58 the truth about the Titanic
COLONEL ARCHIBALD GRACIE
THE TRUTH about the Titanic
BY
COLONEL ARCHIBALD GRACIE
AUTHOR OF
THE TRUTH ABOUT CHICKAMAUGA
NEW YORK
MITCHELL KENNERLEY
1913
Press of J. J. Little ^ Ives Company
East Twenty-fourth Street
New Tork
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. The Last Day Aboard Ship i
II. Struck By an Iceberg 14
III. The Foundering of the *Titanic" 51
IV. Struggling in the Water for Life 64
V. All Night on Bottom of Half- Submerged Upturned Boat 87
VI. The Port Side: Women and Children First 114
VII. Starboard Side: Women First, But Men When There Were No Women 225
Concluding Note 325
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "TITANIC"
CHAPTER I
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP
"There is that Leviathan."— Ps. 104:26.
AS the sole survivor of all the men passen-
gers of the Titanic stationed during the
loading of six or more lifeboats with
women and children on the port side of the ship,
forward on the glass-sheltered Deck A, and later
on the Boat Deck above, it is my duty to bear
testimony to the heroism on the part of all con-
cerned. First, to my men companions who
calmly stood by until the lifeboats had departed
loaded with women and the available complement
of crew, and who, fifteen to twenty minutes later,
sank with the ship, conscious of giving up their
lives to save the weak and the helpless.
Second, to Second Officer Lightoller and his
2 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE *'tITANIC"
ship's crew, who did their duty as if similar oc-
currences were matters of daily routine; and
thirdly, to the women, who showed no signs of
fear or panic whatsoever under conditions more
appalling than were ever recorded before in the
history of disasters at sea.
I think those of my readers who are accus-
tomed to tales of thrilling adventure will be glad
to learn first-hand of the heroism displayed on
the Titanic by those to whom it is my privilege
and sad duty to pay this tribute. I will confine
the details of my narrative for the most part to
what I personally saw, and did, and heard dur-
ing that never-to-be-forgotten maiden trip of the
Titanic, which ended with shipwreck and her
foundering about 2.22 a. m., Monday, April 15,
19 1 2, after striking an iceberg "in or near lati-
tude 41 degrees, 46 minutes N., longitude 50 de-
grees, 14 minutes W., North Atlantic Ocean,"
whereby the loss of 1490 lives ensued.
On Sunday morning, April 14th, this marvel-
lous ship, the perfection of all vessels hitherto
conceived by the brain of man, had, for three and
one-half days, proceeded on her way from South-
ampton to New York over a sea of glass, so level
it appeared, without encountering a ripple brought
on the surface of the water by a storm.
The Captain had each day improved upon the
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP 3
previous day's speed, and prophesied that, with
continued fair weather, we should make an early
arrival record for this maiden trip. But his
reckoning never took into consideration that
Protean monster of the Northern seas which, even
before this, had been so fatal to the navigator's
calculations and so formidable a weapon of
destruction.
Our explorers have pierced to the furthest
north and south of the icebergs' retreat, but the
knowledge of their habitat, insuring our great
ocean liners in their successful efforts to elude
them, has not reached the detail of time and
place where they become detached and obstruct
their path.
In the twenty-four hours' run ending the 14th,
according to the posted reckoning, the ship had
covered 546 miles, and we were told that the
next twenty-four hours would see even a better
record made.
Towards evening the report, which I heard,
was spread that wireless messages from passing
steamers had been received advising the officers
of our ship of the presence of icebergs and ice-
floes. The increasing cold and the necessity of
being more warmly clad when appearing on deck
were outward and visible signs in corroboration of
these warnings. But despite them all no diminu-
4 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
tion of speed was indicated and the engines kept
up their steady running.
Not for fifty years, the old sailors tell us, had
so great a mass of ice and icebergs at this time
of the year been seen so far south.
The pleasure and comfort which all of us en-
joyed upon this floating palace, with its extraor-
dinary provisions for such purposes, seemed an
ominous feature to many of us, including myself,
who felt it almost too good to last without some
terrible retribution inflicted by the hand of an
angry omnipotence. Our sentiment in this respect
was voiced by one of the most able and distin-
guished of our fellow passengers, Mr. Charles M.
