Voices from the Titanic

by Geoff Tibballs

  Jeffery Mr W.

  Jouannault, Mr G.

  Martin, Miss M.

  Marsico, Sig. G.

  Mattman, Mr A.

  Maugé, Mr P.

  Monoros, Mr J.

  Monteverdi, Mr G.

  Nannini, Sig. F.

  Pachera, Mr J.

  Pedrini, Sig. A.

  Peracchio, Sig. A.

  Peracchio, Sig. S.

  Perotti, Sig. A.

  Phillips, Mr W.

  Piatti, Mr L.

  Piazzo, Sig. P.

  Price, Mr E.

  Ratti, Sig. E.

  Ricaldone, Sig. R.

  Rigozzi, Sig. A.

  Rotta, Sig. A.

  Rousseau, Mr P. (Chef)

  Saccaggi, Sig. G.

  Salussolia, Sig. G.

  Sesea, Sig. G.

  Testoni, Sig. E.

  Tietz, Mr C.

  Turvey, Mr C.

  Urbini, Sig. R.

  Valvassori, Sig. E.

  Vicat, Mr A.

  Villvarlange, Mr P.

  Vine, Mr H.

  Vioni, Sig R.

  Vogelin-Dubach, Mr H.

  Zanetti, Mr M.

  Zarracchi, Sig. L.

  POSTAL CLERKS

  Gwinn, Mr W.

  March, Mr J.

  Smith, Mr J.

  Williamson, Mr J.

  Woody, Mr O.

  BARBERS

  Klein, Mr H.

  Weikman, Mr A. H.

  White, Mr A.

  ELECTRICIANS

  Allsop, Mr A.

  Chisnall, Mr G.

  Ervine, Mr A.

  Fitzpatrick, Mr H.

  Jupe, Mr H.

  Kelly, Mr W.

  Middleton, Mr A.

  Sloan, Mr P.

  CLERKS

  Ashcroft, Mr A.

  Campbell, Mr D.

  Duffy, Mr W.

  King, Mr W.

  Rice, Mr R. J.

  Rous, Mr A.

  Turner, Mr G.

  WINDOW CLEANERS

  Harder, Mr W.

  Sawyer, Mr R.

  DISCHARGED CREW

  The following signed on as crew members but, for various reasons, were not on board the Titanic at the time of collision:

  Blake, Mr C.

  Bowman, Mr F. T.

  Brewer, Mr B.

  Burrows, Mr W.

  Carter, Mr F.

  Coffey, Mr J.

  Dawes, Mr W.

  Dawkins, Mr P.

  Di Napoli, Mr E.

  Ettlinger, Mr P.

  Fish, Mr B.

  Fisher, Mr R.

  Haveling, Mr A.

  Holden, Mr F.

  Kilford, Mr P.

  Manby, Mr A.

  Mew, Mr W.

  Penney, Mr V.

  Sartori, Mr L.

  Shaw, Mr J.

  Sims, Mr W.

  Slade, Mr A.

  Slade, Mr B.

  Slade, Mr T.

  GLOSSARY

  TERMS

  Abaft– Nearer the stern than.

  Aft– Towards the stern of a ship.

  Amidships – In the middle of a ship.

  Berth – A ship’s place at a wharf. Also a sleeping-place on board ship.

  Bow – The fore-end of a ship.

  Bridge – The raised platform from where a ship is steered.

  Bulkhead – The upright partition dividing a ship’s watertight compartments.

  Collapsible – A boat with canvas sides, allowing for easy storage.

  C.Q.D. – The international maritime distress call, standing for ‘Come Quick, Danger.’

  Crow’s nest – A shelter for lookouts fixed to the mast-head of a ship.

  Davit – One of a pair of cranes used for hanging or lowering lifeboats.

  Dry-dock – A basin from which water has been pumped out in order to allow the building or repair of a ship.

  Falls – The ropes of hoisting-tackle, used in lowering lifeboats.

  Forward – Towards the bow.

  Gunwale – The upper edge of a boat’s side.

  Hull – A ship’s frame.

  Knot – Unit of speed equivalent to one nautical mile per hour. There are 6,080ft in a nautical mile.

  Painter – Rope attached to the bow of a boat for making it fast to a ship or a stake.

  Poop – The after-most and highest deck on the stern of the ship.

  Port – The left-hand side of a ship, looking forward.

  Slipway – The artificial slope down which a ship is launched.

  Starboard – The right-hand side of a ship, looking forward.

