by Senan Molony
But here are the facts: Boxhall didn’t see the red sidelight only very late on, having previously seen a green light as he fired all but one of his entire stock of rockets. The theory conflicts directly with what Boxhall (who should know what he did and did not do) said in his testimony at the US Inquiry (p.933): ‘I saw the masthead lights first, the two steaming lights; and then, as she drew up closer, I saw her side lights through my glasses, and eventually I saw the red light. I had seen the green, but I saw the red most of the time. I saw the red light with my naked eye’. An instant’s consideration is the end of this book’s nonsense. The theory stretches Boxhall’s ‘eventually’ in the above quotation to breaking point and far beyond.
Furthermore, Boxhall never refers to jealously guarding his last rocket for the supposedly long time required to see a slowly-swinging stranger’s red sidelight. He can see that red light from the earliest time after the stranger has approached Titanic, turned, and lain off, showing her red. And Boxhall is crucially backed up by Titanic lookout Fred Fleet and by Fifth Officer Harold Lowe, both of whom notice that red light at 1 a.m. – testifying thus – and not as late as 1.30 a.m., as the book suggests.
Boxhall is questioned about rockets:
15398. Did you send them [rockets] up at intervals one at a time? — One at a time, yes.
15399. At about what kind of intervals? — Well, probably five minutes: I did not take any times.
Note that there is no suggestion of keeping one last rocket, long after the others, until the end of the night.
A convention has grown up that the first Titanic rocket went off at 12.45 a.m. Titanic time. Testimony certainly suggests one fired contemporaneous with the launch of boat No.7. Boxhall suggests firing even a little earlier. But take 12.45 a.m. as a starting point for the sake of argument in addressing this book’s theory. Firing seven rockets at five-minute intervals will bring Boxhall to 1.15 a.m. The theory would suggest that the Titanic’s stranger was showing green all this time (in order to fit the Californian), but the evidence of Titanic witnesses massively disputes this. No witness on the Titanic boat deck sees a green light on the stranger.
No matter. Boxhall is now seven rockets down while the stranger was showing her green light – which she wasn’t, but we are indulging the book’s theory for a moment. It is now 1.15 a.m. by Boxhall’s account of intervals. The book now suggests that he now waited for fifteen minutes before firing his last rocket at 1.30 a.m. This runs directly counter to Boxhall’s own evidence. The theory suggests Boxhall fired his last rocket when suddenly seeing the stranger’s red light at 1.30 a.m. But he did not suddenly see the red for the first time then. Nor was his last rocket fired at that time: ‘I was sending the rockets up right to the very last minute when I was sent away in the boat’ (question 15420). Boxhall was in boat No.2. This boat had a reported departure time of 1.45 a.m., which has never been disputed. So Boxhall’s last rocket is fired close to 1.45 a.m., and not at 1.30 a.m. as specified by the swing theory book, The Ship That Stood Still.
Furthermore, Gibson of the Californian will see a last rocket close to 2 a.m. by his ship’s clock, which hardly seems in-keeping with the time the book would like to have the Titanic’s last rocket fired. Meanwhile, to cap it all off, Boxhall actually says that the stranger he was observing was turning very slowly from red to the stern light (white), and not from green to red (question 15409): ‘I judged her to be between 5 and 6 miles when I Morsed to her, and then she turned round – she was turning very, very slowly – until at last I only saw her [white] stern light, and that was just before I went away in the boat [at 1.45 a.m.]’. By now it should be clear that forcing the Californian to fit the facts cannot be achieved, no matter how vaunted or superficially attractive this swing theory might be.
Fifthly, and lastly, the Californian’s swing can be calculated from the evidence, although there appear to be various rates of swing during different stages of the night, according to the testimony. Gibson said:
7467. You came up at five minutes to one… — Yes.
7469. Was she still in the same position? — No, Sir. She was about two and a half points before the starboard beam.
7473. When you say it was 2-and-a-half points upon the starboard beam, do you mean forward of the starboard beam? — Before the beam.