Hays, President of the Canadian Grand Trunk
Railroad. Engaged as he then was in studying and
providing the hotel equipment along the line of
new extensions to his own great railroad system,
the consideration of the subject and of the mag-
nificence of the Titanic's accommodations was
thus brought home to him. This was the pro-
phetic utterance with which, alas, he sealed his
fate a few hours thereafter: *'The White Star,
the Cunard and the Hamburg-American lines,"
said he, *'are now devoting their attention to a
struggle for supremacy in obtaining the most
luxurious appointments for their ships, but the
time will soon come when the greatest and most
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP 5
appalling of all disasters at sea will be the result."
In the various trips which I have made across
the Atlantic, it has been my custom aboard ship,
whenever the weather permitted, to take as much
exercise every day as might be needful to put my-
self in prime physical condition, but on board the
Titanic, during the first days of the voyage, from
Wednesday to Saturday, I had departed from
this, my usual self-imposed regimen, for during
this interval I had devoted my time to social en-
joyment and to the reading of books taken from
the ship's well-supplied library. I enjoyed my-
self as if I were in a summer palace on the sea-
shore, surrounded with every comfort — there was
nothing to indicate or suggest that we were on
the stormy Atlantic Ocean. The motion of the
ship and the noise of its machinery were scarcely
discernible on deck or in the saloons, either day
or night. But when Sunday morning came, I con-
sidered it high time to begin my customary exer-
cises, and determined for the rest of the voyage
to patronize the squash racquet court, the gym-
nasium, the swimming pool, etc. I was up early
before breakfast and met the professional racquet
player in a half hour's warming up, preparatory
for a swim in the six-foot deep tank of salt water,
heated to a refreshing temperature. In no swim-
ming bath had I ever enjoyed such pleasure be-
6 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE **TITANIC"
fore. How curtailed that enjoyment would have
been had the presentiment come to me telling how
near it was to being my last plunge, and that be-
fore dawn of another day I would be swimming
for my life in mid-ocean, under water and on the
surface, in a temperature of 28 degrees Fahren-
heit!
Impressed on my memory as if it were but yes-
terday, my mind pictures the personal appear-
ance and recalls the conversation which I had with
each of these employees of the ship. The racquet
professional, F. Wright, was a clean-cut, typical
young Englishman, similar to hundreds I have
seen and with whom I have played, in bygone
years, my favorite game of cricket, which has
done more than any other sport for my physical
development. I have not seen his name men-
tioned in any account of the disaster, and there-
fore take this opportunity of speaking of him, for
I am perhaps the only survivor able to relate any-
thing about his last days on earth.
Hundreds of letters have been written to us
survivors, many containing photographs for
identification of some lost loved one, whom per-
chance we may have seen or talked to before he
met his fate. To these numerous Inquiries I have
been able to reply satisfactorily only in rare in-
stances. The next and last time I saw Wright
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP 7
was on the stairway of Deck C within three-
quarters of an hour after the collision. I was
going to my cabin when I met him on the stairs
going up. ^'Hadn't we better cancel that appoint-
ment for to-morrow morning?'* I said rather jo-
cosely to him. "Yes," he replied, but did not
stop to tell what he then must have known of
the conditions in the racquet court on G Deck,
which, according to other witnesses, had at that
time become flooded. His voice was calm, with-
out enthusiasm, and perhaps his face was a little
whiter than usual.
To the swimming pool attendant I also made
promise to be on hand earlier the next morning,
but I never saw him again.
One of the characters of the ship, best known
to us all, was the gymnasium instructor, T. W.
McCawley. He, also, expected me to make my
first appearance for real good exercise on the
morrow, but alas, he, too, was swallowed up by
the sea. How well we survivors all remember
this sturdy little man in white flannels and with
his broad English accent! With what tireless
enthusiasm he showed us the many mechanical de-
vices under his charge and urged us to take ad-
vantage of the opportunity of using them, going
through the motions of bicycle racing, rowing,
boxing, camel and horseback riding, etc.
8 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
Such was my morning's preparation for the un-
foreseen physical exertions I was compelled to
put forth for dear life at midnight, a few hours
later. Could any better training for the terrible
ordeal have been planned?
