Practically all of the space on the Titanic below the upper deck was occupied by a steam-generating plant, coal bunkers and propelling machinery. Eight of the fifteen water-tight compartments contained the mechanical part of the vessel. There were, for instance, twenty-four double end and five single end boilers, each 16 feet 9 inches in diameter, the larger 20 feet long and the smaller 11 feet 9 inches long. The larger boilers had six fires under each of them and the smaller three furnaces.
One of the most interesting features of the vessel was the refrigerating plant, which comprised a huge ice making and refrigerating machine and a number of provision rooms on the after part of the lower and orlop decks. There were separate cold rooms for beef, mutton, poultry, game, fish, vegetables, fruit, butter, bacon, cheese, flowers, mineral water, wine, spirits and champagne, all maintained at different temperatures most suitable to each. Perishable freight had a compartment of its own, also chilled by the plant.
COMFORT AND STABILITY
Two main ideas were carried out in the Titanic. One was comfort and the other stability. The vessel was planned to be an ocean ferry. She was to have only a speed of twenty-one knots, far below that of some other modern vessels, but she was planned to make that speed, blow high or blow low, so that if she left one side of the ocean at a given time she could be relied on to reach the other side at almost a certain minute of a certain hour.
One who has looked into modern methods for safeguarding a vessel of the Titanic type can hardly imagine an accident that could cause her to founder. No collision such as has been the fate of any ship in recent years, it has been thought up to this time, could send her down, nor could running against an iceberg do it unless such an accident were coupled with the remotely possible blowing out of a boiler. She would sink at once, probably, if she were to run over a submerged rock or derelict in such manner that both her keel plates and her double bottom were torn away for more than half her length; but such a catastrophe was so remotely possible that it did not even enter the field of conjecture.
LIFE-BOAT AND DAVITS ON THE TITANIC
This diagram shows very clearly the arrangement of the life-boats and the manner in which they were launched.
The reason for all this is found in the modern arrangement of water-tight steel compartments into which all ships now are divided and of which the Titanic had fifteen so disposed that half of them, including the largest, could be flooded without impairing the safety of the vessel. Probably it was the working of these bulkheads and the water-tight doors between them as they are supposed to work that saved the Titanic from foundering when she struck the iceberg.
These bulkheads were of heavy sheet steel and started at the very bottom of the ship and extended right up to the top side. The openings in the bulkheads were just about the size of the ordinary doorway, but the doors did not swing as in a house, but fitted into water-tight grooves above the opening. They could be released instantly in several ways, and once closed formed a barrier to the water as solid as the bulkhead itself.
In the Titanic, as in other great modern ships, these doors were held in place above the openings by friction clutches. On the bridge was a switch which connected with an electric magnet at the side of the bulkhead opening. The turning of this switch caused the magnet to draw down a heavy weight, which instantly released the friction clutch, and allowed the door to fall or slide down over the opening in a second. If, however, through accident the bridge switch was rendered useless, the doors would close automatically in a few seconds. This was arranged by means of large metal floats at the side of the doorways, which rested just above the level of the double bottom, and as the water entered the compartments these floats would rise to it and directly release the clutch holding the door open. These clutches could also be released by hand.
It was said of the Titanic that her compartments could be flooded as far back or as far forward as the engine room and she would float, though she might take on a heavy list, or settle considerably at one end. To provide against just such an accident as she is said to have encountered, she had set back a good distance from the bows an extra heavy cross partition known as the collision bulkhead, which would prevent water getting amidships, even though a good part of her bow should be torn away. What a ship can stand and still float was shown a few years ago when the Suevic of the White Star Line went on the rocks on the British coast. The wreckers could not move the forward part of her, so they separated her into two sections by the use of dynamite, and after putting in a temporary bulkhead, floated off the after half of the ship, put it in dry dock and built a new forward part for her. More recently the battleship Maine, or what was left of her, was floated out to sea, and kept on top of the water by her water tight compartments only.
