by Tim Maltin
Miss Compton, who lost her brother, I had the pleasure of meeting on the Carpathia. She is still a sufferer from injuries received in the wreck, and yet has been very kind in sending me an account of her experience, from which I cite the following:
As she stood on the rail to step into boat No. 14 it was impossible to see whether she would step into the boat or into the water. She was pushed into the boat with such violence that she found herself on her hands and knees, but fortunately landed on a coil of rope. This seemed to be the general experience of the women. All the passengers entered the lifeboat at the same point and were told to move along to make place for those who followed. This was difficult, as the thwarts were so high that it was difficult to climb over them, encumbered as the ladies were with lifebelts. It was a case of throwing one’s self over rather than climbing over.
Miss Compton from her place in the stern of the lifeboat overheard the conversation between Officer Lowe and another officer, which the former gave in his testimony.
Just before the boat was lowered a man jumped in. He was immediately hauled out. Mr. Lowe then pulled his revolver and said: “If anyone else tries that this is what he will get.” He then fired his revolver in the air.
She mentions the same difficulties, elsewhere recorded, about the difficulties in lowering the boat, first the stern very high, and then the bow; also how the ropes were cut and No. 14 struck the water hard. At this time the count showed 58 in the boat, and a later one made the number 60. A child near her answered in neither of the counts.
“Mr. Lowe’s manly bearing,” she says, “gave us all confidence. As I look back now he seems to me to personify the best traditions of the British sailor. He asked us all to try and find a lantern, but none was to be found. Mr. Lowe had with him, however, an electric light which he flashed from time to time. Almost at once the boat began to leak and in a few moments the women in the forward part of the boat were standing in water. There was nothing to bail with and I believe the men used their hats.
“Officer Lowe insisted on having the mast put up. He crawled forward and in a few moments the mast was raised and ready. He said this was necessary as no doubt with dawn there would be a breeze. He returned to his place and asked the stewards and firemen, who were acting as crew, if they had any matches, and insisted on having them passed to him. He then asked if they had any tobacco and said: ‘Keep it in your pockets, for tobacco makes you thirsty.’ Mr. Lowe wished to remain near the ship that he might have a chance to help someone after she sank. Some of the women protested and he replied: ‘I don’t like to leave her, but if you feel that way about it we will pull away a little distance.’”
Miss Compton’s account corroborates other information about boat No. 14, which we have elsewhere. She was among the number transferred to Engelhardt boat “D.” “I now found myself,” she said, “in the stern of a collapsible boat. In spite of Mr. Lowe’s warning the four small boats began to separate, each going its own way. Soon it seemed as though our boat was the only one on the sea. We went through a great deal of wreckage. The men who were supposed to be rowing—one was a fireman—made no effort to keep away from it. They were all the time looking towards the horizon. With daylight we saw the Carpathia, and not so very long afterwards Officer Lowe, sailing towards us, for, as he had predicted, quite a strong breeze had sprung up. We caught the rope which he threw us from the stern of his boat. Someone in ours succeeded in catching it and we were taken in tow to the Carpathia.”
BOAT NO. 169
No male passenger
Passengers: Fifty women and children—second and third-class.
Crew: Master-at-arms Bailey in charge. Seaman Archer, Steward Andrews, Stewardess Leather, and two others.
Total: 56.
Incidents
E. Archer, A. B. (Am. Inq., p. 645):
I assisted in getting Nos. 12, 14 and 16 out—getting the falls and everything ready and passengers into No. 14. Then I went to No. 16. I saw that the plug was in tight. I never saw any man get in, only my mate. I heard the officer give orders to lower the boat and to allow nobody in it, having fifty passengers and only my mate and myself. The master-at-arms came down after us; he was the coxswain and took charge. When we were loading the boat there was no effort on the part of others to crowd into it; no confusion at all. No individual men, or others were repelled from getting in; everything was quiet and steady. One of the lady passengers suggested going back to see if there were any people in the water we could get, but I never heard any more of it after that. There was one lady in the boat, a stewardess (Mrs. Leather) who tried to assist in rowing. I told her it was not necessary, but she said she would like to do it to keep herself warm. There was one fireman found in the boat after we got clear. I do not know how he came there. He was transferred to another boat (No. 6) to help row.