The exercise and the swim gave me an appetite
for a hearty breakfast. Then followed the
church service in the dining saloon, and I remem-
ber how much I was impressed with the "Prayer
for those at Sea," also the words of the hymn,
which we sang. No. 418 of the Hymnal. About a
fortnight later, when I next heard it sung, I was
in the little church at Smithtown, Long Island, at-
tending the memorial service in honor of my old
friend and fellow member of the Union Club,
James Clinch Smith. To his sister, who sat next
to me in the pew, I called attention to the fact
that it was the last hymn we sang on this Sunday
morning on board the Titanic, She was much
affected, and gave the reason for its selection for
the memorial service to her brother because it
was known as Jim's favorite hymn, being the first
piece set to music ever played by him as a child
and for which he was rewarded with a promised
prize, donated by his father.
What a remarkable coincidence that at the first
and last ship's service on board the Titanic, the
hymn we sang began with these impressive lines :
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP 9
O God our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come.
Our shelter from the stormy blast
And our eternal home.
One day was so like another that it is difficult
to differentiate in our description all the details
of this last day's incidents aboard ship.
The book that I finished and returned to the
ship's library was Mary Johnston's "Old Do-
minion." While peacefully reading the tales of
adventure and accounts of extraordinary escapes
therein, how little I thought that in the next few
hours I should be a witness and a party to a scene
to which this book could furnish no counter-
part, and that my own preservation from a
watery grave would afford a remarkable illus-
tration of how ofttimes "truth is stranger than
fiction."
During this day I saw much of Mr. and Mrs.
Isidor Straus. In fact, from the very beginning
to the end of our trip on the Titanic, we had been
together several times each day. I was with them
on the deck the day we left Southampton and
witnessed that ominous accident to the American
liner, New York, lying at her pier, when the dis-
placement of water by the movement of our gi-
gantic ship caused a suction which pulled the
smaller ship from her moorings and nearly caused
10 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
a collision. At the time of this, Mr. Straus was
telling me that it seemed only a few years back
that he had taken passage on this same ship, the
New York, on her maiden trip and when she was
spoken of as the *'last word in shipbuilding.'* He
then called the attention of his wife and myself
to the progress that had since been made, by com-
parison of the two ships then lying side by side.
During our daily talks thereafter, he related
much of special interest concerning incidents in
his remarkable career, beginning with his early
manhood in Georgia when, with the Confederate
Government Commissioners, as an agent for the
purchase of supplies, he ran the blockade of Eu-
rope. His friendship with President Cleveland,
and how the latter had honored him, were among™
the topics of daily conversation that interested
me most.
On this Sunday, our last day aboard ship, he
finished the reading of a book I had loaned him,
in which he expressed intense interest. This book
was "The Truth About Chickamauga," of which
I am the author, and it was to gain a much-needed
rest after seven years of work thereon, and in
order to get it off my mind, that I had taken
this trip across the ocean and back. As a counter-
irritant, my experience was a dose which was
highly efficacious.
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP II
I recall how Mr. and Mrs. Straus were par-
ticularly happy about noon time on this same day
in anticipation of communicating by wireless teleg-
raphy with their son and his wife on their way to
Europe on board the passing ship Amerika.
Some time before six o'clock, full of contentment,
they told me of the message of greeting received
in reply. This last good-bye to their loved ones
must have been a consoling thought when the end
came a few hours thereafter.
That night after dinner, with my table com-
panions, Messrs. James Clinch Smith and Edward
A. Kent, according to usual custom, we adjourned
to the palm room, with many others, for the usual
coffee at individual tables where we listened to
the always delightful music of the Titanic^ s band.
On these occasions, full dress was always en regie;
and it was a subject both of observation and ad-
miration, that there were so many beautiful
women — then especially in evidence — aboard the
ship.
I invariably circulated around during these de-
lightful evenings, chatting with those I knew, and
with those whose acquaintance I had made during
the voyage. I might specify names and particu-
larize subjects of conversation, but the details,
while interesting to those concerned, might not
be so to all my readers. The recollections of
12 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
those with whom I was thus closely associated in
this disaster, including those who suffered the
death from which I escaped and those who sur-
vived with me, will be a treasured memory and
bond of union until my dying day. From the palm
room, the men of my coterie would always go to
the smoking room, and almost every evening join
in conversation with some of the well-known men
whom we met there, including within my own
recollections Major Archie Butt, President Taft's
Military Aid, discussing politics; Clarence Moore,
of Washington, D. C, relating his venturesome
trip some years ago through the West Virginia
woods and mountains, helping a newspaper re-
porter in obtaining an interview with the outlaw,
Captain Anse Hatfield; Frank D. Millet, the
well-known artist, planning a journey west;
Arthur Ryerson and others.