  Steerage – The area of a ship allocated to the passengers paying the cheapest fares. In the case of the Titanic, this was third-class.

  Stern – The rear part of a ship.

  Stoker – A member of the ship’s crew who tends the furnace.

  Strake – Continuous line of planking or plates from stem to stern of ship.

  Thwart – Oarsman’s bench in a rowing boat.

  Tiller – The lever fitted to the head of a ship’s rudder to aid steering.

  SHIPS

  Amerika – German liner which reported to the US Navy’s Hydrographic Office in Washington at 1.45 p.m. on 14 April that she had passed two large icebergs at 41:27 north 50:8 west.

  Baltic – White Star liner which warned the Titanic of ice at 1.42 p.m. on 14 April.

  Californian – Leyland Line freighter which left Liverpool for Boston on 5 April 1912. Intrigue and speculation continue to surround her lack of response to the stricken Titanic despite being less than 20 miles from the sinking vessel. Did she see, but ignore, the Titanic’s distress rockets and was she the mystery ship seen on the horizon by some survivors? The Californian finally went to the Titanic’s aid just after 6 a.m. – nearly four hours after she went down – but by then it was too late. The Californian – and her Captain, Stanley Lord – were painted as the villains of the piece by both the US and British inquiries. She was sunk by a German submarine in 1917.

  Caronia – Cunard liner journeying east from New York to Liverpool and which was the first to warn the Titanic of ice in the vicinity. The Titanic received the wireless message at 9 a.m. on 14 April even though it had been sent two days previously.

  Carpathia – Mediterranean-bound Cunard liner which, although 58 miles away, sped to the assistance of the Titanic and ferried survivors to New York. Like the Californian, she was sunk by a German submarine during the First World War.

  Frankfurt – German steamer in the area of the sinking but which had difficulty establishing radio contact with the Titanic.

  Mackay-Bennett– Cable ship which set out from Halifax, Nova Scotia, to retrieve the bodies from the sea. Carrying over 100 coffins, she arrived at the scene of the disaster on 20 April 1912. Corpses with distinguishing features were embalmed and brought back to Halifax for identification but those which had deteriorated beyond recognition were weighted into sacks and buried at sea.

  Mesaba – Westbound vessel which reported a number of large icebergs in the area to the Titanic at 9.40 p.m. on 14 April. It was the sixth ice warning given to the Titanic that day and pinpointed the precise location where the Titanic was to meet her doom. Yet because the Titanic’s wireless operator, Jack Phillips, was busy dealing with a backlog of messages, this warning was never delivered to either Captain Smith or the bridge.

  Minia – Cable ship which assisted the Mackay-Bennettin retrieving bodies.

  Mount Temple – Westbound Canadian vessel which was some 49 miles west of the Titanic at the time of the sinking.

  New York – Liner involved in a near-miss with the Titanic as the latter left Southampton on 10 April.

  Olympic – Sister ship of the Titanic, situated about 512 miles west of her at the time of sinking.

  Virginian – Allan liner situated some 170 miles from the Titanic at midnight on 14/15 April.

  PEOPLE AND PLACES

  Abelseth, Olaus – Norwegian-born livestock farmer who had settled in South
Dakota in 1908. In the autumn of 1911 he visited relatives in Norway, returning home on the Titanic. After the sinking he travelled around for a bit before eventually resuming work on his farm. In 1915 he married a Norwegian girl, Anna Grinde, who bore him four children. She lived to be over a hundred (dying in 1978) and he passed away two years later at the age of ninety-two.

  Andrews, Miss Kornelia – A native of Hudson, New York State, where she was one of the managers of the City Hospital, sixty-three-year-old Miss Andrews was returning to the United States on the Titanic with her sister Anna Hogeboom and their twenty-one-year-old niece Gretchen Longley. They boarded at Southampton and travelled first-class. After the sinking Miss Andrews filed a claim for $480.50 against the White Star Line for a variety of lost possessions including fur coats, antique lamps and ‘one velvet hat with ostrich plumes’. She died in December 1913 from pneumonia.

  Andrews, Thomas – The nephew of Lord Pirrie, the principal owner of shipbuilders Harland & Wolff, Belfast-born Andrews left school at sixteen to join the firm as an apprentice. By 1910 he had become managing director of Harland & Wolffwith special responsibility for design. In his final letter to his wife Elizabeth he wrote: ‘The Titanic is now about complete and will, I think, do the old firm credit tomorrow when we sail.’ One of the last sightings of him was sitting in the sinking ship’s smoking room, staring blankly at the wall, his life jacket in front of him. He was thirty-nine.

