southampton

Arrived on 'Titanic' from Belfast today. Am afraid I shall have to step out to make room for [the] Chief Officer of the Olympic who was going in command but so many ships laid up he will have to wait. Hope eventually to get back to this ship...
Been home all day and down on board tonight on watch.
This is a magnificent ship, I feel very disappointed I am not to make the first voyage.”

The word “very” was underlined. 

It would seem that David stuck around Southampton to witness Titanic’s departure. It has since been confirmed by facial construction experts and David’s family that the gentleman in black walking along the dock is, in fact, David Blair.

Knowing that, one can’t help but see dejection in his stance.

RMS Titanic docked in Southampton. The man in black walking toward the camera has been identified as Former Second Officer David Blair.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

But many people seem to believe that David Blair’s removal from the crew had disastrous consequences. Because when David disembarked, he accidentally took something that should have remained on board.

It was a tiny iron key, with an oval-shaped brass tag that read “Crow’s Nest Telephone Key.”

In the locker opened by that key were David Blair’s looking glasses. And it is speculated that, because the key that David Blair took was of course missing from the ship, that Titanic’s lookouts were without binoculars.

To spot things like icebergs in the distance.

The speculation about the impact of the lost binoculars is not novel—in fact, began in the Senate Inquiry immediately after the disaster. Lookout George Hogg attested to binoculars being on board during Second Officer Blair’s tenure, but that they became unavailable for use before leaving Southampton.

17494. Do you remember when the "Titanic" was leaving Belfast - you signed on the "Titanic" as look-out man, we know - were a pair of glasses given you?

- Yes.

17495. For the crow's-nest?

- Yes.

17496. Who gave them to you, do you remember?

- Mr. Blair, the acting Second Officer then.

17501. When you left the ship at Southampton, what did you do with those glasses?

- Mr. Blair was in the crow's-nest and gave me his glasses, and told me to lock them up in his cabin and to return him the keys.

17503. As far as you were concerned, the glasses, you were told, were to be locked up in the cabin of the second Officer?

- I locked them up.

17504. And they were locked up. When the ship left Queenstown were there any glasses in the crow's-nest?

- There were none when we left Southampton.

George went on to testify that newly appointed Second Officer Lightoller seemed none too bothered by their absence.

17507. Did you ask for them at all after you left Queenstown?

- After I left Queenstown.

17508. You personally asked for them?

- I personally asked.

17509. Whom did you ask?

- Mr. Lightoller.

17510. Will you tell us what you said to him, quite shortly, about it?

- I said, "Where is our look-out glasses, Sir?" He made some reply, I did not exactly catch it. "Get them later," or something like that.

17511. At any rate, you did not get any?

- I did not get any.

But, despite the sensationalism regarding David Blair’s supposedly fatal moment of forgetfulness, Lightoller’s response to Hogg was neither damning nor surprising. Lightoller would not be troubled by the lack of binoculars because he had his own pair on board with him.

Moreover, the White Star Line was anecdotally the only line of vessels to even provide binoculars to lookouts, as it was unnecessary for spotting endangering objects and was therefore completely against industry practice. And George Hogg’s testimony immediately following, as well as those of his colleagues, attest to as much. Notable captains experienced in disaster, such as Captain Walter Lord of the SS Californian and Ernest Shackleton, were of the same opinion.

17513. Have you had experience of glasses; have you used them much?

- Never before; only in the White Star Line.

17514. But had you used them before you were on this voyage?

- On another ship.

17515. Of the White Star Line?

- In the "Adriatic."

17516. You had never had them in any ship you have been on except in the "Adriatic," which was another ship of the White Star Line you had sailed in?

- No other ship except the White Star.

17517. Did you find them of use?

- Well, I believe in my own eyesight.

 

17522. What it comes to, if I understand that, is you pick it up with your eyesight, and then if you want to see as well as you can what it is you would use the glasses?

- That is what they are handy for, Sir.

17523. But not for picking up things, you mean?

- No, I pick up things with my own eyesight.

And it was understood that George Hogg’s testimony was accurate—binoculars were never intended to spot distant objects. Just to ascertain details.

Additionally, Senator Smith, who conducted the American Inquiry, was in no way familiar with this fact because he was not a mariner in the slightest—a fact that deeply vexed multiple surviving officers who he interrogated, including Second Officer Lightoller and Fifth Officer Harold Lowe.

So, when contemplated within the context of contemporary maritime practice, David Blair’s mistake resulted in nothing more than a perplexity.

Summarily: David Blair did not “doom” Titanic at all.

The RMS Majestic (left) and RMS Olympic, docked in Southampton.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

In July of 1912, aboard the RMS Majestic, David was reunited with his friend and Titanic colleague, Charles Lightoller. In a repetition of Titanic’s original assignments, Lightoller was First Officer; Blair, Second.

In 1913, following a stint on the Teutonic during which David had been promoted to First Officer, he returned to the Majestic with his newly acquired superior rank, which he maintained for four months.

But fate was determined to intervene on behalf of The Man Who Doomed Titanic.

On the morning of May 6, 1913, a trimmer (id est, a fireman) chose to attempt suicide by jumping overboard. He was only 27 years old.

David was laying down in his cabin when he heard the cries of alarm. He hastily dressed in his uniform and ran up on deck.

As the fog lifted the officer saw Keoun [the man who jumped ship], apparently very weak, bobbing up and down on the swell, and without a moment's hesitation he dived from the rail of the promenade deck into the water.

David Blair, without a thought as to his own person, swan-dove 40 feet down into 44-degree water, his sight obscured by ocean fog.

According to the New York Tribune's report, the fireman was crazed with heat and recently bereaved. "Keoun lost his wife a month ago, and brooded over her death.  Worry, augmented by the heat of the fire room, affected his mind temporarily, and on Tuesday he ran up to the main deck and jumped."

MAJESTIC IN WITH CHIEF OFFICER A HERO

Passengers Cheer David Blair, Who Risked Life in Fog to Save Fireman
---
DIVED IN MIDOCEAN
---
Women Weep as Gallant Sailor and Man for Whom He Jumped Are Helped Over Side

...

Everybody on board except Blair himself, wanted to tell about the rescue yesterday, and  Captain Kelk said he felt mighty proud of his chief officer.

...

Mr. Blair, who had been roused from sleep by the cry of "Man overboard!" pulled his trousers over his pajamas and grasping his binoculars rushed forward to a place on the promenade deck just under the bridge.  He never took his eyes from the sea until he shouted to the skipper that he saw the helpless fireman.

The passengers said Blair made a perfect dive.  When he came to the surface he looked to the bridge, and seeing Kelk pointing in the direction of the fireman, got his bearings and struck out for the man he could not then see.

Once he got a glimpse of the unconscious Keoun as the  fireman was tossed up on a wave, and from that tie until he himself was rescued Blair saw nothing but sea and mist.

Thought of Fireman First

He kept bravely on, with nothing to guide him, until the lifeboat came by in search of the fireman.  Those in the boat called to Blair to climb in, but he shouted: "I'm all right.  Get that fireman first.  He should be somewhere about here."

David was celebrated as a hero for this act. But the accolades were short-lived.

On September 8, 1914, on board the RMS Oceanic—and acting as Second Officer alongside First Officer Lightoller once again—David was acting as navigator as the monstrous liner crept in between mainland Scotland the Faroe Islands.

And she ran aground on a reef renowned for its treachery, called the Shaalds of Foula. Fortunately, all souls were saved and the Oceanic was left to her fate.

RMS Oceanic docked in New York, circa 1903. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

On September 29, a gale turned Oceanic over to the sea. Once visible from shore, local islanders awoke to discover that she had utterly vanished.

David Blair shouldered the blame at the subsequent court martial. Lightoller, however, disagreed entirely with this.

The Oceanic was really far too big for that patrol and in consequence it was not long before she crashed on to one of the many outlying reefs and was lost. The fog was as thick as the proverbial hedge when she ripped up on the rocks; and in all fairness one could not lay the blame on the navigator—my old shipmate of many years, Davy Blair—trying as he was to work that great vessel amongst islands and mostly unknown currents.

© "Titanic and Others Ships," by Charles H. Lightoller, 1935.

But Lightoller had a bit of frivolity planned for them both, while his dear, unlucky friend was in town for the court martial: they were to patrol the coastline disguised as fishermen for the Royal Navy.