7474. Five and a-half from the bows? — Yes.
There are thirty-two points of the compass, with eight in each quadrant. There are thus eight points between the Californian’s bow and her starboard beam. Gibson confirms these eight points (five and a half plus two and a half) between the bow and the starboard beam, which is the midpoint on the starboard side. But, at twenty minutes past twelve, when he first saw the lights, Gibson said: ‘Where did the lights of this steamer you have spoken of bear from you? — Right on the starboard beam’ (question 7438). So, as the Californian swung slowly clockwise, the puzzling stranger’s bearing had advanced two and a half points from the beam towards the Californian’s bow. This happened between 12.20 a.m. and 12.55 a.m., according to Gibson’s evidence. Two and a half points travelled in thirty-five minutes.
Remember that the stranger’s light still needed to ‘advance’ five and a half points to the Californian’s bow before the Californian – under observation by the other – would begin to show the stranger her port light, the red one. As the Californian drifts, it would appear the other light is advancing along the Californian’s starboard side towards the bow…
Two and a half points in thirty-five minutes. If the current is now unvarying (and it would seem from Gibson’s evidence to have picked up since the Californian first came to a standstill) then to swing through the next five points will take seventy minutes. Adding one hour and ten minutes to Gibson’s time of 12.55 a.m., gives 2.05 a.m. Californian time. Yet the ship below her – argued to be the Titanic – still will not see a red light because this southern vessel (even if she remains stationary in the same current) will find herself remaining half a point on the green side of the Californian’s bow.
So Boxhall, contrary to the swing theory book’s claims, is not seeing a change of the mystery ship’s side light from green to red at 1.30 a.m. He actually saw a change from red to white, around 1.45 a.m.
Look at it another way. According to Gibson, thirty-five minutes of swing have left the strange ship, at 12.55 a.m., with five and a half points still to ‘travel’ before she can discern the Californian’s red light. Another thirty-five minutes will bring the time from 12.55 to 1.30 – the point at which the book claims Titanic first sees a red light. Even if there is a major difference between 1.30 a.m. on the Californian and 1.30 a.m. on the Titanic, the swing-rate can hardly suddenly jump from two and a half points in thirty-five minutes to several points in the following thirty-five minutes!
The swinging Californian theory should now be dead and buried. But there are further considerations about the rate of swing. Lord and Groves both testified that the Californian was heading north-east when she stopped. Stone wrote in his original statement for his captain that a couple of hours later, at 1.50 a.m., the Californian was heading west-south-west. Gibson verifies that at 2 a.m. Stone told him to tell the captain ‘we are heading WSW’. This would make it appear that the current has speeded up after midnight – and that it did so again from the rate of swing indicated by Gibson’s observations!
To illustrate this, consider that from east-north-east to west-south-west is sixteen points (half the compass) or exactly 180 degrees. The Californian was pointing east-north-east at the beginning of their watch, according to both Stone (question 8061) and Gibson (question 7437). Thus there is the impression that the Californian began to swing more quickly. In the 110 minutes from 12.10 a.m. to 2 a.m., a uniform rate of drift would average 6.87 minutes per point – much faster than the speed from 10.21 p.m. to 12.10 a.m. (one point per hour). This overall rate is also much faster than the fourteen minutes per point suggested by Gibson’s observations in the period from 12.20 a.m. to 12.55 a.m. Yet the ‘spe
eding up’ contrasts with the common testimony that Californian was swinging slowly (in actual fact, the current speed may have stayed the same, with only the ‘rate of swing’ increasing due to the changing orientation of the Californian to the current).
It looks like the Californian swung slowly from 10.21 p.m. until almost 1 a.m., then much faster from 1 a.m. to 2 a.m., then slowly again thereafter. With a current flowing to the south-west, this would make sense. As the Californian changed her heading from north-east to south-east, the vessel would gradually become more broadside to the current. At south-east it would be broadside to a south-west current (south-east to south-west is 90 degrees), thus swinging much faster as the whole length of the ship would be exposed to the force of the current. Once she got around to west-south-west at 1.50 a.m., the vessel would be end-on to the current and we would expect the swing rate to slow down. This is exactly what the testimony of Stone and Gibson describes. Once again we find the testimony of Californian witnesses matching up with expected physical conditions that night. Of course the current could appear to speed up if there was some motive force on the part of at least one of the ships at some stage of the night!