  Asplund, Mrs Selma – Steerage passenger from Sweden who was emigrating with her family to Worcester, Massachusetts. While Mrs Asplund, six-year-old daughter Lillian and baby Felix all survived their ordeal at sea, husband Carl and sons Gustaf, Oscar and Carl were lost. Mrs Asplund died on 15 April 1964 – the fifty-second anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.

  Astor, Colonel John Jacob – One of the richest men in the world in 1912 with a personal fortune estimated at $87 million. At the age of forty-six, he had scandalized New York society by choosing as his second wife Madeleine Force, who, at eighteen, was younger than his son Vincent. The newlyweds had fled to Egypt to escape the gossip but headed back to New York on the Titanic when Madeleine discovered that she was pregnant. After helping his wife into a lifeboat, he met his fate with great dignity in company with his Airedale terrier, Kitty. In August 1912 Astor’s widow gave birth to a son, whom she named after him.

  Astor, Mrs Madeleine – During the First World War, she married New Yorker William K. Dick (thus relinquishing all claim to the Astor fortune) and had two sons by him, but the union ended in divorce in 1933. That same year she married professional boxer Enzo Firemonte but that marriage lasted just five years before it too ended in divorce. She died in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1940, aged forty-seven.

  Barrett, Frederick – Liverpool-born crew member who had previously served on the New York. As a leading fireman on the Titanic, he earned a monthly wage of £6. 10s. Shortly after testifying to the Board of Trade Inquiry, twenty-eight-year-old Barrett was back at sea working on the Titanic’s sister ship, the Olympic.

  Beane, Edward – Although born in Norwich, England, he worked in New York as a bricklayer before returning to his home town to marry wife Ethel in April 1912. A few days later he returned to New York with his bride on board the Titanic. They travelled second-class and both were rescued in lifeboat No. 13. Mr Beane died in 1948, aged sixty-seven, but his wife lived until 1983, reaching the age of ninety.

  Beesley, Lawrence – Educated at Cambridge, Beesley was given his first teaching post at Wirksworth Grammar School, Derbyshire. By 1912 he was a science master at Dulwich College in south London, and provided the press with one of the most graphic accounts of the Titanic disaster. He died in 1967, aged eighty-nine.

  Bentham, Miss Lillian – One of a party of eleven Americans on their way home from a trip to Europe, she travelled second-class from Southampton, paying £13 for her ticket. After her rescue, she was unable to be met in New York by her family because her brother had contracted typhoid. In 1918 Lillian married John Black. She died in 1977.

  Bishop, Dickinson – Wealthy resident of Dowagiac, Michigan, who was returning to the US after honeymooning in Europe with his second wife Helen. They escaped on the first boat to leave the Titanic and twenty-five-year-old Bishop was there-after the subject of unfounded rumours that he had dressed as a woman to secure his place in the boat. Fortune rarely smiled on them again. The baby that Helen was carrying at the time of the sinking died when just two days old, they were caught up in an earthquake, and then Helen was involved in a car crash from which she never fully recovered. They were divorced in 1916 and she died later that year. He quickly remarried and lived until 1961.

  Bjornstrom-Steffanson, Lt. Mauritz Hakan – A military man as well as being a leading light in the Swedish pulp industry, twenty-eight-year-old Bjornstrom-Steffanson paid £26 11s. for his first-class ticket. He was drinking hot lemonade in the first-class smoking room immediately prior to the collision. He and other survivors later presented an inscribed silver cup to Captain Rostron and medals to each of the 320 members of the Carpathia’s crew in appreciation of their bravery. In 1917 Bjornstrom-Steffanson married Mary Pinchot Eno to whom he had been introduced by fellow Titanic survivor Helen Churchill Candee. They set up home in Manhattan but had no children. He died in 1962, nine years after his wife.

  Bonnell, Miss Caroline – Aged thirty from Youngstown, Ohio, Miss Bonnell travelled on the Titanic with her aunt Lily and the Wick family. She shared cabin C7 with Natalie Wick. Rescued in lifeboat No. 8, among the wreckage in the water she spotted a man’s glove and a baby’s bonnet. She later married and had two children. She died in 1950.

  Boxhall, Joseph – A twenty-eight-year-old from Hull, Yorkshire, Boxhall was the Titanic’s Fourth Officer and the man responsible for calculating the ship’s precise position. He survived the disaster and acted as technical consultant on the making of the 1958 film A Night to Remember. When he died in 1967, his ashes were scattered at the point where the Titanic went down.