Davy Blair, my old Oceanic pal, and I volunteered for a job that we had got wind of in the Flag Lieutenant’s office. The main qualification for the men who were to get it, we were told, was that they should be “Hard Cases.” Well, Davy and I had both done the Western Ocean, and knew it in its worst moods these many years… We were accepted… A visit down sailor town soon completed the outfit, blue jersey, smock, rough serge pants, heavy weather cap, and seaboots, making us the imitation of a perfect fisherman.

© "Titanic and Others Ships," by Charles H. Lightoller, 1935.

David Blair’s subsequent Naval service during the First World War garnered him a number of the afore-stated accolades from the British and French governments. In 1918, he was promoted by the Crown to Lietenant Commander.

In 1923, David was employed as the Commanding Officer on the schooner St. George, leading an immense scientific expedition on a Pacific tour, including the Isthmus of Panama and many of the islands, including the Galapagos.

The steam yacht St. George, docked in Sydney Harbor, Australia, circa 1982. Courtesy of the Australian national Maritime Museum, from the William Hall Collection.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

David Blair passed away at 80 years old on January 10, 1955. 

Do note that, despite occasional false reports, that David Blair was NOT killed in action in 1917 in a U-Boat encounter during  the First World War. This is nothing but irresponsible and lazy reporting. The lost soldier in question was David Blair Chalmers, an Assistant Steward in the Mercantile Marines, aged 26, from Glasgow, Scotland.

In 2007, the infamous key to the crow’s nest sold at auction for £90,000.

SOURCE MATERIAL

Open post

“Every Star in the Heavens Was Visible”: Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall

"Every Star in the Heavens Was Visible": Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall

Joseph Groves Boxhall was the son of a seafaring family, and he carried the tradition on. When he boarded Titanic on March 27, 1912, he had already spent 13 years at sea. 

He was 28 years old.

Joseph signed onto Titanic as Fourth Officer. Despite his extensive career up until that point, his path had only intersected with one Titanic colleague, Second Officer Charles Lightoller.

Fourth Officer Boxhall was on duty when Titanic collided with the iceberg on April 14, 1912.

Joseph Boxhall, photographed before 1919.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Per his testimony to both the American and British Inquiries following the tragedy, Joseph said that he was on the bridge when the collision occurred. 

But in 1962, he gave an interview to the BBC in which he stated that he was in his cabin, making a cup of tea.

He heard a trio a warning bells and immediately returned to the bridge, where he overheard First Officer William Murdoch shouting to Quartermaster Hitchens to pull the wheel hard over, as well as the telegraphs ordering the engine room to reverse.

Joseph was subsequently present for First Officer Murdoch’s discussion with Captain Smith about the strike, which he detailed at the British Inquiry.

Commissioner: And did the Captain then come out on to the bridge?

Boxhall: The Captain was alongside of me when I turned round.

Commissioner: Did you hear him say something to the first Officer?

Boxhall: Yes, he asked him what we had struck.

Commissioner: What conversation took place between them?

Boxhall: The First Officer said, "An iceberg, Sir. I hard-a-starboarded and reversed the engines, and I was going to hard-a-port round it but she was too close. I could not do any more. I have closed the watertight doors." The Commander asked him if he had rung the warning bell, and he said "Yes."

He went on to say that Captain Smith and Murdoch went to look overboard to spy the iceberg, but that he did not see it himself. “I was not too sure of seeing it,” he said. “I had just come out of the light, and my eyes were not accustomed to the darkness.”

Joseph then went down to F Deck to assess the ship for any damage, but he found none. On his way return, as he passed through C Deck, he encountered steerage passengers playing with fragments from the iceberg that had scattered the well deck.

Yes, I took a piece of ice out of a man's hand, a small piece about as large as a small basin, I suppose; very small, anyhow; about that size (Describing.) He was going down again to the passenger accommodation, and I took it from him and walked across the deck to see where he got it. I found just a little ice in the well deck covering a space of about three or four feet from the bulwarks right along the well deck, small stuff.

Joseph returned to the bridge to report the absence of any finding, and was sent to fetch the ship’s carpenter. He met him on the way, and he told Joseph that water was coming in. Fast.

Joseph hurried to the mailroom, where he saw the worst. “It was rising rapidly up the ladder and I could hear it rushing in.”

From there, Joseph returned to the bridge to report the state of the mailroom, and was assigned to calculate Titanic’s position for Captain Smith to provide to the Marconi Room, in order to begin distress signaling.

Joseph then worked to prepare the lifeboats for launch, unlacing the covers on the port side himself. It was then, he testified, that he heard someone state that they saw the light of another ship out ahead of them.

He saw it himself: the two masthead lights of a steamship.

At Captain Smith’s behest, Joseph began firing distress rockets, one at a time at five-minute intervals. He informed the British Inquiry that these rockets were the type with which “you see a luminous tail behind them and then they explode in the air and burst into stars.”

COMMISSIONER: Could you see it distinctly with the naked eye?

BOXHALL: No, I could see the light with the naked eye, but I could not define what it was, but by the aid of a pair of glasses I found it was the two masthead lights of a vessel, probably about half a point on the port bow, and in the position she would be showing her red if it were visible, but she was too far off then.

COMMISSIONER: Could you see how far off she was?

BOXHALL: No, I could not see, but I had sent in the meantime for some rockets, and told the Captain I had sent for some rockets, and told him I would send them off, and told him when I saw this light. He said, "Yes, carry on with it." I was sending rockets off and watching this steamer. 

Joseph Boxhall testified at great length about the nature of this light: its color, its distance, and how frequently it was signaled.

The ship—which most have concluded was the SS Californian, and which had been communicating via wireless with Titanic shortly before collision—never came to Titanic’s aid.

The reasons for its negligence are manifold and contested.

The SS Californian, taken on or about April 15, 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Soon thereafter, Joseph was assigned by Chief Officer Wilde to Lifeboat 2. He noted that there were no lights stocked in the boat, and had the presence of mind to bring some green flares along.

Joseph recalled that there were mostly women and children in the boat, three crewmen, and a male passenger “who did not seem to do much.”

Lifeboat 2 was launched on the port side under the supervision of Second Officer Lightoller. So Joseph, following orders, promptly rowed around Titanic’s stern to the starboard side.

I got the crew squared up and the oars out properly and the boat squared when I heard somebody singing out from the ship, I do not know who it was, with a megaphone, for some of the boats to come back again, and to the best of my recollection they said "Come round the starboard side," so I pulled round the starboard side to the stern and had a little difficulty in getting round there.

But Lifeboat 2 did not return. When the boat approached the starboard side as ordered, Joseph sensed suction from Titanic “settling down.”

And so he turned the lifeboat away, until it was about a half-mile out. He stated that he did not witness the final moments of Titanic's submersion.

COMMISSIONER: After she sank, did you hear cries?

BOXHALL: Yes, I heard cries. I did not know when the lights went out that the ship had sunk. I saw the lights go out, but I did not know whether she had sunk or not, and then I heard the cries. I was showing green lights in the boat then, to try and get the other boats together, trying to keep us all together.

Joseph Boxhall’s was the first lifeboat to be picked up by the rescue ship Carpathia, aided by his signaling with the green lights he had brought on during the sinking.

Once he was aboard, he was ordered to the bridge, where he informed the captain of the Carpathia that Titanic had gone under at 2:30am.

Titanic's recovered lifeboats, 1912. Courtesy of the State library of Queensland, Australia.

PUBLIC DOMAIN (NO KNOWN COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS)

Joseph was called before the American Senate Inquiry, in which his insights, while valuable, were communicated with curt words. Once permitted to return home to Great Britain, Joseph also testified--with a notable surplus of patience--at the British Inquiry.

Joseph promptly returned to the sea. Having joined the Royal Navy Reserve already, he was promoted the lieutenant in 1915 during World War I. In 1919, he married, and post-war, was promoted once again to Lieutenant Commander.

Joseph Boxhall was a taciturn sort, and was always reticent to speak about Titanic, but he did agree to be a technical advisor on the 1958 film “A Night to Remember” and even attended the premier.

 In the years that followed, Joseph agreed at last to collaborate with researchers, and also took the above-cited BBC interview.

He passed away five years later, in 1967.

He was the last of Titanic’s deck officers to die.

Joseph Boxhall (far right), photographed with Titanic's other surviving officer Harold Lowe (far left), Charles Lightoller (center), and Herbert Pitman (seated.) Circa 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Per his wishes, Joseph Boxhall’s ashes were scattered at sea at 41° 46’ N, 50° 14’ W: the coordinates he had calculated for Titanic as she sank.

