Voices from the Titanic

by Geoff Tibballs

  We were afloat in the lifeboat from about 12.30 Sunday night until five o’clock Monday morning. Although we were the first boat to leave the Titanic, we were about the fourth picked up by the Carpathia. The scenes on that little craft adrift in mid-ocean with little hope of rescue were most heartrending. Still the characters of the individuals appealed to me.

  For instance, there was a German baron aboard who smoked an obnoxious pipe incessantly and refused to pull an oar. The men were worn out with the work, and I rowed for considerable time myself. There was a little French aviator in our boat, Pierre Maréchal, who never took his monocle from his eye all the time we were on the water, but he did assist in the rowing.

  Whenever a light, however small, was flashed in a lifeboat, those in the other drifting crafts were given false hopes of rescue. After we had been afloat for several hours without food or water and with everyone suffering from the cold, I felt certain we should all perish. I took off my stockings and gave them to a little girl who hadn’t as much time to dress as I had.

  When the day broke and the Carpathia was sighted, there were indescribable scenes of joy. After we had pulled alongside the rescue ship, many of the women were lifted aboard in chairs, tied to a rope. I was sufficiently composed to climb the ladder alongside to the deck.

  Those on board the Carpathia did everything in their power for our comfort. They shared everything with us and the captain of that boat was not like Captain Smith of the Titanic. You didn’t see him at fashionable dinners. He was always on duty.

  Mrs Lucian Smith of Huntington, West Virginia, a dear little woman who lost her husband in the disaster, said that before they parted on the deck he told her he had seen Captain Smith at a dinner at 11 p.m. that night. When he left the dining room, the captain was still there, although he may have gone to the bridge before the collision, but it doesn’t seem likely. For some reason, for which we will probably never know, the bulkhead doors refused to work. I watched the men for several minutes endeavouring to turn the screws that would lower them and make the compartments watertight, but they were unsuccessful. It may be that the impact so wrenched them as to throw them out of line.

  (Dowagiac Daily News, 20 April 1912)

  American stockbroker William Thompson Sloper revealed how he owed his salvation to actress Dorothy Gibson, whom he had met that evening over a game of bridge with her mother and Frederick Seward. One American newspaper alleged that Sloper had dressed in women’s clothing to escape the sinking ship, an accusation which he spent the remaining forty-three years of his life denying.

  Standing in the shelter of the ship’s superstructure we helped each other adjust our life preservers while the terrific racket overhead caused by the steam from the ship’s boilers made it almost impossible for us to hear anything we said to each other. Shortly afterwards the First Officer said to the fifty or sixty passengers who in the meantime had collected on the deck, speaking through a megaphone held to his mouth: ‘Any passengers who would like to do so may get into this lifeboat.’ After a few of the passengers standing between us and the First Officer had been handed into the lifeboat by him and his assistants or had balked at getting into it and stepped aside, our time came to decide whether to get into the boat or pull back.

  Every passenger seemed to have taken a firm grip on his nerves. Dorothy Gibson was the only one who seemed to realize the desperate situation we were in because she had become quite hysterical and kept repeating over and over so that people standing near us could hear, ‘I’ll never ride in my little grey car again.’ There was no doubt in Dorothy’s mind what she wanted to do and her mother was satisfied to go along with Dorothy. So with the help of the First Officer, I handed Dorothy down into the bow of the lifeboat. Mr Seward and the junior officer handed Mrs Gibson down after her daughter. Luckily for both Seward and me, Dorothy held onto my hand and demanded that we get into the boat with them. ‘We don’t go unless you do,’ she said. ‘What do you say?’ I asked Seward. ‘What’s the difference? We may as well go along with them.’ Finding seats for ourselves, we sat in the lifeboat designed for sixty-five persons for about ten minutes looking up into the faces of the passengers looking down at us, trying to make up their minds to get in with us. After nineteen people had finally made up their minds and had been lowered into the boat, the First Officer asked for the last time through his megaphone: ‘Are there any more who would like to get into this boat before we lower away?’ When no one else made the move towards him, he gave the signal to lower away. Then began a jerky descent to the surface of the ocean sixty feet below. Fortunately for us the three sailors knew their business, for in a few minutes they skilfully launched our boat without accident.