  Brayton, George – Minnesota-born professional gambler George Brereton sailed on the Titanic under the alias of ‘Brayton’, presumably to avoid detection. Even on the Carpathia he tried to involve fellow survivor Charles Stengel in a horse-racing scam. Tragedy dogged his later years. Grieving over the death of their son, his wife shot herself dead in Los Angeles in 1922. Twenty years later in the same house, sixty-seven-year-old Brereton took his own life in similar fashion.

  Bride, Harold – Twenty-two-year-old junior wireless operator aboard the Titanic, born in Nunhead, South London. Despite selling his story at the time, he subsequently shunned publicity and went to live in Scotland where he worked as a travelling salesman. He died there quietly in 1956.

  Brown, Miss Edith – A native of South Africa, fifteen-year-old Edith Brown was travelling with her sister and father to Seattle, but was the only survivor. Afterwards she went to live in Cape Town and in 1917 married Frederick Thankful Haisman following a whirlwind, six-week romance. They had ten children. She ended her days in Southampton where she died in 1997.

  Brown, Mrs Margaret Tobin – Born in Hannibal, Missouri, in 1867 to an Irish immigrant family, she married impoverished miner James Joseph Brown in 1886 and, when he struck it rich, she became one of the most prominent citizens of Denver, Colorado. By 1912, however, they were virtually estranged since he did not share her enthusiasm for the high life. She had been holidaying with the Astors in Cairo when she learnt that her first grandchild was ill. So she booked on the first available ship back to the United States – the Titanic. Her heroics in boat No. 6 and her indomitable spirit made her a national figure. She tried to run for Congress, became a keen supporter of women’s rights and in 1932 was awarded the French Legion of Honour. She died in that same year of a brain tumour. Although she has gone down in history as ‘Molly’ Brown, the name was purely a Hollywood invention, The Unsinkable Molly Brown becoming a hit movie starring Debbie Reynolds.

  Buckley, Daniel – Twenty-one-year-old from County Co
rk, he boarded at Queenstown and paid £7 15s. 17d. for his third-class ticket. He survived the Titanic but could not survive the First World War and was killed in service in 1918.

  Buss, Miss Kate – One of a family of seven from Sittingbourne in Kent, Kate worked in a village grocer’s shop owned by her brother Percy. She was going to America to marry her fiancé, Samuel Willis, in San Diego and transported assorted wedding gifts on the Titanic. The couple married later in 1912 and had a daughter Sybil. Kate Buss died in 1972, aged ninety-six.

  Butt, Major Archibald – Hailing from a prominent Augusta, Georgia, family, Archie Buttgraduated from the University of Tennessee in 1888 and went on to work as a journalist in Louisville, Kentucky, and Washington, DC. He joined the United States Army in 1898 as a lieutenant during the Spanish– American War and later became military aide to President Theodore Roosevelt. He held the same post with Roosevelt’s successor, William H. Taft, but by 1912 his health had begun to suffer as a result of the stress caused by the ongoing feud between Roosevelt and Taft. To recuperate, Butt took six weeks’ leave from the White House and went to Europe with his friend, the artist Frank Millet. Before leaving for Europe, Buttmade a will, having apparently been told that he would meet his death on the trip. The return journey was aboard the Titanic. Butt hosted a party in the Café Parisien on the evening of the disaster and went down with the ship. He was forty-five.

  Candee, Mrs Helen Churchill – A fifty-three-year-old New York writer and lecturer (married to Edward Candee), she journeyed alone on the Titanic. Shortly after the collision she gave an antique cameo of her mother to fellow first-class passenger Edward Kent in the belief that he was more likely to survive than her. In the event Kent died and she was rescued. When his body was recovered, the cameo was found on his clothing and returned to Mrs Candee. She eventually died in 1949.

  Cardeza, Mrs Charlotte – A wealthy fifty-eight-year-old Philadelphian who, in her younger days, was a noted yachtswoman (twice sailing around the world) and fearless big game hunter. Married to attorney James Cardeza, she sailed on the Titanic with her son Thomas and maid Anna Ward, both of whom also survived. They brought with them fourteen trunks, four suitcases, three crates and a medicine chest, the contents including seventy dresses, ten fur coats, thirty-eight feather boas, twenty-two hatpins and ninety-one pairs of gloves. She later filed a fourteen-page claim against the White Star Line for loss of property amounting to $177,352.75. She died in 1939.