The wreck site sits to the east, about 20 miles away.

Open post

“Let Go the After Fall”: Lead Stoker Frederick Barrett

"Let Go the After Fall": Lead Stoker Frederick Barrett

There isn’t too much information available about Frederick William Barrett’s early years. He was born and baptized in 1883, near Liverpool, England; in 1891, he was noted on the census as a wheelwright, also known as a carman.

It is unknown when exactly Frederick Barrett turned to the sea, although rumor has it that he did so after discovering that his wife was having an affair with another man while he was at work. 

Regardless, he is first discoverable on a crew manifest in 1903, as a fireman aboard the Campania.

The RMS Campania, Fred Barrett's first known vessel. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Fred signed onto Titanic on April 6, 1912, as a lead stoker. Curiously, he was one of two men named “Frederick William Barrett” who were hired onto Titanic as firemen.

Immediately following departure on Wednesday, April 10, Fred received orders alongside about a dozen other firemen to empty out the coal bunker in Boiler Room 6 because of a fire. It took three full days, until Saturday, to get it done.

Fred reported that he noted warping and fire damage in the bulkhead.

When Titanic struck the iceberg on Sunday night, Fred was once again in Boiler Room 6. He was speaking to an engineer named James Helsketh when a bell rang and a red light flashed on; Fred immediately called for the dampers to be shut.

Almost simultaneously, there was an enormous crash and water shot into the boiler room from the ship’s side. Fred and James managed to get into Boiler Room 5 just in time, as the watertight door was descending and about to lock. Then they saw it.

The water was flooding into that room, too.

Fred went back into Boiler Room 6 with another engineer, Jonathan Shepherd, within 15 minutes of the collision, and testified later that the water was already 8 feet high.

All firemen were then ordered to go up top on deck. But Fred was ordered to stay behind.

While he waited with Jonathan and another engineer, the lights extinguished, and Fred was sent to retrieve lamps. 

Shortly thereafter, Fred was ordered by Junior Assistant Engineer Herbert Harvey to lift the manhole cover in order to get at some valves. As this was happening, Jonathan Shepherd ran past, and in the thick steam, did not notice the hole. And he fell in and broke his leg.

Fred and Herbert carried Jonathan away to the pump room to care for him as best they could. 

Soon, the bulkhead between Rooms 5 and 6 buckled, and sea water rushed in. Herbert Harvey screamed an order to Fred: to go up top immediately.

That was the last time Fred, or anyone else, saw Herbert Harvey or Jonathan Shepherd.

Fred climbed a hatchway all the way up to A Deck, and found that there were only two wooden lifeboats still aboard: Lifeboat 13, and Lifeboat 15, both on the starboard side and under the supervision of First Officer William Murdoch.

Fred chose Lifeboat 13.

He later testified that the boat was close to capacity when he literally jumped in, and that a handful of people followed his example. From up above, he heard one of the officers shout that no more should be let in the lifeboat, because the falls would break. Next door, so to speak, Lifeboat 15 also began lowering.

When 13 reached the water, it began drifting due to the water discharged from Titanic’s side.

And it drifted directly underneath Lifeboat 15.

Everyone in Lifeboat 13 shrieked and hollered for those above to stop lowering Lifeboat 15, but they couldn’t be heard. Fred began screaming to the officers up top to “Let go the after fall.”

Lifeboat 15 was bearing down on them and closing the distance fast. Fred scrambled over everyone and dashed to cut through the falls with his knife.

Fred push the boat away within seconds of Lifeboat 15 splashing down beside them.

Lawrence Beesley, who was one of the few men from Second Class to survive, was an occupant of Lifeboat 13 and described the near-disaster as follows. (It should be noted that he mistakes the other lifeboat as No. 14, when it was in fact Lifeboat 15.)

'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- 15 feet, 10 feet, 5 feet, and a stoker and I reached up and touched her swinging above our heads, but just before she dropped another stoker sprang to the ropes with his knife.

'One," I heard him say. 'Two,' as his knife cut through the pulley ropes, and the next moment the exhaust steam has carried us clear while boat no. 14 dropped into the water into the space we had the moment before occupied, our gunwales almost touching.

Written by survivor Lawrence Beesley, as cited in "On Board RMS Titanic: Memories of the Maiden Voyage" by George Behe.

And that is how Fred Barrett saved himself and the approximate 70 other people in Lifeboat 13.

There were so many people in Lifeboat 13 that the gunwale was maybe 6 inches above the water.

Once the lifeboat was clear of Titanic, Fred realized that there was no officer in the boat. And so he took command, despite the fact that he was wearing nothing more on his shoulders than the thin shirt he’d been wearing on duty when the collision occurred.

Q. What officer was in charge?

A. No officer in it. Because I had no clothes I felt myself giving out and gave it to someone else. I do not know who it was.

But after enduring for an hour in the raw chill, Fred became too cold to carry on, and forfeited the tiller to another man.

A woman wrapped Fred Barrett in a cloak, and he fell asleep. Hours later, when the Carpathia was in sight of the lifeboats, those occupants of Lifeboat 13 rowed toward it, all while singing the hymn "Pull for the Shore."

Fred was called before the Senate Inquiry. And in May of 1912, when Senator William Alden Smith, the head of the Inquiry, toured RMS Olympic, he was informed by the captain that “one of [his] stokers” had been on board Titanic. So Fred Barrett was joined by Senator Smith in the boiler rooms to discuss Fred’s firsthand experience.

Fred Barrett went on to marry in 1915, and stayed at sea until the early 1920s. He was widowed after only 7 years of marriage, in 1923.

Fred Barrett died of pulmonary tuberculosis in 1931, at the age of 48. His one surviving child, a son named Harold, was 10 years old.

The other Fred Barrett on board Titanic did not survive the sinking.

SOURCE MATERIAL

Behe, George. "On Board RMS Titanic: Memories of the Maiden Voyage." The History Press, 1912.

https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-survivor/frederick-barrett.html

https://www.titanicinquiry.org/USInq/AmInq18Barrett01.php

Open post

Two New Pennies: Touring Titanic

Two New Pennies: Touring Titanic & the Story of Thomas Millar

The weather was pleasant enough on Wednesday, April 10, 1912.

The region had “a clear night with dry spells; [and] the morning dawned fine with some good spells of sunshine.” Hardly unforeseen in the early springtime, it was still a touch chilly, even in the sunlight.

Titanic had been scheduled to depart at noon. 

Over 900 passengers boarded Titanic that morning, and a skeleton crew had been on board since late March, in preparation for her sea trials. 

This roster included all seven officers—save the newly installed Chief Officer Henry Tingle Wilde, and including the newly former Second Officer David Blair, who had been ousted from the crew to make room for Wilde and had disembarked upon Titanic's docking in Southampton.

But neither the crew nor the passengers were the first to step foot within Titanic.

The ship’s debut had gone all sorts of awry.

Titanic’s maiden voyage had unfortunately already been delayed from its original date of March 20th, owing to her older sister Olympic having sustained damage to her portside propeller shaft in a collision with the H.M.S. Hawke in September of 1911.

Titanic's new departure date of April 10th then found itself in the immediate wake of a prolonged coal miners’ strike, which had begun in February and ended over a month later on April 6, just four days shy of Titanic at last setting sail. 

Furthermore, British transit lines were still severely impacted by the miners’ strike, and along with that came significant shipping delays. 

Titanic had, therefore, not been properly polished on schedule, so to speak, and so her fittings were not complete when they should have been. As Titanic sat docked in Southampton, therefore, she was still in fact receiving her so-called final touches: carpets were still being laid, furniture and potted ferns were still being situated, and in many areas she was still being painted.

Fresh flowers were reportedly brought aboard to mask the pungent scent of the paint and varnish, but it did not seem to help much. For example, Second-Class passenger Winnifred Quick, who was 8 years old when she survived the sinking, recalled that the smell of fresh paint nauseated her so much that on the night of April 14th, her mother had left the door to their room ajar to vent the fumes.

Owing to this delayed work, White Star refrained from the usual publicity-driven grand “Open Day” that it had held for previous vessels, wherein visitors would pay admission to tour the most impressive parts of the new ship, such as the Grand Staircase.

Titanic’s older sister, the RMS Olympic, had successfully hosted such a day back on May 27, 1911, shortly before her sea trials got under way.

Titanic’s crew, however, had done their best.

