The Princess Alice Disaster

by Joan Lock

  With infinite patience and never failing promptitude and decision, Captain Grinstead would thread his tortuous course through these thousand and one obstacles in the growing darkness – never hurrying or losing his temper, yet always making way.4

  One thing the captain wasn’t, Mr Townsend Mayer assured readers, was a man to take risks just so as to make good time. What’s more, he loved his job and his ship and was unhappy when away from either.

  Abraham Deness, the Master of the Bonetta who had gone to the rescue of survivors, had already (at the end of his statement to the press) given his opinion as to who was to blame for the accident:

  It is my firm opinion that if the Bywell Castle had not ported her helm she would have cleared the Princess Alice, and if the latter had not been there she must have gone ashore … It was just dark, but moonlight – the moon was just showing itself. The Princess Alice was keeping her course in a proper direction, and had no chance of avoiding a collision than by keeping the course she was going in. If the Bywell Castle had not ported her helm she must have gone clear. There was nothing else in her way to the northward for three-quarters of a mile.5

  A letter from Mr Mead Corner offered all kinds of technical data but emphasized that the public should clearly understand that the Princess Alice was only a little steamer – and he gave her tonnage and measurements to prove his point. It was necessary to be very explicit on this he wrote, because, ‘to the inexperienced, these “saloon” steamers appear large boats’. However, her length was twenty-eight times her depth, which made her grossly top heavy ‘thus the leverage exercised by passengers rushing from one side to another is immensely increased.6 Imagine Blondin7 on his rope with a sack of coals on his head’.

  ‘A Flag Officer’ agreed with ‘Marine Insurance’ that collisions were incessant on the river and, given the traffic, it was almost impossible it should be otherwise. Like Mr Townsend Mayer, the Flag Officer penned a vignette of river life at that time:

  Steamers of all sizes and descriptions, sailing vessels, lighters, barges, and pleasure boats throng the reaches from before daylight till long after dark. Add to this fog and mists and, not least, the smoke from factory chimneys, and bear in mind that scarcely any obstacle will stop the traffic on the river. The rule of the road as applied on the open sea is almost useless.8

  In any case, he added, boats like the Princess Alice were not calculated to stand even a slight collision with a heavier vessel.

  F.C. told The Times that he had commanded a ship around the Cape of Good Hope thirty-four times but, having seen an overcrowded passenger steamer leaving London Bridge for Woolwich, declared that he would not cross the river on her. ‘Observer’ claimed that ‘on crossing London Bridge yesterday I saw the Albert Edward [sister ship to the ill-fated Princess Alice] just about leaving Swan Pier literally swarming with passengers. Suspended aft, hung one small boat, capable of holding some dozen persons at the most. Comment is superfluous’.9

  Suggestions for improving safety included semaphore on ships so they could indicate their intentions, lighting the Thames with electricity at night and electric lights fixed to the mastheads.

  Naturally, the subject of life-saving, once a collision had occurred, also exercised many of the correspondents.

  Passengers should not be allowed to go onboard a river steamer without a life-belt, declared the Flag Officer. This did not have to be cumbrous or unsightly. Indeed, a neat and handy cork belt fitted round the waist and over the shoulders would be quite adequate to support a person in the water for hours ‘and in the case of a female, it might, doubtless, be made ornamental or attractive if desired’. He, himself, had been frequently on the river for years and had always worn an ordinary coat but one fitted with an air-tight lining ‘that I could inflate it in a few seconds with my own breath’.10

  Other life-saving notions included: a number of life preservers fixed on simple posts fore and aft which would float freely when the vessel was submerged; airtight seating on board which could then be used to support people in the water; and folding rafts recently trialled in Ostend Harbour.

  Some survivors chipped in by explaining to reporters why they had not drowned. Mrs Dee and her child were kept afloat by her very stiff, quilted dress which was padded with wool, while Mrs Mary Brent, one of the only two adult survivors of the Bible party, claimed she owed her life to the buoyancy of her alpaca dress and petticoat.