C. E. Andrews, steward (Am. Inq., p. 623):
Besides these six men I should think there were about fifty passengers.
There was no effort on the part of the steerage men to get into our boat. I was told by the officer to allow none in it. When the officer started to fill the boat with passengers and the men to man it, there were no individuals who tried to get in, or that he permitted to get in. There was no confusion whatever. The officer asked me if I could take an oar. I said I could.
BOAT NO. 210
Only one old man, third-class, a foreigner in this boat.
Passengers: Miss Allen (now Mrs. J. B. Mennell), Mrs. Appleton, Mrs. Cornell, Mrs. Douglas and maid (Miss Le Roy), Miss Madill, Mrs. Robert and maid (Amelia Kenchen). One old man, third-class, foreigner, and family: Brahim Youssef, Hanne Youssef, and children Marian and Georges. The rest second and third-class.
Bade good-bye to wife and sank with ship: Mr. Douglas.
Crew: Fourth Officer Boxhall, Seamen Osman and Steward Johnston, cook.
Total: 25.
Incidents
J. G. Boxhall, Fourth Officer (Am. Inq., p. 240, and Br. Inq.):
I was sent away in Emergency boat 2, the last boat but one on the port side. There was one of the lifeboats (No. 4) lowered away a few minutes after I left. That was the next lifeboat to me aft. Engelhardt boat “D” was being got ready. There was no anxiety of people to get into these boats. There were four men in this boat—a sailorman (Osman), a steward (Johnston), a cook and myself, and one male passenger who did not speak English—a middle-aged man with a black beard. He had his wife there and some children. When the order was given to lower the boat, which seemed to be pretty full, it was about twenty minutes to half an hour before the ship sank. Someone shouted through a megaphone: “Some of the boats come back and come around to the starboard side.” All rowed except this male passenger. I handled one oar and a lady assisted me. She asked to do it. I got around to the starboard side intending to go alongside. I reckoned I could take about three more people off the ship with safety; and when about 22 yards off there was a little suction, as the boat seemed to be drawn closer, and I thought it would be dangerous to go nearer the ship. I suggested going back (after ship sank) to the sailorman in the boat, but decided it was unwise to do so. There was a lady there, Mrs. Douglas, whom I asked to steer the boat according to my orders. She assisted me greatly in it. They told me on board the Carpathia afterwards that it was about ten minutes after four when we went alongside.
After we left the Titanic I showed green lights most of the time. When within two or three ship lengths of the Carpathia, it was just breaking daylight, and I saw her engines were stopped. She had stopped within half a mile or a quarter of a mile of an iceberg. There were several other bergs, and I could see field ice as far as I could see. The bergs looked white in the sun, though when I first saw them at daylight they looked black. This was the first time I had seen field ice on the Grand Banks. I estimate about 25 in my boat.
F. Osman, A. B. (Am. Inq., p. 538):
All of us went
up and cleared away the boats. After that we loaded all the boats there were. I went away in No. 2, the fourth from the last to leave the ship. Boxhall was in command. Murdoch directed the loading. All passengers were women and children, except one man, a third-class passenger, his wife and two children. After I got in the boat the officer found a bunch of rockets which was put in the boat by mistake for a box of biscuits. The officer fired some off, and the Carpathia came to us first and picked us up half an hour before anybody else. Not until morning did we see an iceberg about 100 feet out of the water with one big point sticking on one side of it, apparently dark, like dirty ice, 100 yards away. I knew that was the one we struck. It looked as if there was a piece broken off.