CHAPTER III
THE MAIDEN VOYAGE OF THE TITANIC
PREPARATIONS FOR THE VOYAGE—VOYAGE—SCENES OF GAYETY— THE BOAT SAILS—INCIDENTS OF THE VOYAGE—A COLLISION NARROWLY AVERTED—THE BOAT ON FIRE—WARNED OF ICEBERGS.
NEVER was an ill-starred voyage more auspiciously begun than when the Titanic, newly crowned empress of the seas, steamed majestically out of the port of Southampton at noon on Wednesday, April 10th, bound for New York.
Elaborate preparations had been made for the maiden voyage. Crowds of eager watchers gathered to witness the departure, all the more interested because of the notable people who were to travel aboard her. Friends and relatives of many of the passengers were at the dock to bid Godspeed to their departing loved ones. The passengers themselves were unusually gay and happy.
Majestic and beautiful, the ship rested on the water, a marvel of shipbuilding, worthy of any sea. As this new queen of the ocean moved slowly from her dock, no one questioned her construction; she was fitted with an elaborate system of water-tight compartments, calculated to make her unsinkable: She had been pronounced the safest as well as the most sumptuous Atlantic liner afloat.
There was silence just before the boat pulled out—the silence that usually precedes the leave-taking. The heavy whistles sounded and the splendid Titanic, her flags flying and her band playing, churned the water and plowed heavily away.
Then the Titanic, with the people on board waving handkerchiefs and shouting good-byes that could be heard only as a buzzing murmur on shore, rode away on the ocean, proudly, majestically, her head up and, so it seemed, her shoulders thrown back. If ever a vessel seemed to throb with proud life, if ever a monster of the sea seemed to “feel its oats” and strain at the leash, if ever a ship seemed to have breeding and blue blood that would keep it going until its heart broke, that ship was the Titanic.
And so it was only her due that as the Titanic steamed out of the harbor bound on her maiden voyage a thousand “God-speeds” were wafted after her, while every other vessel that she passed, the greatest of them dwarfed by her colossal proportions, paid homage to the new queen regnant with the blasts of their whistles and the shrieking of steam sirens.
THE SHIP’S CAPTAIN
In command of the Titanic was Captain E. J. Smith, a veteran of the seas, and admiral of the White Star Line fleet. The next six officers in order of their rank were, Murdock, Ligthttolder, Pitman, Boxhall, Lowe and Moody. Dan Phillips was chief wireless operator, with Harold Bride as assistant.
From the forward bridge, fully ninety feet above the sea, peered out the benign face of the ship’s master, cool of aspect, deliberate of action, impressive in that quality of confidence that is bared only of long experience in command.
From far below the bridge sounded the strains of the ship’s orchestra, paying blithely a favorite air from “The Chocolate Soldier.” All went as merry as a wedding bell. Indeed, among that gay ship’s company were two score or more at least for whom the wedding bells had sounded in truth not many days before. Some were on their honeymoon tours, others were returning to their motherland after having passed the weeks of the honeymoon, like Colonel John Jacob Astor and his young bride, amid the diversions of Egypt or other Old World countries.<
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What daring flight of imagination would have ventured the prediction that within the span of six days that stately ship, humbled, shattered and torn asunder, would lie two thousand fathoms deep at the bottom of the Atlantic, that the benign face that peered from the bridge would be set in the rigor of death and that the happy bevy of voyaging brides would be sorrowing widows?
ALMOST IN COLLISION
The big vessel had, however, a touch of evil fortune before she cleared the harbor of Southampton. As she passed down stream her immense bulk—she displaced 66,000 tons—drew the waters after her with an irresistible suction that tore the American liner New York from her moorings; seven steel hawsers were snapped like twine. The New York floated toward the White Star ship, and would have rammed the new ship had not the tugs Vulcan and Neptune stopped her and towed her back to the quay.
When the mammoth ship touched at Cherbourg and later at Queenstown she was again the object of a port ovation, the smaller craft doing obeisance while thousands gazed in wonder at her stupendous proportions. After taking aboard some additional passengers at each port, the Titanic headed her towering bow toward the open sea and the race for a record on her maiden voyage was begun.