Officer Stone on the Californian made it clear (question 7922) that the ship under observation altered her bearing. Stone said that she began altering her bearing from his vessel ‘from the time I saw the first rocket’ (question 7938). He reported this at the time to Captain Lord, who corroborates. Here is more of Stone’s evidence:
7940. You say you saw the steamer altering her bearing with regard to you? — She bore first SSE and she was altering her bearing towards the south towards west.
7941. Under way apparently? — Yes.
Stone added: ‘Two ships remaining stationary could not possibly alter their bearings’ (question 7968). If the other ship is indeed moving of her own volition, as described above, then she is not the Titanic. The rate of swing, rather than the current, may have speeded up – but since this other ship was moving from south-south-east to south to south-west, the swinging Californian would also have to catch up with her in order to show her a red light!
An accelerated clockwise swing of the Californian moves her head more swiftly toward the south and ultimately to the west-south-west. But the other ship’s relative bearing to the Californian’s starboard side does not move as swiftly – because that ship is steaming toward the south-west!
This takes away the apparent contradiction between Gibson and Stone’s swing-speed. In fact they now support one another, because Stone is describing the Californian’s absolute heading (by giving compass points for the bow), while Gibson describes the bearing of the other ship by reference to the Californian herself.
Gibson’s is a relative bearing, and depends in part on what the other ship is doing. If the other ship is moving away as the men describe, then the rate of change in her bearing to the Californian will slow down in comparison to the rate of change in the Californian’s heading. Stone and Gibson’s separate descriptions are thus independently corroborative of the other ship moving. In the final analysis, therefore, anyone trying to prove a point by relying on a simplistic view of the Californian’s swing (while ignoring complex testimony on the issue) is on very shaky ground indeed. Not only was the red light on the Titanic’s mystery ship seen far earlier in the night (at 1 a.m. by Officer Boxhall and Officer Lowe) than was ‘swingable’, but the claims of Stone (implicitly backed by Gibson) are that the Californian’s nearby steamer actively ‘steamed away’ or went ‘out of sight’.
The evidence will soon point us to a telling conclusion – that Californian’s stranger did indeed have locomotive power at the end of the night. And she used it! Because she was not the Titanic.
We shall hear later from Gibson and Stone on this point. But now it is time to consider some hard facts, particularly the main breakthrough in the case and its ramifications for the entire debate. That breakthrough was achieved in September 1985 with the discovery of the wreck of the RMS Titanic.
9
LOCATION, LOCATION AND LOCATION
The actual Titanic wreck site gives us an indisputable and wonderful anchoring point for analysis of the conflicting claims – yet is often completely overlooked in the mystery ship analysis of heading, drift, bearing, course, light effects, and so on. With the wreck site, discovered in 1985, we know where the Titanic actually was when she sank and can infer where she was when she fired her rockets. This must be a central plank. One can build further, but for now let us enunciate clearly that the Titanic sank at:
41° 43’ N, 49° 56’ W.
The centre of the boiler field, to be absolutely precise, was a further thirty-two seconds north and an extra forty-nine seconds W, but we don’t need to be told to the exact second when we ask someone the time.
Knowing this indisputable fact, one can celebrate the famous real-estate maxim: location, location and location.
So, we know where the Titanic sank. But where was the Leyland liner Californian? The pointers are in the evidence: ‘To Captain Antillian… Three large bergs five miles to southward of us, regards Lord’ (Evans 8941 and 8943; British Report, p.43). This wireless message was broadcast by Californian at 7.30 p.m. her time. It related to a sighting an hour earlier at 6.30 p.m. on the Californian. This transmission came practically four hours before the Titanic hit the berg. The ice warning included the Californian’s position at the time. This is useful, as the Californian could not have had any reason to mislead as to location at this point, the Titanic collision not having happened yet. Californian reported seeing those ‘three large bergs’ at 6.30 p.m. in 42° 03’ N, 49° 09’ W.