  The sea was perfectly calm – not even a ripple on the surface. For the next hour and a half we just sat there and drifted farther and farther away. Two hours after our lifeboat was launched, the sailors estimated that we had drifted more than two miles from where the Titanic was sinking. The ship remained until two or three minutes before she sank as brilliantly lighted as she was directly after the accident occurred and all the lights had been turned on. Then suddenly (like the house lights in a brilliantly lighted theatre just before the curtain goes up) all the lights dipped simultaneously to a pale glow. A moment or two later everyone watching in the lifeboats saw silhouetted against the starlit sky the stern of the ship rise perpendicularly into the air from about midship. Then with a prolonged rush and a roar like 10,000 tons of coal sliding down a metal chute several hundred feet long, the great ship went down out of sight and disappeared beneath the surface of the ocean. Then a great cry arose on the air from the surface of the calm sea where the ship had been.

  One of the sailors divided the rugs among the women, some of whom were not too warmly dressed. The night air was very cold and Dorothy felt the cold very much. I used Sunday night as an excuse for not changing at dinner time into my evening clothes. I had been wearing a brand new suit of heavy woollen material. When I went down to get my life preserver I had pulled on a heavy Shetland wool sweater and my winter overcoat. With my life preserver I was cumbersomely dressed so that a few minutes of pulling an oar in the lifeboat threw me into a dripping perspiration. So I was glad to take off my winter coat and put it on Dorothy.

  It took us an hour to awkwardly row our boat to the side of the Carpathia. During the hour we had been rowing the sun came out of the ocean like a ball of fire. Its rays reflected on the numerous icebergs sticking up out of the sea around us.

  Sculptor Paul Chevré made his escape from the Titanic in the company of two other Frenchmen, aviator Pierre Maréchal and cotton dealer Alfred Omont.

  When I got on deck, after the boat seemed to tremble from stem to stern, there was some excitement, but it was among the officers and not among the passengers. The officers were running about the deck insisting that persons get into the lifeboats. I didn’t want to get into a boat, but when the third one [sic] was launched I simply was made to get in. I much preferred staying on the Titanic. In fact, when the officers of the ship insisted on the boats being filled many of the persons drew back and positively refused to obey.

  We were some distance from the Titanic when we discovered in the bright night that she was sinking. Then there was evidently a panic on board. I saw one of the petty officers draw his revolver and fire three shots. It is my impression that he did this to attract attention and also to get the passengers from their state rooms.

  The discipline on the lifeboats and rafts was as good as could be expected. I was off the Titanic before there was any real panic. I will take off my hat to the English seamen who went down with their ship and to the men who manned the lifeboats. Every man of them was a man.

  (New York World, 19 April 1912)

  John Snyder, aged twenty-four, of Minneapolis was travelling first-class with his new wife Nelle. They too left on boat No. 7.

  We were told to get into a boat and we did, although at the time I much preferred staying on the Titanic. It looked s
afe on the Titanic and far from safe in the lifeboat. Before we knew what was being done with us we were swung from the Titanic into the sea and then the boat was so crowded that the women lay on the bottom to give the crew a chance to row.

  We went about 200 yards from the Titanic. We could see nothing wrong except that the big boat seemed to be settling at the bow. Still we could not make ourselves believe that the Titanic would sink. But the Titanic continued to settle, and we could see the passengers plunging about the decks and hear their cries. We moved farther away. Suddenly there came two sharp explosions as the water rushed into the boiler room and the boilers exploded. The explosions counteracted the effect of the suction made when the big boat went to the bottom and it is more than probable that this saved some of the lifeboats from being drawn to the bottom. Following the explosion we could see persons hanging to the side railings of the sinking boat. It is my opinion that many persons were killed by these explosions and not drowned.