NEW BURST OF SPEED EACH DAY
The Titanic made 484 miles as her first day’s run, her powerful new engines turning over at the rate of seventy revolutions. On the second day out the speed was hit up to seventy-three revolutions and the run for the day was bulletined as 519 miles. Still further increasing the speed, the rate of revolution of the engines was raised to seventy-five and the day’s run was 549 miles, the best yet scheduled.
But the ship had not yet been speeded to her capacity; she was capable of turning over about seventy-eight revolutions. Had the weather conditions been propitious, it was intended to press the great racer to the full limit of her speed on Monday. But for the Titanic Monday never came.
FIRE IN THE COAL BUNKERS
Unknown to the passengers, the Titanic was on fire from the day she sailed from Southampton. Her officers and crew knew it, for they had fought the fire for days.
This story, told for the first time by the survivors of the crew, was only one of the many thrilling tales of the fateful first voyage.
“The Titanic sailed from Southampton on Wednesday, April 10th, at noon,” said J. Dilley, fireman on the Titanic.
“I was assigned to the Titanic from the Oceanic, where I had served as a fireman. From the day we sailed the Titanic was on fire, and my sole duty, together with eleven other men, had been to fight that fire. We had made no headway against it.”
PASSENGERS IN IGNORANCE
“Of course,” he went on, “the passengers knew nothing of the fire. Do you think we’d have let them know about it? No, sir.
“The fire started in bunker No. 6. There were hundreds of tons of coal stored there. The coal on top of the bunker was wet, as all the coal should have been, but down at the bottom of the bunker the coal had been permitted to get dry.
“The dry coal at the bottom of the pile took fire, and smoldered for days. The wet coal on top kept the flames from coming through, but down in the bottom of the bunkers the flames were raging.
“Two men from each watch of stokers were tolled off, to fight that fire. The stokers worked four hours at a time, so twelve of us were fighting flames from the day we put out of Southampton until we hit the iceberg.
“No we didn’t get that fire out, and among the stokers there was talk that we’d have to empty the big coal bunkers after we’d put our passengers off in New York, and then call on the fire-boats there to help us put out the fire.
“The stokers were alarmed over it, but the officers told us to keep our mouths shut—they didn’t want to alarm the passengers.”
USUAL DIVERSION
Until Sunday, April 14th, the voyage had apparently been a delightful but uneventful one. The passengers had passed the time in the usual diversions of ocean travelers, amusing themselves in the luxurious saloons, promenading on the boat deck, lolling at their ease in steamer chairs and making pools on the daily runs of the steamship. The smoking rooms and card rooms had been as well patronized as usual, and a party of several notorious professional gamblers had begun reaping their usual easy harvest.
As early as Sunday afternoon the officers of the Titanic must have known that they were approaching dangerous ice fields of the kind that are a perennial menace to the safety of steamships following the regular transatlantic lanes off the Great Banks of Newfoundland.
AN UNHEEDED WARNING
On Sunday afternoon the Titanic’s wireless operator forwarded to the Hydrographic office in Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia and elsewhere the following dispatch:
“April 14,—The German steamship Amerika (Hamburg-American Line) reports by radio-telegraph passing two large icebergs in latitude 41.27, longitude 50.08.—Titanic, Br. S.S.”
Despite this warning, the Titanic forged ahead Sunday night at her usual speed—from twenty-one to twenty-five knots.
CHAPTER IV
SOME OF THE NOTABLE PASSENGERS
SKETCHES OF PROMINENT MEN AND WOMEN ON BOARD, INCLUDING MAJOR ARCHIBALD BUTT, JOHN JACOB ASTOR, BENJAMIN GUGGENHEIM, ISIDOR STRAUS, J. BRUCE ISMAY, CHARLES M. HAYS, AND OTHERS.
THE ship’s company was of a character befitting the greatest of all vessels and worthy of the occasion of her maiden voyage. Though the major part of her passengers were Americans returning from abroad, there were enrolled upon her cabin lists some of the most distinguished names of England, as well as of the younger nation. Many of these had purposely delayed sailing, or had hastened their departure, that they might be among the first passengers on the great vessel.