During these evenings I also conversed with
Mr. John B. Thayer, Second Vice-President of
the Pennsylvania Railroad, and with Mr. George
D. Widener, a son of the Philadelphia street-car
magnate, Mr. P. A. B. Widener.
My stay in the smoking-room on this particu-
lar evening for the first time was short, and I re-
tired early with my cabin steward Cullen's prom-
ise to awaken me betimes next morning to get
ready for the engagements I had made before
THE LAST DAY ABOARD SHIP 13
breakfast for the game of racquets, work in the
gymnasium and the swim that was to follow.
I cannot regard it as a mere coincidence that
on this particular Sunday night I was thus
prompted to retire early for nearly three hours of
invigorating sleep, whereas an accident occurring
at midnight of any of the four preceding days
would have found me mentally and physically
tired. That I was thus strengthened for the ter-
rible ordeal, better even than had I been fore-
warned of it, I regard on the contrary as the first
provision for my safety (answering the constant
prayers of those at home), made by the guardian
angel to whose care I was entrusted during the
series of miraculous escapes presently to be re-
corded.
CHAPTER II
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG
"Watchman^ what of the night?" — Isaiah 21:11.
MY Stateroom was an outside one on Deck
C on the starboard quarter, somewhat
abaft amidships. It was No. C, 51. I
was enjoying a good night's rest when I was
aroused by a sudden shock and noise forward on
the starboard side, which I at once concluded was
caused by a collision, with some other ship per-
haps. I jumped from my bed, turned on the elec-
tric light, glanced at my watch nearby on the
dresser, which I had changed to agree with
ship's time on the day before and which now reg-
istered twelve o'clock. Correct ship's time would
make it about 11.45. ^ opened the door of my
cabin, looked out into the corridor, but could not
see or hear anyone — there was no commotion
whatever; but immediately following the collision
came a great noise of escaping steam. I listened
intently, but could hear no machinery. There was
14
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 1 5
no mistaking that something wrong had happened,
because of the ship stopping and the blowing off
of steam.
Removing my night clothing I dressed myself
hurriedly in underclothing, shoes and stockings,
trousers and a Norfolk coat. I give these details
in order that some idea of the lapse of time may
be formed by an account of what I did during the
interval. From my cabin, through the corridor
to the stairway was but a short distance, and I
ascended to the third deck above, that is, to the
Boat Deck. I found here only one young lad,
seemingly bent on the same quest as myself.
From the first cabin quarter, forward on the
port side, we strained our eyes to discover what
had struck us. From vantage points where the
view was not obstructed by the lifeboats on this
deck I sought the object, but in vain, though I
swept the horizon near and far and discovered
nothing.
It was a beautiful night, cloudless, and the
stars shining brightly. The atmosphere was quite
cold, but no ice or iceberg was in sight. If an-
other ship had struck us there was no trace of it,
and it did not yet occur to me that it was an ice-
berg with which we had collided. Not satisfied
with a partial investigation, I made a complete
tour of the deck, searching every point of the
1 6 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ''tITANIC''
compass with my eyes. Going toward the stern, I
vaulted over the iron gate and fence that divide
the first and second cabin passengers. I disre-
garded the "not allowed"*notice. I looked about
me towards the officers* quarters in expectation
of being challenged for non-observance of rules.
In view of the collision I had expected to see
some of the ship's officers on the Boat Deck, but
there was no sign of an officer anywhere, and no
one from whom to obtain any information about
what had happened. Making my tour of the
Boat Deck, the only other beings I saw were a
middle-aged couple of the second cabin prome-
nading unconcernedly, arm in arm, forward on
the starboard quarter, against the wind, the man
in a gray overcoat and outing cap.
Having gained no satisfaction whatever, I de-
scended to the glass-enclosed Deck A, port side,
and looked over the rail to see whether the ship
was on an even keel, but I still could see nothing
wrong. Entering the companionway, I passed
Mr. Ismay with a member of the crew hurrying up
the stairway. He wore a day suit, and, as usuaP,
was hatless. He seemed too much preoccupied to
notice anyone. Therefore I did not speak to him,
but regarded his face very closely, perchance to
learn from his manner how serious the accident
might be. It occurred to me then that he was
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG I7
putting on as brave a face as possible so as to
cause no alarm among the passengers.