  Other passengers were tossed into the water. For an hour after the explosions we could see them swimming about in the water or floating on the lifebelts. We could hear their groans and their cries for help, but we did not go to them. To have done this would have swamped our own boat and everybody would have been lost. Several persons did float up to our boat and we took them on board.

  After we had got aboard the Carpathia, we did not see J. Bruce Ismay until today, when he came on deck for a short time. He seemed badly broken up. You would hardly have known him.

  (US press, 19 April 1912)

  Michigan-born Mrs Lily Potter, a fifty-six-year-old widow, was returning from a European holiday with her daughter Olive and the latter’s old school friend, Margaret Hays. The ladies were due to travel home on board a different ship but, on hearing about the splendour of the Titanic, they switched bookings even though it meant sailing a week later than they had planned. The three first-class passengers climbed into boat No. 7, Miss Hays carrying her pet Pomeranian wrapped in a blanket. Mrs Potter recounted:

  The men took to the oars. The sea was absolutely calm and the stars were out. We kept rowing and suddenly someone cried out, ‘I feel water on my feet!’ We checked and found that the drainage plug was not in. It was quickly put back. I asked, ‘Are there any provisions aboard?’ The men looked and could find none whatsoever.

  After rowing for a quarter of a mile, we stood off and watched the mammoth ship. About fifteen minutes after we left the Titanic, we were drifting in water filled with cakes of floating ice with our eyes on the great vessel we had deserted. Within a short time, we saw the Titanic begin to settle and then we knew that we had been wise to take to the small boats.

  On the Titanic, the crew kept sending up the distress signals. The rockets would roar upward and light the water for miles around. The orchestra kept playing and their music helped to calm us.

  I kept my eyes on the liner and could see six rows of portholes. I looked again and there were five rows, then only four and then I knew she was going down. We who were watching knew that many persons were going to their death when the upper deck neared the level of the water. It was the most tragic sight anyone will ever witness. Scores of men were standing on the decks. All the lights on the Titanic suddenly went out, and she slowly began to disappear from sight. Then came the screams, too horrible for words.

  First-class passenger James R. McGough of Philadelphia related his experiences on boat No. 7.

  They called for the women and children to board the boats first. Both women and men, however, hesitated, and did not feel inclined to get into the small boats, thinking the larger boat was the safer. I had my back turned looking in the opposite direction at that time and was caught by the shoulder by one of the officers who gave me a push, saying: ‘Here, you are a big fellow. Get into the boat.’

  Our boat was launched with twenty-eight people. We, however, transferred five from one of the other boats after we were out in the ocean, which was some time after the ship went down.

  When our lifeboats left the vessel, we were directed to row away a short distance from the large boat, feeling it would be but a short time until we would be taken back on the Titanic. We then rested our oars. But after realizing that the Titanic was really sinking, we rowed away for about half a mile, being afraid that the suction would draw us down.

  Although there were several of us wanting drinking water, it was unknown to us that there was a tank of water and also some crackers in our boat. Having no light on our boat, we did not discover this fact until after reaching the Carpathia.

  (US Inquiry, 1 May 1912)

  BOAT NO. 5

  This was the second boat to be lowered (again from the starboard side) with forty-one on board. The loading of passengers was done by the ship’s Third Officer Herbert Pitman with a little help from the Titanic’s most controversial figure, White Star Line chairman J. Bruce Ismay.

  I stood by No. 5 boat. They would not allow the sailors to get anything, as they thought we should get it again in the morning. In the act of clearing away this boat a man dressed in a dressing gown with slippers on said to me very quietly: ‘There is no time to waste.’ I thought he did not know anything about it at all, so we carried on our work in the usual way.