There were aboard six men whose fortunes ran into tens of millions, besides many other persons of international note. Among the men were leaders in the world of commerce, finance, literature, art and the learned professions. Many of the women were socially prominent in two hemispheres.
Wealth and fame, unfortunately, are not proof against fate, and most of these notable personages perished as pitiably as the more humble steerage passengers.
The list of notables included Colonel John Jacob Astor, head of the Astor family, whose fortune is estimated at $150,000,000; Isidor Straus, merchant and banker ($50,000,000); J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the International Mercantile Marine ($40,000,000); Benjamin Guggenheim, head of the Guggenheim family ($95,000,000); Henry S. Harper, of the firm of Harper & Bros.; Henry B. Harris, theatrical manager; Major Archibald Butt, military aide to President Taft; and Francis D. Millet, one of the best known American painters.
MAJOR BUTT
Major Archibald Butt, whose bravery on the sinking vessel will not soon be forgotten, was military aide to President Taft and was known wherever the President traveled. His recent European mission was apparently to call on the Pope in behalf of President Taft; for on March 21st he was received at the Vatican, and presented to the Pope a letter from Mr. Taft thanking the Pontiff for the creation of three new American Cardinals.
Major Butt had a reputation as a horseman, and it is said he was able to keep up with President Roosevelt, be the ride ever so far or fast. He was promoted to the rank of major in 1911. He sailed for the Mediterranean on March 2nd with his friend Francis D. Millet, the artist, who also perished on the Titanic.
COLONEL ASTOR
John Jacob Astor was returning from a trip to Egypt with his nineteen-year-old bride, formerly Miss Madeline Force, to whom he was married in Providence, September 9, 1911. He was head of the family whose name he bore and one of the world’s wealthiest men. He was not, however, one of the world’s “idle rich,” for his life of forty-seven years was a well filled one. He had managed the family estates since 1891; built the Astor Hotel, New York; was colonel on the staff of Governor Levi P. Morton, and in May, 1898, was commissioned colonel of the United States volunteers. After assisting Major General Breckinridge, inspector-general of the United States army, he was assigned to
duty on the staff of Major-General Shafter and served in Cuba during the operations ending in the surrender of Santiago. He was also the inventor of a bicycle brake, a pneumatic road-improver, and an improved turbine engine.
BENJAMIN GUGGENHEIM
Next to Colonel Astor in financial importance was Benjamin Guggenheim, whose father founded the famous house of M. Guggenheim and Sons. When the various Guggenheim interests were consolidated into the American Smelting and Refining Company, he retired from active business, although he later became interested in the Power and Mining Machinery Company of Milwaukee. In 1894 he married Miss Floretta Seligman, daughter of James Seligman, the New York banker.
ISIDOR STRAUS
Isidor Straus, whose wife elected to perish with him in the ship, was a brother of Nathan and Oscar Straus, a partner with Nathan Straus in R.H. Macy & Co. and L. Straus & Sons, a member of the firm of Abraham & Straus in Brooklyn, and has been well known in politics and charitable work. He was a member of the Fifty-third Congress from 1893 to 1895, and as a friend of William L. Wilson, was in constant consultation in the matter of the former Wilson tariff bill.
Mr. Straus was conspicuous for his works of charity and was an ardent supporter of every enterprise to improve the condition of the Hebrew immigrants. He was president of the Educational Alliance, vice-president of the J. Hood Wright Memorial Hospital, a member of the Chamber of Commerce, on one of the visiting committees of Harvard University, and was besides a trustee of many financial and philanthropic institutions.
Mr. Straus never enjoyed a college education. He was, however, one of the best informed men of the day, his information having been derived from extensive reading. His library, said to be one of the finest and most extensive in New York, was his pride and his place of special recreation.
J. BRUCE ISMAY
Mr. Ismay was president and one of the founders of the International Mercantile Marine. He had made it a custom to be a passenger on the maiden voyage of every new ship built by the White Star Line. It was Mr. Ismay who, with J.P. Morgan, consolidated the British steamship lines under the International Mercantile Marine’s control; and it is largely due to his imagination that such gigantic ships as the Titanic and Olympic were made possible.
The Sinking of the Titanic Page 2