On Thursday, April 4th, the docked ship was “dressed” in flags and pennants as a “salute” to the people of Southampton in the absence of the tradition Open Day: a veritable "rainbow," wrote Sixth Officer James Moody, that consisted of 220 flags, each of which were set 9 feet apart.

The pageantry remained in place through April 5th, which also happened to be Good Friday.

Titanic had also been unofficially toured by various visitors in both Southampton and its hometown of Belfast, where it had been constructed.

Some of these tourists were illustrious—such as artist Norman Wilkinson, whose painting was hung in the First-Class Smoking Lounge and who Captain Smith was simply too busy to chaperone—and many were unnamed or otherwise covert. 

Per the Belfast News-letter edition dated April 1, 1912, White Star allowed guests of “special invitation” to take a look around the ship on March 30th, shortly before she undertook her sea trials on April 2nd.

“Guests… had the opportunity of inspecting the liner on Saturday last… and naturally this privilege was highly appreciated. The visitors were afforded every possible facility in their tour through the huge vessel.”

Citation Courtesy of the British Newspaper Archive.

Amongst these may have been the children of Thomas Millar.

Thomas Millar was 33 years old in April 1912, and he had labored on both Olympic and Titanic. He’d completed his apprenticeship with Harland & Wolff, and as of the 1911 census, he was noted as a fitter. He reportedly worked to build Titanic’s engines.

Thomas was also a new widower. Three months prior in January 1912, his wife Jennie had died at only 32 years old from pulmonary tuberculosis. Thomas was bereft, and his two young boys were without a mother.

After Jennie passed away, Thomas decided to take to the sea in order to reconstruct life for himself and his sons, named Thomas Jr. And William. He planned to work in New York, or maybe Canada, and carry on with the White Star Line. His sons would be taken care of by their aunt, and sent over in a few months’ time, once Thomas was settled.

So Thomas Millar signed onto Titanic on April 6, 1912, as an assistant deck engineer. It was only his second sea voyage, with the first being a stint on the SS Gothland, which at the time was chartered to the Red Star Line.

And on April 2, 1912, Thomas brought his sons to the dock where Titanic awaited its departure from Belfast.

There, as a special gift, he gave Thomas Jr. and William both two shiny new pennies, and asked them to make a promise: to keep them, until they were reunited. “They are this year’s”, he is reported to have told his boys. “Don’t spend them until I come back. I kept them out of my last wages specially for each of you.”

Later that day, little William Millar watched Titanic pull away from the beach at Boneybefore.

And less than two weeks later, as he played with a paper boat on that same beach, that he saw his older cousin Ella approaching, bearing tragic news.

Thomas Millar died in the sinking. His body, if ever identified, went unrecovered.

The Millar boys, who had only just lost their mother, were now orphaned and impoverished. Thomas Jr. was 11 years old; William was only 5.

They stayed in the custody of their aunt until each were aged 16, supported only by a “pittance” from the funds provided to the surviving families of victims. 

But they, much like their late father, carried on. And neither ever spent their father’s pennies.

Thomas Jr. grew up to work for Harland & Wolff. William, who went by his middle name of Ruddick, became a notable writer and playwright. He died in 1952.

The pennies that Ruddick refused to spend, even as he grew up poor and parentless, now belong to his granddaughter, Susie Millar.

Open post

“I Am Here for Life”: Fifth Officer Harold Lowe

"I Am Here for Life": Fifth Officer Harold Lowe

Harold Godfrey Lowe was born in Wales in 1882, the fourth of eight children. At all of 14 years old, he ran away from home to escape an apprenticeship that his father had destined him for.

I ran away from home when I was about 14, and I went in a schooner. I was in seven schooners altogether, and my father wanted to apprentice me but I said I would not be apprenticed; that I was not going to work for anybody for nothing, without any money.

Well, alright then.

Young Harold Lowe endeavored to get his certificates, then worked for about five years off the West African coast before signing on with the White Star Line.

Even though Lowe had been working at sea for some time and had been on two White Star vessels, these voyages were on Australian routes. As such, Titanic was to be his first transatlantic journey.

He signed on as Fifth Officer, and reported to White Star’s Liverpool offices on March 26, 1912. He then went on to Titanic’s sea trials in Belfast.

Being Fifth, Lowe was considered a junior officer, along with Third Officer Herbert Pitman, Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall, and Sixth Officer James Moody. Unlike his fellow officers, who had all worked together in some capacity before, Lowe was not acquainted with anyone at all.

Lowe was off-duty and in bed on April 14, 1912, when Titanic collided with the iceberg. He stated that he was woken up and informed of it by Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall about 30 minutes after the fact, although Lowe did not remember this particular moment.

It must have been while I was asleep. You must remember that we do not have any too much sleep and therefore when we sleep we die.

Lowe grabbed his revolver and presented on deck to assist First Officer William Murdoch in launching lifeboats on the starboard side. He insisted that it was calm, for the most part; only “little knots” of people here and there.

When reading Lowe’s testimony, it’s clear that Lowe was a very forthright—even terse—man. And he had precisely no patience for nonsense as he worked to the lower the boats.

Within the event of the sinking itself, nowhere is this more apparent than in a conflict he had with J. Bruce Ismay, the Chairman of White Star.

White Star Chairman J. Bruce Ismay, circa 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

It was a very tense point of contention in the Senate Inquiry that would follow the disaster.

Senator SMITH. What did you say to him?

Mr. LOWE. This was on the starboard side. I don't know his name, but I know him by sight. He is a steward. He spoke to me on board the Carpathia. He asked me if I knew what I had said to Mr. Ismay. I said, "I don't know Mr. Ismay. "Well," he said, "you used very, very strong language with him." I said, "Did I?" I said, "I can not help it if I did." He said, "Yes, you did," and he repeated the words. If you wish me to repeat them I will do so; if you do not, I will not.

Senator SMITH. I will first ask you this: What was the occasion for your using this harsh language to Mr. Ismay

Mr. LOWE. The occasion for using the language I did was because Mr. Ismay was overanxious and he was getting a trifle excited. He said, "Lower away! Lower away! Lower away! Lower away!" I said - well, let it be -

Mr. ISMAY. Give us what you said.

Mr. LOWE. The chairman is examining me.

Yeesh.

Lowe went on, at Ismay’s belligerent insistence, to write down and then read out loud the very terrible no-good language he had used.

I told him, "If you will get to hell out of that I shall be able to do something."

…He did not make any reply. I said, "Do you want me to lower away quickly?" I said, "You will have me drown the whole lot of them."

Lowe afterward tried to mitigate, expressing that Ismay was just anxious and trying to help.

While working on Lifeboat 14, Lowe entered into a conversation with Sixth Officer James Moody, and Lowe stated that an officer should accompany the group. Moody deferred to Lowe as the junior-most of the two officers, and insisted that Lowe man the boat, which was about to be lowered away. Moody said he’d take to the next one.

Officer Moody did not survive.

By the time Lifeboat 14 was being lowered, alarm had risen within the crowds. As the vessel descended toward the water, passengers rushed to the edge of the deck, and Lowe fired his pistol three times into the air to ward off some steerage men from jumping down into the boat.

He insisted that his bullets never struck a soul.

Upon reaching the water, Lowe ordered the boat to row approximately 150 yards out from Titanic. He then set to work in corralling four other lifeboats around and lashing them together, to condense the passengers therein and return to the wreck.

Lowe was the only officer to return for survivors.

I herded them together and roped them - made them all tie up - and of course I had to wait until the yells and shrieks had subsided - for the people to thin out - and then I deemed it safe for me to go amongst the wreckage. So I transferred all my passengers - somewhere about 53 passengers - from my boat, and I equally distributed them between my other four boats. Then I asked for volunteers to go with me to the wreck…

Unfortunately, it was done too late. In an effort to avoid the lifeboat being swarmed, they had waited over an hour.

As Lowe maneuvered through the wreckage and corpses, he found only four men alive.

Daylight was breaking by this time, and Lowe perceived the Carpathia steaming ahead in the far distance. He determined then that his lifeboat was fastest, and he rigged the sail. His was the only lifeboat to do so.

Lifeboat 14 (right) approaching the rescue ship Carpathia, with sail up and Fifth Officer Lowe standing. From the George Grantham Bain Collection, courtesy of the library of Congress.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

By and by, he came across Collapsible D and took it in tow.

He then discovered Collapsible A in a far worse condition. It had been washed off deck without the canvas sides pulled up, and the few survivors still alive were standing knee-deep in water, including 21-year-old Richard Norris Williams, the young American tennis player destined for fame.