There was no panic at all. There was no suction whatever. When we were in the boat I shoved off from the ship and I said to the officer: “See if you can get alongside to see if you can get some more hands—squeeze some more hands in”; so the women started to get nervous after I said that, and the officer said: “All right.” The women disagreed to that. We pulled around to the starboard side of the ship and found that we could not get to the starboard side because it was listing too far. We pulled astern again that way, and after we lay astern we lay on our oars and saw the ship go down. It seemed to me as if all the engines and everything that was in the after part slid down into the forward part. We did not go back to the place where the ship had sunk because the women were all nervous, and we pulled around as far as we could get from it so that the women would not see and cause a panic. We got as close as we would dare to. We could not have taken any more hands into the boat. It was impossible. We might have gotten one in; that is all. There was no panic amongst the steerage pasengers when we started manning the boats. I saw several people come up from the steerage and go straight up to the Boat Deck, and the men stood back while the women and children got into the boats—steerage passengers as well as others.
Senator Burton: So in your judgment it was safer to have gone on the boat than to have stayed on the Titanic?
Witness: Oh, yes, sir.
Senator Burton: That was when you left?
Witness: Yes, sir.
Senator Burton: What did you think when the first boat was launched?
Witness: I did not think she was going down then.
J. Johnston, steward (Br. Inq.):
Crew: Boxhall and four men, including perhaps McCullough. (None such on list.) Boxhall said: “Shall we go back in the direction of cries of distress?” which were a half or three-quarters of a mile off. Ladies said: “No.” Officer Boxhall signaled the Carpathia with lamp. Soon after launching the swish of the water was heard against the icebergs. In the morning Carpathia on the edge of ice-field about 200 yards off.
Mrs. Walter D. Douglas’s affidavit (Am. Inq., p. 1100):
Mr. Boxhall had difficulty in getting the boat loose and called for a knife. We finally were launched. Mrs. Appleton and a man from the steerage faced me. Mrs. Appleton’s sister, Mrs. Cornell, was back of me and on the side of her the officer. I think there were eighteen or twenty in the boat. There were many who did not speak English. The rowing was very difficult, for no one knew how. We tried to steer under Mr. Boxhall’s orders, and he put an old lantern, with very little oil in it, on a pole, which I held up for some time. Mrs. Appleton and some other women had been rowing, and did row all the time. Mr. Boxhall had put into the Emergency boat a tin box of green lights like rockets. These he sent off at intervals, and very quickly we saw the lights of the Carpathia, whose captain said he saw our green lights ten miles away and steered directly towards us, so we were the first boat to arrive at the Carpathia. When we pulled alongside, Mr. Boxhall called out: “Slow down your engines and take us aboard. I have only one seaman.”
Mrs. J. B. Mennell (née Allen):
My aunt, Mrs. Roberts’ maid, came to the door and asked if she could speak to me. I went into the corridor and she said: “Miss Allen, the baggage room is full of water.” I replied she needn’t worry, that the water-tight compartments would be shut and it would be all right for her to go back to her cabin. She went back and returned to us immediately to say her cabin, which was forward on Deck E, was flooded.
We were on the Boat Deck some minutes before being ordered into the lifeboat. Neither my aunt, Mrs. Roberts, my cousin, Miss Madill, nor myself ever saw or heard the band. As we stood there we saw a line of men file by and get into the boat—some sixteen or eighteen stokers. An officer11 came along and shouted to them: “Get out, you damned cowards; I’d like to see everyone of you overboard.” They all got out and the officer said: “Women and children into this boat,” and we got in and were lowered.
With the exception of two very harrowing leave-takings, we saw nothing but perfect order and quiet on board the Titanic. We were rowed round the stern to the starboard side and away from the ship, as our boat was a small one and Boxhall feared the suction. Mrs. Cornell helped to row all the time.
As the Titanic plunged deeper and deeper we could see her stern rising higher and higher until her lights began to go out. As the last lights on the stern went out we saw her plunge distinctively, bow first and intact. Then the screams began and seemed to last eternally. We rowed back, after the Titanic was under water, toward the place where she had gone down, but we saw no one in the water, nor were we near enough to any other lifeboats to see them. When Boxhall lit his first light the screams grew louder and then died down.