  One of The Times letter writers was concerned that there might be children left indoors when their parents had gone down river who might now be left to die undetected

  While many children were lost, quite a few had been saved whilst their parents were missing. Finding out who young children were was sometimes a problem. The coroner’s officer, PC Gilham, interrupted inquest proceedings to read out a letter from Dr Rice of Plumstead Infirmary, stating that a little boy who had originally given his name as Freddy Brady was now saying he was Freddy Lambert. Constable Gilham hoped the press would notice this.

  The Daily News reported:

  Perhaps one of the most painful scenes is that which has been experienced at No.17 Ferndale-Road, the residence of Mr Elliott. He and his wife were amongst the excursionists, leaving their children at home. Our Correspondent went to the address indicated as above by a police-officer, and a child said, ‘Sir, there is nobody in; but we see that there have been 120 persons saved, and surely father and mother will be home soon. I hope they will; don’t you, sir?’ and the child burst into a fit of grief.11

  Many kind souls offered to adopt orphaned children. Miss Cayley of St Leonard’s said she would take an orphan girl, as would Mrs Horsfall of Liverpool and Mrs Hope of Birkenhead. Mrs Ladds of Tunbridge Wells offered to take six children for six months. The East End Juvenile Mission (Dr Barnado’s Home) promised to admit the orphaned children into their homes at Ilford or Stepney Causeway, as did St Saviours Home for Boys at Woolwich. The National Orphan Home at Ham Common said they would take two girls.

  The Princess Alice disaster continued to dominate the newspapers, not only with the lists, narratives of survivors and statements of witnesses, but the subject percolated the news generally. Anything that could be linked was picked up and placed alongside, particularly any excursion steamer accidents or near misses.

  All this dicing with death came as no surprise to the Ipswich Journal. According to them it was all down to steam, as they exclaimed dramatically:

  The excursion season has set in with its usual accompaniments of human slaughter. The French observation of our national character, that we take our amusements solemnly, will soon have a terrible meaning. Each year sees its long ghastly roll of victims and, if we do not amend, a man who goes on a holiday excursion, or for an Autumnal holiday, will feel that he travels with his life in his hands.

  The awful accident on the Thames on Tuesday evening is a warning and a lesson to us. We are a little accustomed to boast of the power over time and space which the use of steam has conferred on us, and here we are reminded with terrible emphasis that there is a limit to our powers.12

  They went on to discuss who was to blame for the collision but questioned whether, in any case, a crowded passenger steamer should be allowed to navigate the busy waters of the Thames in the dark? The Ipswich Journal’s opinions about the dangers of steam and potentially lethal excursions did not prevent them advertising, in the same issue, the Great Eastern Railway Company’s Excursions for the following week to Brighton, London and elsewhere.

  Readers were also informed which areas of the capital city had so far been most affected by the tragedy: south London (Walworth, Camberwell and Brixton), Islington, Whitechapel and Marylebone. Those passengers from the last, it was pointed out, would be of ‘the superior working classes’. Woolwich, too, of course suffered quite heavily since many of the crew came from that area.

  Then there was the news that the Princess Alice had been insured for £8,000 and that shares in the London Steamboat Company had taken a tumble. One generous s
hareholder correspondent to The Times suggested that one per cent of the next dividend should be handed over for the benefit of ‘those poor children who had lost their parents due to the sad calamity’.13

  A rather curious side note to this obsession with the subject was an item in the Daily News of Saturday 7 September titled ‘The Foreign Press and the Thames Disaster’ which began with the rather petulant remark: ‘From foreign journals it appears that the frightful catastrophe in The Thames has awakened an amount of interest abroad that is seldom shown in British affairs’. Apparently, the ‘earliest, fullest and most accurate accounts’ had appeared in the Paris Figaro. They went on to list the other French newspapers that had given the subject proper attention, as well as those of Belgium and Germany.