It was also from Collapsible A that Lowe saved to the only woman to be rescued from the water that night: Mrs. Rhoda Abbott, who had lost both her young sons in the sinking.

Lowe also found three corpses within Collapsible A.

As to the three people that I left on her - of course, I may have been a bit hard hearted, I can not say - but I thought to myself, "I am not here to worry about bodies; I am here for life, to save life, and not to bother about bodies," and I left them…

They were dead; yes, sir. The people on the raft told me they had been dead some time. I said, "Are you sure they are dead?" They said, "Absolutely sure." I made certain they were dead, and questioned them one and all before I left this collapsible.

Harold Lowe’s testimony in the subsequent Senate Inquiry was vital—and not a little uncomfortable.

The surviving White Star officers—Lowe, Second Officer Charles Lightoller, Third Officer Herbert Pitman, and Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall—were of course British citizens, who had been sailing on a British vessel. The men resented being interrogated by the American government, and by men who knew absolutely nothing about seafaring life, to boot.

Titanic's surviving officers, from left to right: Fifith Officer Lowe, Second Officer Charles Lightoller, Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall; seated: Third Officer Herbert Pitman.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

As if that weren’t aggravating enough, the officers were attempting throughout all of this to defend themselves, their dead peers, and their employer. They were livid that these senators, who were ignorant of all maritime terms and protocol, could so easily call their judgments as sailors into question, especially without having suffered the sinking themselves.

And they endured all this in the immediate wake of their own traumas, both physical and mental. Because the Senate Inquiry began a mere four days after Titanic sank, on April 19, 1912.

The reactions of the four surviving officers reflected Britain’s aghast reaction to the American Inquiry in its entirety.

The British press portrayed Senator William Alden Smith of Michigan, who had spearheaded the entire shindig, as a thoroughly ignorant ass. His questioning was misguided and redundant, and often offensive to the witnesses he interviewed.

And to the delight of his countrymen, Harold Lowe let Smith know it, over and again.

"Frequent tilts between Lowe and Smith," a newspaper reported, "enlivened the proceedings."

Illustrations of Senate Inquiry witnesses, inclding Fifth Officer Lowe (lower right). Illustrated by Lous F. Grant for "The Graphic," circa May 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Lowe began his testimony on April 24, 1912.

It got off on the wrong foot, really, when Senator Smith demanded the Lowe sit differently in his chair. Lowe, already vexed at having to testify to begin with, bristled.

The interview hastily degraded as Smith asked inane questions that merited responses from Lowe like, "I could no more tell you now than fly."

Early on in the testimony, Lowe's tone elicited the following from Senator Smith, who clearly found Lowe’s snarky, defensive responses unnecessary. “Let me say this to you, Mr. Lowe: Nobody is on trial here, and this is not a court; this is an inquiry.”

This helped nothing. The two men bickered frequently.

But their most memorable exchange is easily this.

Senator SMITH. Do you know what an iceberg is composed of?

Mr. LOWE. Ice, I suppose, sir.

The room broke with laughter.

And it did again, when Senator Smith asked about the nature of temperature. Lowe is reported to have over-enunciated his already curt reply.

Senator SMITH. What was the temperature between Southampton and the place of the accident?

Mr. LOWE. The temperature, sir?

Senator SMITH. Exactly. Do you know whether it was cold, or whether it was warm? Was it warm when you left Southampton?

Mr. LOWE. Yes; it was nice weather. I should say it would be about 48.

Senator SMITH. Above zero?

Mr. LOWE. Forty-eight degrees.

Senator Smith also interrogated Lowe about his alcohol consumption, even when Lowe professed himself a teetotaler. All because someone whispered to Senator Smith that Lowe might have been drunk that night.

Lowe's father had been an alcoholic, so he took grave offense to this suggestion. Per contemporary reports, he became flushed and was "extremely angry and spoke the words with some heat."

Senator SMITH. Are you a temperate man?

Mr. LOWE. I am, sir. I never touched it in my life. I am an abstainer.

Senator SMITH. I am very glad to have you say that.

Mr. LOWE. I say it, sir, without fear of contradiction.

Senator SMITH. I am not contradicting you, and I congratulate you upon it; but so many stories have been circulated one has just been passed up to me now, from a reputable man, who says it was reported that you were drinking that night.

The whole thing was such a tense affair that Senator Smith reprimanded Lowe on multiple occasions, chiding him for responding with information that he deemed irrelevant—when in truth, Smith's questions were ignorant, confusing, and often, plainly absurd.

A satirical cartoon of Senator William Alden Smith titled "The Importance of Being Earnest" by David Wilson. Illustrated for "The Graphic" in April 1912.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

In contrast, audiences found Lowe irreverent and delightful, and he had many favorable reviews.

He even had fangirls. No, really.

But once Lowe had departed, another survivor's testimony put him in a more negative light; she called his language in the lifeboat "blasphemous" and stated that he must have been drunk to be so profane.

People immediately came forward to defend him against the condemnation, including Rhoda Abbott, who said point-blank that if it hadn't been for Lowe, she would have been dead. "It would have been impossible," she said, "for an officer to show more courtesy and many of the criticisms that have been made against this man are very unjust."

Another survivor, Irene Harris, proclaimed him "the real hero of Titanic."

Harold Lowe's reputation went untarnished. The Senate's Sergeant at Arms, Sheriff Joe Bayliss, spoke thusly of him.

I have never prided myself upon being a prophet, but of this I am positive: When the Titanic disaster has become a matter of history, Harold G. Lowe will occupy the hero's place.

© As cited in "Titanic Valour: The Life of Fith Officer Harold Lowe" by Inger Sheil, 2012.

Harold Lowe returned to the mariner life, serving in the Royal Navy Reserve during the First World War and returning to private ships thereafter.

He also volunteered his home as a sector post during the Second World War and served as an Air Raid Warden.

As an ARW, Lowe ensured blackout protocol was observed, soundeded sirens, and generally safeguarded, evacuated, rescued, and sheltered citizens. A job, I think, that Titanic uniquely suited him to perform.

He died in 1944 of hypertension at the age of 61.

Open post

“Here, There, and Everywhere”: Chief Designer Thomas Andrews

"Here, There, and Everywhere": Chief Designer Thomas Andrews

As a child, Thomas Andrews, Jr., was fond of horses and beekeeping. He was a competitive cricket player.

And of course, he really enjoyed boats.

Thomas Andrews. Taken on July 7, 1911.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Thomas, who often was called “Tommie”, was 16 years old when he was granted a privileged apprenticeship at Harland & Wolff in 1889. This was convenient, since his uncle was none other than Lord William Pirrie, partner of the firm.

Though Thomas's parents were still, of course, required to pay for the opportunity.

Lord William Pirrie's office at Harland & Wolff, where Thomas Andrews undoubtedly spent time. Taken by Robert John Welch for Harland & Wolff.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

During this five-year apprenticeship, Thomas’s daytime hours were spent working in various departments, including the cabinetmakers and draughting office, throughout the firm. And at night, he attended technical college.

In late 1894, he took a proper job at the shipyard; in 1907, he became the managing director of the Draughting Office. Good news, that, as he was engaged to be married.

At the time, Thomas was engaged to Helen Reilly Barbour, who he called Nellie. Apparently, he had proposed to her rather abruptly back in 1906, according to a remorseful letter he sent to her on March 25 of that year. "My dear Nellie," he wrote, "I cannot tell you how much it grieves me to feel that I frightened or gave you any annoyance last night."

Nellie clearly forgave him for his impulsivity, though, and they married in 1908. They had a daughter, nicknamed Elba because of her initials, in 1910.

Thomas with his wife Nellie and daughter Elba. Taken November 29, 1910.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

So it was in 1907, after having been promoted, that Thomas began a new project: a line of triplet luxury liners for the White Star Line, beginning with the R.M.S. Olympic.

The draughting office. Taken by Robert John Welch for Harland & Wolff.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Now by the time of this well-earned promotion, "Tommie" was an extremely popular guy in the yard.

Vera Morrison, who is Nellie's daughter from her second marriage, recounted a story her mother had told her of Thomas’s popularity at Harland & Wolff.

He told Nellie when they were driving out of the shipyard one day together that all the workers who were coming out were his mates. He was so very popular and dearly loved, I think, by so many people.

This anecdote goes hand-in-hand with a biography of Thomas Andrews by Shan Bullock, which was published in 1912.