We could hear the lapping of the water on the icebergs, but saw none, even when Boxhall lit his green lights, which he did at regular intervals, till we sighted the Carpathia. Our boat was the first one picked up by the Carpathia. I happened to be the first one up the ladder, as the others seemed afraid to start up, and when the officer who received me asked where the Titanic was, I told him she had gone down.
Capt. A. H. Rostron, of the Carpathia (Am. Inq., p. 22):
We picked up the first boat, which was in charge of an officer who I saw was not under full control of his boat. He sang out that he had only one seaman in the boat, so I had to maneuver the ship to get as close to the boat as possible, as I knew well it would be difficult to do the pulling. By the time we had the first boat’s people it was breaking day, and then I could see the remaining boats all around within an area of about four miles. I also saw icebergs all around me. There were about twenty icebergs that would be anywhere from about 150 to 200 feet high, and numerous smaller bergs; also numerous ones we call “growlers” anywhere from 10 to 12 feet high and 10 to 15 feet long, above the water.
BOAT NO. 412
No man passenger in this boat
Passengers: Mrs. Astor and maid (Miss Bidois), Miss Bowen, Mrs. Carter and maid (Miss Serepeca), Mrs. Clark, Mrs. Cummings, Miss Eustis, Mrs. Ryerson and children, Miss S. R., Miss E. and Master J. B. and maid (Chandowson), Mrs. Stephenson, Mrs. Thayer and maid, Mrs. Widener and maid.
Women and children: 36. (Br. Rpt.)
Crew: Perkis, Q. M., in charge. Seamen: McCarthy, Hemmings,1 Lyons2; Storekeeper Foley and Assistant Storekeeper Prentice1; Firemen: Smith and Dillon1; Greasers: Granger and Scott1; Stewards: Cunningham,13 Siebert.14
Bade good-bye to wives and sank with ship: Messrs. Astor, Clark, Cummings, Ryerson, Thayer, Widener and his son Harry.
Stowaway: 1 Frenchman.
Total: 40. (Br. Rpt.)
Incidents
C. H. Lightoller, Second Officer (Am. Inq., p. 81):
Previous to putting out Engelhardt Boat “D,” Lightoller says, referring to boat No. 4: “We had previously lowered a boat from A Deck, one deck down below. That was through my fault. It was the first boat I had lowered. I was intending to put the passengers in from A Deck. On lowering the boat I found that the windows were closed; so I sent someone down to open the windows and carried on with the other boats, but decided it was not worth while lowering them down—that I could manage just as well from the Boat Deck. Whe
n I came forward from the other boats I loaded that boat from A Deck by getting the women out through the windows. My idea in filling the boats there was because there was a wire hawser running along the side of the ship for coaling purposes and it was handy to tie the boat in to hold it so that nobody could drop between the side of the boat and the ship. No. 4 was the fifth boat or the sixth lowered on the port side.”15
W. J. Perkis, Quartermaster (Am. Inq., p. 581):
I lowered No. 4 into the water and left that boat and walked aft; and I came back and a man that was in the boat, one of the seamen, sang out to me: “We need another hand down here,” so I slid down the lifeline there from the davit into the boat. I took charge of the boat after I got in, with two sailormen besides myself. There were forty-two, including all hands. We picked up eight people afterwards swimming with life-preservers when about a ship’s length away from the ship. No. 4 was the last big boat on the port side to leave the ship. Two that were picked up died in the boat—a seaman (Lyons) and a steward (Siebert). All the others were passengers. After we picked up the men I could not hear any more cries anywhere. The discipline on board the ship was excellent. Every man knew his station and took it. There was no excitement whatever among the officers or crew, the firemen or stewards. They conducted themselves the same as they would if it were a minor, everyday occurrence.
Senator Perkins (addressing Perkis, Symon and Hogg):
All three of you seem to be pretty capable young men and have had a great deal of experience at sea, and yet you have never been wrecked?
Mr. Perkis: Yes, sir.
Senator Perkins: Is there any other one of you who has been in a shipwreck?
Mr. Hogg: I have been in a collision, Senator, but with no loss of life.