  With so much frantic newsgathering, not to mention the copying of each other’s survivors’ narratives, it is not surprising some mistakes or even some journalistic embroidery took place. Thus, Mr Robert Haines, the double bass player in the Princess Alice band wished to make it known to readers of the Daily News and Morning Post that the statement that he had been ‘kept afloat by his instrument’ was incorrect. He had, however, suffered severely from the effects of ‘the immersion’ and had since been an in-patient at the Charing Cross Hospital.14

  Similarly, although having appeared on the missing list, Mr and Mrs Wickens wanted it known that they had not been involved in ‘that lamentable catastrophe’. Neither (‘despite rumours’) had Mr Boncy, the Princess Alice restaurant contractor, been on board. He had intended to go, but had been too late.15 However, there was reason to believe that Mr Buncy, his uncle who was the chief steward, had been.

  Mr Henry Drew was particularly angry about this press licence. He wrote to the Daily News:

  Sir: In your today’s impression you publish a statement purporting to be mine, sent by an anonymous correspondent, which my friends will, I am sure, from its style and phraseology, detect as an invention. As to the facts themselves: In the first place, I could not possibly have stated that I sat abaft the paddle-boxes, knowing that I was on the fore-station deck the whole of the journey from Sheerness. I did certainly, and most providentially, cling to a piece of board; but not a single thought had I of any other poor creature taking it away from me, nor had I, indeed, any opportunity of hearing or seeing any of the hundreds struggling round me after the ill-fated vessel had sunk. Surely the bare facts of my case, without embellishment, are sufficiently appalling to satisfy the public crave for harrowing details; and I feel, as a private individual, I have a right to expect from the press some respect for my feelings in this my calamity. As you have published the statement from an anonymous correspondent, I trust you will give this the same publicity.

  Yours faithfully,

  HENRY DREW

  The Hale, Tottenham16

  His ‘calamity’ was that he had lost his three little girls taken on an outing while their brothers had the treat of going to a cricket match at Lord’s. His situation was to become even more appalling on the day after his letter was published when his wife, who had been rescued, died from ‘exhaustion and a broken heart’.

  At times like these the newspapers were the only way many people had of acquiring urgent information so, despite the mischief wrought by some of the over-enthusiastic reporting, some of it may have turned out to be of assistance to survivors such as the Leaver family of Lambeth. The father, being a strong swimmer, had been able to tread water until he was picked up and taken to Woolwich where he arrived bewailing the loss of his whole family. Meanwhile, the son, 19-year-old Edward, had gotten out from the saloon on impact and had also been saved, but landed in another place and dashed home to tell his mother that all the others had perished. Sadly, however, the rest of the Leavers, 18-year-old Benjamin, 15-year-old Albert and 14-year-old Ruth, all drowned.

  Notes

  1. Coroners’ Records COR/PA13,14,15, 22 and The Times 5 and 9 October 1878.

  2. The Times, 5 September 1878 and Gavin Thurston, The Great Thames Disaster, p.49.

  3. Morning Post, 7 September 1878.

  4. Daily News, 7 September 1878.

  5. Standard, 9 September 1878.

  6. The Times, 5 September 1878.

  7. Famous French tight-rope walker.

  8. The Times, 6 September 1878.

  9. The Times, 7 September 1878.

  10. The Times, 6 September 1878.

  11. Daily News, 5 September 1878.

  12. Ipswich Journal, 10 September 1878.

  13. The Times, 6 September 1878.

  14. Morning Post, 7 September 1878.

  15. Daily News, 7 September 1878.

  16. Ibid.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Shameful Sunday

  The red-painted rail of the Princess Alice’s starboard paddle box had become visible at low tide and when the approximate position of the wreck was established by probing with poles a diver was sent below to examine it.

  In spite of being hampered by the muddiness of the water he was able to report that the pleasure steamer had broken into three parts; the shorter forepart pointing downstream, the larger after-part upstream and the boilers in between. The roof of the forward saloon was missing but was found two days later downstream at Rainham.