He would share his lunch with a mate, toil half the night in relief of a fellow-apprentice who had been overcome by sickness, or would plunge gallantly into a flooded hold to stop a leakage. “It seemed his delight,” writes a foreman, “to make those around him happy. His was ever the friendly greeting and the warm handshake and kind disposition.” Such testimony is worth pages of outside eulogy, and testimony of its kind, from all sorts and conditions, exists in abundance.

Despite his esteem, tenure, and status at the shipyard, some of Thomas’s suggestions for the White Star superliners—including a minimum of 46 lifeboats and watertight bulkheads reaching up to B Deck—went unheeded.

Deck plans of the R.M.S. Titanic, as used for reference in the Senate Inquiry.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Thomas had been on the maiden voyages of the Adriatic, Oceanic, and Olympic, so the choice to sail on Titanic was routine--so much so that Chief Baker Charles Joughin had a customary loaf of bread made especially for him at the start of each journey.

None of this is to say that Thomas wasn’t enthused about his newest ship. He wrote the following to Nellie while in Southampton.

The Titanic is now about complete and will I think do the old Firm credit tomorrow when we sail.

Henry Etches, a steward who had also worked on Olympic, attended to Thomas’s needs on board, taking him “some fruit and tea” and helping him to dress in his evening wear every night.

“That would be about a quarter or 20 minutes to 7, as a rule,” Etches said. “He was rather late in dressing.”

By all accounts, Thomas spent his time roaming all about the gargantuan ship looking for improvements to be made. He always took down the minutest of details in his notebook, such as an excess of screws in the stateroom hat hooks and the color of the red tiling on the promenade deck being just a touch too dark.

Etches testified to as much at the American inquiry. When asked by Senator Smith if Mr. Andrews had been busy and worked nights, Etches replied as follows.

He was busy the whole time… He had charts rolled up by the side of his bed, and he had papers of all descriptions on his table during the day… He was working all the time, sir. He was making notes of improvements; any improvements that could be made… during the day I met him in all parts, with workmen, going about. I mentioned several things to him, and he was with workmen having them attended to. The whole of the day he was working from one part of the ship to the other… I happened to meet him at different parts of Deck E more often than anywhere else.

According to Etches, he also knew that Thomas visited the boiler rooms, as he saw the suit that he wore when visiting the boilers discarded on Thomas’s bed.

Thomas’s perfectionism and meticulous attention to detail, however, should not be taken as an implication that he was not pleased with Titanic on the whole. He is reported to have said to first-class survivor Albert Dick, whom Thomas had befriended on board, “I believe her to be nearly as perfect as human brains can make her.”

Thomas routinely worked into the late hours, and is reported to have been awake and working at the time of the collision with the iceberg. Immediately thereafter, he was witnessed taking emergency tours of the ship. Per survivor Albert Dick, as reported in Shan Bullock’s biography of Thomas Andrews:

He was on hand at once and said that he was going below to investigate. We begged him not to go, but he insisted, saying that he knew the ship as no one else did and that he might be able to allay the fears of the passengers. He went.

Steward James Johnstone reported that while he was in the dining saloon, he saw Mr. Andrews run down toward the Boiler Room, followed by Captain Smith.

Johnstone said that while he was stuffing four oranges in his pockets, Thomas resurfaced. Johnstone followed him down to E-Deck, where he watched him descend further still to the mail rooms.

When he peered after Thomas running down the stairwell, he saw water flooding in.

Thomas, who was without a hat and had an insufficient coat for the ocean night-chill, was also witnessed personally seeing to getting passengers to wear their lifebelts and enter lifeboats throughout the entire sinking.

Jack Thayer wrote in his account that he and his parents were directly approached by Thomas.

We saw, as they passed, Mr. Ismay, Mr. Andrews and some of the ship’s officers. Mr. Andrews told us he did not give the ship much over an hour to live. We could hardly believe it, and yet if he said so, it must be true. No one was better qualified to know.

Excerpt from "The Sinking of the S.S. Titanic" by Jack Thayer.

Jack's encounter is hardly unique. Given Thomas’s famed congeniality and his apparent omnipresence on the ship, he was highly esteemed by many passengers and was often stopped for a comforting word or further information about what was really going on. He makes appearances in many survivor accounts.

The testimony of Mr. Etches at the Senate Inquiry sheds light on Thomas’s calm but urgent direction to the stewards, as well as attests to his overwhelming concern for the passengers.

[I saw Mr. Andrews at] 20 minutes past 12. He stopped me. I was going along B Deck, and he asked had I waked all my passengers… Mr. Andrews then told me to come down on C Deck with him, and we went down the pantry staircase together. Going down he told me to be sure and make the passengers open their doors, and to tell them the lifebelts were on top of the wardrobes and on top of the racks, and to assist them in every way I could to get them on, which I endeavored to do.

We walked along C Deck together. The purser was standing outside of his office, in a large group of ladies. The purser was asking them to do as he asked them, and to go back in their rooms and not to frighten themselves, but, as a preliminary caution, to put the lifebelts on, and the stewards would give them every attention. Mr. Andrews said: "That is exactly what I have been trying to get them to do," and, with that, he walked down the staircase to go on lower D Deck. That is the last I saw of Mr. Andrews.

Stewardess Mary Sloan likewise was awed by Thomas’s calm and determined selflessness, despite the fact that his face “had a look as though he were heart-broken”.

She said, “He was here, there, and everywhere, looking after everybody… thinking of everybody but himself.”

Stwardess Annie Robinson’s report likewise speaks to Thomas’s drive to protect those on board. After asking her to open up all the unoccupied rooms and distribute their lifebelts and blankets, as well as to make sure all the ladies had left their rooms, he gently chided her for not wearing her own lifebelt. Per the biography of Thomas Andrews written by Shan Bullock, their exchange went like this.

“Did I not tell you to put on your life-belt. Surely you have one?”

She answered, “Yes, but I thought it mean to wear it.”

“Never mind that,” said he. “Now, if you value your life, put on your coat and belt, then walk round the deck and let the passengers see you.”

“He left me then,” writes the stewardess, “and that was the last I saw of what I consider a true hero and one of whom his country has cause to be proud.”

All of his bravery and pro-activity is belied by perhaps the most famous of all Titanic’s oft-called Last Sightings: that of Thomas Andrews, standing mute, dazed, and lifebelt-less at the fireplace of the First-Class Smoking Room.

Starboard view of the First-Class Smoking Room on Olympic. Thomas Andrews was encountered by the fireplace in Titanic's identical room.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

This comes from First-Class Steward John Stewart, who was one of two stewards charged with the Verandah Café. Per the Bullock biography, Stewart’s encounter went thusly.

[Stewart] saw him standing along in the smoking room, his arms folded over his breast and the belt lying on a table near him, "Aren't you going to have a try for it, Mr. Andrews?"

He never answered or moved. "Just looked like one stunned."

Thing is, this wasn’t the last sighting of Thomas Andrews.

And it was never purported to be.

While Thomas was indeed seen in the Smoking Room, the timeline for this particular Last Sighting is just plain off. Stewart stated that he saw Mr. Andrews only minutes before he took to Lifeboat 15, which left the ship at 1:40a.m. The ship did not sink until 2:20a.m.

It’s a heartbreaking moment for sure, but it was never set forth as Thomas’s last moments alive.

In truth, Bullock states directly thereafter that Thomas was seen on deck during Titanic' final few minutes; he was throwing deck chairs and anything else to hand overboard before being washed off the deck. And as per Mess Steward William Fitzpatrick and disclosed by the authors of “On a Sea of Glass,” he was last witnessed being washed off the bridge alongside or nearby Captain Smith.

Thomas's body was never recovered.

On April 19, 1912, the Andrews family in Belfast received the telegram they’d dreaded.

Interview Titanic’s officers. All unanimous Andrews heroic until death, thinking only safety others. Extend heartfelt sympathy to all.

He was 39 years old.

Open post

“When Picked Up Out of the Sea”: First-Class Barber Augustus Weikman

"When Picked Up Out of the Sea": First-Class Barber Augustus Weikman

Augustus Henry Weikman was Philadelphia-born in 1860, and aged 52 when he boarded the RMS Titanic. He and his wife, Mary, had wed in 1884. They had four living children.

Augustus worked as a barber for First-Class passengers, and signed on to work on Titanic directly from his same position on the Olympic. He was evidently very glad for his luck in being assigned to the maiden voyage, as he stated in a telegram to his wife from Southampton.