This transmission was a slight error. Captain Lord was adamant (questions 6694/5) that the latitude he had asked his wireless operator to send was 42° 05’ N, not 42° 03’ N. It appears that Evans misread the scrap of paper he was handed, since 42° 03’ N is what he sent (Lord’s handwriting could be difficult to decipher, see here). But the 2-mile difference (each minute of latitude represents 1 nautical mile on the North–South axis) is not staggeringly important.
A letter from the Leyland Line to Sir Walter Howell, secretary of the Marine Department of the Board of Trade, dated 17 June 1912. Captain Lord’s employers effectively pointed out that the Californian could not have prefabricated an alibi as to her position by anticipating an accident that hadn’t happened yet. The Leyland vessel’s course had been clearly indicated in a series of wireless transmissions before the Titanic struck.
What counts is the general latitude and the time. It is long before the impact and the Californian is westbound for Boston just as Titanic is westbound for New York. Californian stayed heading west on that northern track, Lord later said. She had been in latitude 42° 05’ N, and she stopped in latitude 42° 05’ N, he testified. Heading due west therefore.
Latitude (northerly axis) is important. There is a twenty-two minute vertical separation between the Californian’s reported stop position in 1912 and the Titanic’s actual wreck site, discovered in 1985. That’s 42° 05’ N (Californian reported stop) minus 41° 43’ N (Titanic wreck) equals twenty-two minutes, there being sixty minutes in a full degree. One minute in all latitudes is 2,026 yards, or 1 nautical mile. Only minutes of longitude change their measurement. Twenty-two minutes of latitude difference between the two positions makes them 22 nautical miles apart. That was the ‘height gap’ between the ships. So, 22 miles is the gulf on the North–South axis between the Titanic wreck and Lord’s 1912 reported overnight stopping place.
Naturally the course of the Californian is central to the reckoning. From the British Inquiry report: ‘The Californian proceeded on her course S 89 deg, West true [author’s italics], until 10.20 p.m. when she was obliged to stop and reverse engines because she was running into field ice’ (p.43).
Californian was steaming at just one degree off true West to counter an effect of current. She stopped at 42° 05’ N, just as Lord had intended to report her in 42° 05’ N nearly three hours earlie
r. The latitude is exactly the same. That is consistent with her heading due west, as intended. Her line is still 22 miles north of the Titanic’s line. That is the gap between the upper and lower lines in an ‘equals sign’, or ‘=’, which represents their separate courses to the west.
Californian Marconigram sent on the early evening of 14 April 1912, which establishes the Leyland liner’s course as being north of latitude 42 degrees. It reads: ‘To Captain, Antillian, 6.30 p.m. ATS [apparent time ship] Lat 42 3 N, Long 49 9 W, three large bergs five miles to southward of us, regards, Lord’. These are believed to be the same bergs seen earlier by the Parisian, far to the north of the Titanic’s New York course.
Lord says he stopped at 10.21 p.m. in 42° 05’ N, 50° 07’ W. This is a crucial assertion. Lord Mersey, Commissioner of the British Inquiry, noted that this position was 19 miles north by east from the Titanic’s SOS position. He then went on to declare: ‘I am satisfied that this position [Californian’s reported stopping place] is not accurate’ (p. 43 of the Final Report). Mersey knew there was something wrong because of the direction in which the Californian witnesses had seen the faint rockets, which were certainly those of the Titanic. But in fact it was the Titanic’s position that was ‘not accurate’, not that of the Californian, as we now know.
An explanation is forthcoming. Titanic’s wreckage was found in 1985 in a position 13 nautical miles short of the position she reported by CQD (the old distress sign) and SOS in 1912! This next bit is a little complex and demands careful concentration. If Titanic’s SOS position was correct (and it was wrong, as we know from the wreck site) then the Titanic would have outstripped the stopped Californian. Titanic would have gone further west, to reach the SOS position, which was to the west of the ice barrier that had forced the Californian to stop. Of course the Titanic never reached the SOS position. But the court in 1912 believed she did.