  Chillingly, the diver reported that the cabins appeared to be full of bodies standing erect and packed together by the doors through which they had obviously been trying to escape.

  Raising the wreck was not going to be easy. The Board of Trade had never found themselves in the face of a task so difficult claimed, the Standard on 9 September 1878: ‘Vessels of twice the size and many times the weight are handled briskly, and lifted with ease … but these hulls are complete, the motions of which can be calculated and the chains adjusted to an easy principle’. It was a new thing, they claimed, even for Mr Wood, the experienced Surveyor of Moorings, to whose office the lifting of the wreck was entrusted, to deal with a steamer from which the boilers and machinery had rolled out, and which lay in two huge pieces.

  But it seemed that one of the fragments, the forepart (which was about 90 ft long) was not going to be such a problem after all. On Friday night it was announced that it would be beached at low tide at around 2 a.m. The operation commenced under the dim and flickering light of lanterns and war rockets provided by the military who had been practising for this purpose on Plumstead Common.

  But practical matters often take longer and are more complicated than one expects and to forecast them ahead of time is tempting providence. It had been hoped that two chains, suspended from the lighter, would be sufficient to raise the forepart, but these proved inadequate and caused the lighter to swing around dangerously. Another chain was affixed before the water slacked down, then, a couple of hours later, a fourth chain was passed under while a diver went down to adjust it. The lifting was again attempted, very slowly and carefully until, finally, at around 8 a.m., there was a sudden extra straining on the chain, then a slackening at the bows of the big lighter and, to a cry of ‘Here she comes!’, she was lifted from the bed of the river.

  Very slowly, still submerged, she was towed from her spot in the middle of the channel towards the south riverbank, where she was deposited in five fathoms of water. This left the river a little safer for the early morning traffic of large, outward-bound steam and sailing vessels. One of these was the Bywell Castle, but without her captain who remained in London. A few minutes later the Metis steamboat passed carrying a pleasure party and, on seeing the part-revealed wreck, their band played a funeral march.

  As the tide gradually receded, the crumpled bridge and twisted rails came into view, then the battered funnel. At this stage, only one body could be extricated, so it was decided to wait until the next tide, when it was hoped the forepart could be lifted to shallower waters.

  ‘It was a lovely morning’, the Standard’s special correspondent reported incongruously. ‘The great buildings on the north shore loomed shadowless and pale, like painted things washed in with a fl
owing brush. Even the bleak south coast had a softness of colour which broad daylight would disperse, and the river stream was warm with dappled tint. It was a morning too beautiful for our work, and the ill-omened wreck we had to view took on a shape more dismal – if that could be’, he finished lamely, his poetic muse suddenly deserting him.

  The activity had caused bodies to surface and numerous watermen were probing the site in the hope of raising more. After the wreck was beached, they augmented their income by offering trips to see the wreck at a shilling a head. ‘All the water thieves in London are out’, commented a police inspector,1 his men even having to guard the ship’s boiler, the metal being a great temptation.

  The Thames Police endeavoured to keep order, aided by the fact that they had use of a chartered steamboat rather than their usual rowing boats. The want of such a vessel had been long felt, commented the Standard, ‘but this affair has compelled the police to adopt what should have been only an ordinary thing for the officer in charge of a river like the Thames’. But the rapidly increasing flow of bodies meant the extra police drafted in were needed for many other duties at the dockyard, such as the search for a sufficient number of large-size shells to take the increasingly bloated corpses.

  The harbourmaster, Captain Fitzgerald, had assumed some police duties. He sent out boats to patrol the north (Essex) shore for bodies that were then brought back to Woolwich. He also patrolled back and forth in the conservators’ yacht, keeping an eye out for theft from corpses and preventing watermen taking more than one body onboard at a time. Stacking them, which they preferred to do, caused them damage. He towed the loaded boats back to his vessel, the Heron, making sure the faces of the dead were covered with linen rags for decency’s sake.