Augustus Weikman.

PUBLIC DOMAIN (photo taken prior to 1923)

Augustus had been working for the White Star Line since 1892, and he had the distinction of being the oft-reported sole American White Star employee on Titanic.

Mr. Weikman's seniority and skill had distinguished him among the elite passengers of First Class. He reportedly had an excellent rapport with his regular clients, and enjoyed talking about the stock market with Philadelphia millionaire George D. Widener, and even J.P. Morgan. It was reported by the Cleveland Plain Dealer in its April 19, 1912, issue that old J.P. would let no other man attend to him whilst traveling at sea.

J.P. Morgan, circa 1910.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

The First-Class barbershop was located only a little ways off the after Grand Staircase, on C-Deck.

It was a pretty nice setup for its specialized services: installed with two swivel chairs and matching sinks, as well as a leather waiting bend and a marble counter. For a shilling, the dapperest of passengers would get a shave, a shampoo, and hairdressing. That shilling, along with any tips paid by happy customers, made for a nice paycheck for Augustus.

The Aft Grand Staircase on R.M.S. Olympic.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

The barbershops on Titanic—plural, because there was Second-Class counterpart to the first—also served as little souvenir shops.

It was here that passengers could purchase postcards, tobacco, pens, flags, wallets, chocolates, as well as necessary items such as collars and combs, and a whole array of bric-a-brac, all boasting the White Star logo.

Strung from the ceiling were plenty of little trinkets, including hats, dolls, and penknives.

It’s been speculated that teddy bears might have also been available, as they were quite popular at the time and peer liners such as the rescue ship Carpathia had them available for sale.

Since there was no “stock list,” so to speak, of which sundries were kept in these shops, it’s a lot of reasonable speculation.

The Second-Class barbershop on R.M.S. Olympic. Taken for the White Star Line in the late 1910s.

PUBLIC DOMAIN (Taken prior to 1923)

Very few souvenirs from Titanic’s First-Class barbershop exist, but those that have survived include few engraved spoons, a hat ribbon with “R.M.S. Titanic” on it, and a pin cushion that Fr. Francis Browne bought for his niece while on board from Southampton to Queenstown.

It is a lifebuoy with the Union Jack, the American Flag, and "Titanic" on the ring. In the letter that accompanied it, Fr. Browne wrote that the little gift was “not beautiful, but it may be useful.”

Oh, painful irony.

Match tin souvenir from the R.M.S. Olympic, circa 1911. Courtesy of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

The First-Class barbershop was only open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., but Augustus was evidently a night owl, because he testified in his affidavit to the Senate on April 24, 1912, that he was chilling in the barbershop upon Titanic’s collision with the iceberg at 11:40 p.m.

For note, this affidavit is contrasted by Augustus’s report to the North American on April 20, 1912, in which he spun a much more dramatic yarn.

“I had closed my shop," he continued, "and was taking a turn on the promenade. Looking through the windows I could see the passengers in the main saloon playing cards and reading. Suddenly, I was startled to hear the hoarse voice of a lookout command “Port your helm!"

There was a dead silence for a moment and then I felt the vessel lurch slightly and heard the side plates of the ship wrench and scrape. The bell in the engine room then clanged out the signal for reversing the engine, and I knew that we had struck something.

Augustus said that it was only a “slight shock,” but he never the less immediately made his way to A-Deck.

He met Thomas Andrews along the way. When Augustus asked what the damage report was, Thomas is reported to have replied, “My God, it’s serious.”

Augustus made his way to the First-Class gymnasium and found John Jacob Astor and George Widener standing at leisure together, watching men hit at a punching bag. When Augustus suggested to Mr. Widener that he should put on a lifevest, Mr. Widener laughed at him.

"What sense is there in that?" Widener is claimed to have replied. "This boat isn't going to sink."

Augustus later saw the same two men standing together on the deck after they had bid farewell to their wives. This is the last known sighting of either Astor or Widener.

John Jacob Astor, circa 1909.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Augustus spent the sinking assisting women and children into lifeboats, reportedly alongside White Star Chairman J. Bruce Ismay, whose conduct during the sinking--id est, saving himself--Augustus later defended with vehemence.

Because, according to Augustus, "the lifeboats offered no opportunity for the savings of a humble barber," he at some point took the time to go change his clothes and grab a pair of gloves. He said he didn't want to ruin his new uniform.

Augustus appears to have recounted the details of his own rescue a little differently in every contemporary journalistic retelling, but the basics go something like this: he seems to have been washed off his feet by the vertical rising of the deck, and was submerged—possibly against the railing alongside a dozen deckchairs all tethered together.

The Camden Post Telegram reported the following in its May 15, 1912, issue.

The crisis came while I was aiding in getting loose the last collapsible boat," said [Weikman]. "All at once the bow of the Titanic dipped down into the ocean about 500 feet and the stern reared itself in the air about 350 feet. No person under deck at this time had a possible chance to escape, and all on deck were hurled into a jumble in the center of the boat. I was covered with ropes, timbers and chains and while endeavoring to extricate myself could hear the shrieks, yells and moans of the dying. Finally I got loose except for a rope fastened about my foot. This gave me considerable trouble, but I finally got free and began to swim away from the ship.

I had not gone more than fifteen feet when there was an explosion on the boat and I was hurled about 100 feet away from her with a lot of the ship's appliances falling about me. In the wreckage were a dozen or so deck chairs tied together. This fell near me and saved my life.

 

When Augustus resurfaced, he climbed on board the nearby deckchairs and used them as a raft. He stated that if he had hauled himself entirely aboard that the entire thing would have been submerged, so his feet and legs were dangling off of it.

Augustus stated that, while the deck chairs were literal life-savers, that they had struck him when he was thrown into the air. He believed that the blunt force he sustained from them did some damage to his spine.

He saw a lifeboat in the near distance and paddled his way to it with only his hands and his bottom half dragging in the water, because he realized that he would be more likely to be saved the closer he was to it.

As he got closer, it’s reported that someone aboard called out, “Gus, is that you?”

The lifeboat had looked crowded from afar, but when he finally approached, he was surprised to find the opposite. Augustus realized that the crowd had thinned because the lifeboat was several inches underwater and barely floating, so every time the craft lurched, people were thrown into the water and lost to hypothermia.

There were a number of people clinging to ropes on the side as well; when Augustus expressed his surprise that they did not try to pull themselves up and aboard, he found out that they were frozen dead.

There is little discoverable information about which lifeboat this was, but its submersion has led many Titanicophiles to conclude that it had to be Collapsible A, which had been washed off the deck before its side could be pulled up.

Collapsible A was finally approached by Fifth Officer Harold Lowe in Lifeboat 14, and its few survivors suffered from extensive damage to their legs and feet, which Weikman likewise sustained.

Because of the extent of his injuries, the severe cold, and a friendly hit of brandy, Augustus is reported to have passed out and brought up onto Carpathia barely conscious.

Titanic survivors waiting to board Carpathia. From the George Grantham Bain Collection, courtesy of the Library of Congress.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

And according to his grandchildren, he was so deeply unconscious and his pulse so faint that he was mistaken for dead.

They say that Augustus's effects, including his watch, were stripped from him, and he woke up in a body bag in the makeshift morgue on board Carpathia. As the story goes, he literally kicked and screamed his way out until someone came to his aid.

While I cannot find any primary source for this story, it is never the less borne out by the fact that Augustus was originally not listed among Titanic survivors.

In fact, his wife was reportedly in the midst of being consoled by neighbors on April 17, 1912, when the miraculous telegram arrived: Augustus Weikman was, against all odds, alive.

Per the Trenton Evening Times, which published an interview with Augustus taken when the Carpathia docked in New York City, “Weikman showed the effects of the terrible experiences through which he had just passed, and at time his talk was almost incoherent.”

Augustus Weikman took quite some time to recover from his injuries; he was confined to a wheelchair, and it was feared he might lose his feet. But he made a full recovery, and his great-grandson has stated that, according to family lore, Augustus used a poultice of chicken manure to regain circulation in his legs.

When Augustus returned to his home in Palmyra, New Jersey, he was celebrated as a hero; his neighbors are reported to have lined the street just to shake his hand as he was wheeled inside his house.

August kept some invaluable mementos of the sinking, including a one-dollar bill that he’d found in his pocket once rescued. He inscribed it thusly.