  It struck me at the time the easy way the boat went out, the great improvement the modern davits were on the old-fashioned davits. I had about five or six men there, and the boat was out in about two minutes.

  I got her overboard, and lowered level with the rail of the boat deck. Then this man in the dressing gown said we had better get her loaded with women and children. So I said, ‘I await the commander’s orders,’ to which he replied, ‘Very well,’ or something like that.

  It then dawned on me that it might be Mr Ismay, judging by the description I had had given me. So I went along to the bridge and saw Captain Smith, and I told him that I thought it was Mr Ismay that wished me to get the boat away with women and children on it. So he said: ‘Go ahead. Carry on.’

  I came along and brought in my boat. I stood on it and said: ‘Come along, ladies.’ There was a big crowd. Mr Ismay helped to get them along, assisted in every way. We got the boat nearly full, and I shouted for any more ladies. None were to be seen, so I allowed a few men to get into it.

  Mr Murdoch said: ‘You go in charge of this boat and hang around the after gangway.’ I did not like the idea of going away at all because I thought I was better off on the ship.

  (US Inquiry, 23 April 1912)

  Passengers included Mrs Catherine Crosby of Milwaukee.

  We got into the lifeboat that was hanging over the rail alongside the deck. Men and women, with their families, got in the boat with us. There was no discrimination between men and women. About thirty-six persons got in the boat with us. There were only two officers in the boat, the rest were all first-class passengers. My husband did not come back again after he left me, and I don’t know what became of him except that his body was found and brought to Milwaukee and buried.

  There were absolutely no lights in the lifeboats, and they did not even know whether the plug was in the bottom of the boat to prevent the boat from sinking. There were no lanterns, no provisions, no lights, nothing at all in these boats but the oars. One of the officers asked one of the passengers for a watch with which to light up the bottom of the boat to see if the plug was in place. The officers rowed the boat a short distance from the Titanic, and I was unable to see the lowering of any other boats. We must have rowed quite a distance, but could see the steamer very plainly. I saw them firing rockets, and heard a gun fired as distress signals to indicate that the steamer was in danger.

  We continued a safe distance away from the steamer, probably a quarter of a mile at least, and finally saw the steamer go down very distinctly. I heard the terrible cries of the people that were on board when the boat went down, and heard repeated explosions, as though the boilers had exploded.

  Our boat drifted around in that vicinity until about daybreak when the Carpathia was
sighted and we were taken on board. We had to row quite a long time and quite a distance before we were taken on board the Carpathia. I was suffering from the cold while I was drifting around, and one of the officers put a sail around me and over my head to keep me warm.

  We received very good treatment on the Carpathia. It was reported on the Carpathia by passengers that the lookout who was on duty at the time the Titanic struck the iceberg had said: ‘I know they will blame me for it because I was on duty, but it was not my fault. I had warned the officers three or four times before striking the iceberg that we were in the vicinity of icebergs, but the officer on the bridge paid no attention to my signals.’ I can not give the name of any passenger who made that statement, but it was common talk on the Carpathia that that is what the lookout said.

  (US Inquiry, 17 May 1912)

  Mrs Annie Stengel of Newark, New Jersey, a first-class passenger travelling with her husband Henry, suffered two broken ribs and was knocked unconscious when Dr Henry Frauenthal and his brother Isaac, spotting empty places, jumped from the deck into the boat as it was being lowered away.

  As I stepped into the boat an officer in charge said: ‘No more; the boat is full.’ My husband stepped back, obeying the order. As the boat was being lowered, four men deliberately jumped into it. One of them was a Hebrew doctor – another was his brother. This was done at the risk of the lives of all of us in the boat. The two companions of this man who did this were later transferred to boat No. 7, to which we were tied. He weighed about 250 pounds and wore two life preservers. These men who jumped in struck me and a little child. I was rendered unconscious and two of my ribs were badly dislocated.