“This note was in my pocket when picked up out of the sea by ‘S.S. Carpathia’ from the wreck of ‘S.S. Titanic’ April 15th, 1912/A.H. Weikman, Palmyra, N.J.”

As inscribed by Augustus Weikman on the dollar bill he found in his pocket after surviving the sinking of Titanic.

In July of 1912, upon hearing of fundraising for a Titanic memorial by Mrs. John Hays Hammond, Augustus Weikman sent the inscribed dollar bill, enclosed in a letter recounting his experience.

Augustus also treasured his pocket watch, almost lost when he was given up for dead on board the rescue ship, if not for the fact that it was engraved with his initials.

It was stopped forever, as he said, on 1:50 a.m.

Weikman had sworn off the sea in April, but by August of 1912, he was offered the position of Admiral's Barber on Titanic's elder sister Olympic once he had recovered from his injuries. He chose instead to sign on to the Lusitania, which was reported by the New York Times on August 6, 1912.

[Augustus Weikman] is unable to content himself ashore. Mr. Weikman said after his experiences that he would never go to sea again, but he has arranged to resume his old position as chief barber, and will sail from New York on the Lusitania to-morrow.

Mr. Weikman has been traversing the ocean for a number of years, and says that when on land he is like a fish out of water, and it is impossible for him to be content except on the ocean.

"After all,' he said to-night, "an accident like the Titanic's may never occur again, and I think I will risk it, anyway."

Augustus Weikman died on November 7, 1924, in Pennsylvania.

Open post

“Too Frozen and Numb to Think It Strange”: The ‘Unsinkable’ Violet Jessop & Arthur John Priest

"Too Frozen and Numb to Think It Strange": The 'Unsinkable' Violet Jessop & Arthur John Priest

Incredibly, Titanic had two famously unlucky lucky passengers, both of them crew.

Stewardess Violet Jessop, whose name those with even a passing interest in Titanic will probably recognize, was born in Argentina to Irish parents; after her father died when she was 16, the whole family relocated to England. Her mother was reportedly a ship stewardess, and at 21, Violet set out to become one.

But this turned out to be difficult. Violet was a beautiful girl, and prospective employers considered this a flaw because most stewardesses were middle-aged and matronly. She clearly found a job eventually--and received at least three marriage proposals during her time at sea.

Violet Jessop during her service in the First World War.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Violet was 24 years old when she boarded Titanic. She had been reticent to go, as she was happy on Titanic's older sister, Olympic--despite having been on board when it collided with the H.M.S. Hawke on September 20, 1911. But Violet's friends had insisted that Titanic would be "a wonderful experience," so she relented, taking a horse-drawn carriage out to Southampton.

Violet spent time on board doing her job, though she did make reference in her memoirs to being friends with ship violinist Jock Hume.

She also wrote with great affection for Thomas Andrews, White Star's Chief Designer, "Often during our rounds we came upon our beloved designer going about unobtrusively with a tired face but a satisfied air. He never failed to stop for a cheerful word, his only regret that we were 'getting further from home.'"

Thomas Andrews, of whom Violet Jessop wrote with much admiration in her memoirs.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Violet was "comfortably drowsy" when the collision occurred, and went up on deck. She stood on deck with other stewardesses and was eventually asked to enter a lifeboat--possibly Lifeboat 16, which means she was on port-side, Second Officer Charles Lightoller's jurisdiction--to set an example to those female passengers who were afraid to leave Titanic. And here is where yet another Titanic mystery arises.

Violet claimed that as the lifeboat was being lowered, an unnamed officer dropped a wriggly bundle down to her. "'Here, Miss Jessop. Look after this baby.'" Violet pressed the mystery baby to her throughout the night, until she boarded Carpathia.

I was still clutching the baby against my hard cork lifebelt I was wearing when a woman leaped at me and grabbed the baby, and rushed off with it, it appeared that she put it down on the deck of the Titanic while she went off to fetch something, and when she came back the baby had gone. I was too frozen and numb to think it strange that this woman had not stopped to say 'thank you'

While this might present as terribly good drama, the story of this baby has never been verified.

To date, there is no record of an untended baby in Lifeboat 16 aside from 5-month-old Assed Thomas, who was given to First-Class passenger Edwina Troutt to look after.

Now, Edwina herself did say there were "not less than a dozen babies" on board. But that should not be taken to mean that if there were that many "babies" on board, they were all , in fact, infants--children were commonly referred to as babies.

In spite of the Titanic disaster, Violet was somehow undeterred from the sea and White Star. And so, in 1914, Violet Jessop was aboard on Titanic's younger sister, the RMS Britannic, which has been converted to a hospital ship to aid in the First World War. Violet was working as a Nurse of the Red Cross.

H.M.H.S. Britannic, Titanic's younger sister, which became a medical vessel during the Great War.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

On November 21, 1916, an explosion throttled Britannic as she cruised the Aegean; speculation still swings between a torpedo and an underwater mine. Whichever it was, she started taking on water. Fast.

Britannic sank in just 55 minutes--compare that to Titanic's 2 hours and 40 minutes, and Titanic broke in half. But because of the Titanic's tragedy, Britannic's casualty count was far smaller at only thirty deaths.

And yet, Violet was almost one.

Of course, if the officers had waited for orders from the bridge, the death toll may well have been zero. This is because the officers started launching lifeboats without orders to do so, while the ship was still moving. So when the lifeboats, filled with people, hit the water, the propellers sucked them in.

The result was horrific carnage.

Violet Jessop was in one of these fated lifeboats, but jumped overboard to avoid the slaughter. She was still pulled by the water, and struck her head on the ship's keel. She "surfaced surrounded by severed corpses and wounded men." She always got fairly severe headaches after Britannic, and only found out why later in life, when a doctor informed her that she'd fractured her skull.

Illustration of the sinking of H.M.H.S. Britannic.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

Violet finally took the hint and retired from sea... in 1950, after continuing to work for multiple liners. it appears that at some point, she was briefly married.

By the end of her extraordinary life, she lived alone in a small cottage in England.

Now, Violet claimed that it was a dark and stormy night. And then, quite mysteriously, her telephone rang. When she answered, a female voice asked her if she was in fact the same Violet Jessop who had rescued a baby on Titanic.

When Violet answered in the affirmative, the woman laughed and said, "I was that baby," and then hung up. When her biographer suggested it was a prank, Violet insisted she had never relayed the story to anyone before that point.

Violet died at the age of 71 from cardiac failure.

But here's the thing that's even more remarkable than a White Star employee who had survived the whole Olympic class: she was one of two.

The other was named Arthur John Priest.

He was a stoker, also called a 'fireman,' on Titanic. And he's far less well-known than Violet Jessop, probably because he did not write memoirs or sell his story.

Arthur John Priest boarded on April 6, 1912, and like Violet, was 24 years old. And also like Violet, Arthur had been on board Titanic's elder sister Olympic when it rammed the H.M.S. Hawke in 1911.

Damage sustained to R.M.S. Olympic in its collision with H.M.S. Hawke.

PUBLIC DOMAIN

So little is known about Arthur's survival on Titanic, though he's most often been associated with Lifeboat 15. As a fireman, it's remarkable that he survived, given the difficulty many stokers faced in attempting to reach the boat deck from the bowels of the ship, as well as the minimal clothing the men wore while working beside the boilers.

In 1915, Arthur John Priest got married. And in 1916, he found himself among fellow Titanic survivors: Violet Jessop, of course, and Archie Jewell, who was a lookout.

As fate would have it, Arthur was also in one of the doomed Britannic lifeboats. He described it in gruesome detail in a letter home.

Most of us jumped in the water but it was no good we was pulled right in under the blades...I shut my eyes and said good bye to this world, but I was struck with a big piece of the boat and got pushed right under the blades and I was goin around like a top...I came up under some of the wreckage ... everything was goin black to me when someone on top was struggling and pushed the wreckage away so I came up just in time I was nearly done for ... there was one poor fellow drowning and he caught hold of me but I had to shake him off so the poor fellow went under.

Arthur John Priest then went on to survive the sinkings of the Alcantara on Leap Day, 1916, and then the S.S. Donegal on April 17, 1917, the latter ship taking the life of double-survivor Archie Jewett.

With a total of five shipwrecks now associated with his name, The Unsinkable Fireman was more or less forced to retire from maritime life, as everyone refused to sail with him.

Arthur died of pneumonia in 1937. He was 49 years old.

SOURCE MATERIAL

Posts navigation

1 2 3
Scroll to top