At the foot of the stairway were a number of
men passengers, and I now for the first time dis-
covered that others were aroused as well as my-
self, among them my friend, Clifich Smith, from
whom I first learned that an iceberg had struck
us. He opened his hand and showed me some ice,
flat like my watch, coolly suggesting that I might
take it home for a souvenir. All of us will re-
member the way he had of cracking a joke with-
out a smile. While we stood there, the story of
the collision came to us — how someone in the
smoking room, when the ship struck, rushed out
to see what it was, and returning, told them that
he had a glimpse of an iceberg towering fifty feet
above Deck A, which, if true, would indicate a
height of over one hundred feet. Here, too, I
learned that the mail room was flooded and that
the plucky postal clerks, in two feet of water,
were at their posts. They were engaged in trans-
ferring to the upper deck, from the ship's post-
office, the two hundred bags of registered mail
containing four hundred thousand letters. The
names of these men, who all sank with the ship,
deserve to be recorded. They were: John S.
Marsh, William L. Gwynn, Oscar S. Woody, lago
Smith and E. D. Williamson. The first three
1 8 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
were Americans, the others Englishmen, and the
families of the former were provided for by their
Government.
And now Clinch Smith and myself noticed a list
on the floor of the companionway. We kept our
own counsel about it, not wishing to frighten any-
one or cause any unnecessary alarm, especially
among the ladies, who then appeared upon the
scene. We did not consider it our duty to express
our individual opinion upon the serious character
of the accident which now appealed to us with the
greatest force. He and I resolved to stick to-
gether in the final emergency, united in the silent
bond of friendship, and lend a helping hand to
each other whenever required. I recall having in
my mind's eye at this moment all that I had read
and heard in days gone by about shipwrecks, and
pictured Smith and myself clinging to an over-
loaded raft in an open sea with a scarcity of food
and water. We agreed to visit our respective
staterooms and join each other later. All pos-
sessions in my stateroom were hastily packed into
three large travelling bags so that the luggage
might be ready in the event of a hasty transfer
to another ship.
Fortunately I put on my long Newmarket over-
coat that reached below my knees, and as I passed
from the corridor into the companionway my
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG I9
worst fears were confirmed. Men and women
were slipping on life-preservers, the stewards as-
sisting in adjusting them. Steward Cullen insisted
upon my returning to my stateroom for mine. I
did so and he fastened one on me while I brought
out the other for use by someone else.
Out on Deck A, port side, towards the stern,
many men and women had already collected. I
sought and found the unprotected ladies to whom
I had proffered my services during the voyage
when they boarded the ship at Southampton, Mrs.
E. D. Appleton, wife of my St. Paul's School
friend and schoolmate; Mrs. R. C. Cornell, wife
of the well-known New York Justice, and Mrs.
J. Murray Brown, wife of the Boston pubhsher,
all old friends of my wife. These three sisters
were returning home from a sad mission abroad,
where they had laid to rest the remains of a fourth
sister. Lady Victor Drummond, of whose death
I had read accounts in the London papers, and all
the sad details connected therewith were told me
by the sisters themselves. That they would have
to pass through a still greater ordeal seemed im-
possible, and how little did I know of the respon-
sibility I took upon myself for their safety ! Ac-
companying them, also unprotected, was their
friend. Miss Edith Evans, to whom they intro-
duced me. Mr. and Mrs. Straus, Colonel and
20 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
Mrs. Astor and others well known to me were
among those here congregated on the port side
of Deck A, including, besides Clinch Smith, two of
our coterie of after-dinner companions, Hugh
Woolner, son of the English sculptor, whose
works are to be seen in Westminster Abbey, and
H. Bjornstrom Steffanson, the young lieutenant
of the Swedish army, who, during the voyage,
had told me of his acquaintance with Mrs.
Gracie's relatives in Sweden.
It was now that the band began to play, and
continued while the boats were being lowered.
We considered this a wise provision tending to al-
lay excitement. I did not recognize any of the
tunes, but I know they were cheerful and were
not hymns. If, as has been reported, ''Nearer
My God to Thee'' was one of the selections, I
assuredly should have noticed it and regarded it
as a tactless warning of immediate death to us all
and one likely to create a panic that our special
efforts were directed towards avoiding, and which
we accomplished to the fullest extent. I know of
only two survivors whose names are cited by the
newspapers as authority for the statement that
this hymn was one of those played. On the other
hand, all whom I have questioned or corresponded
with, including the best qualified, testified emphati-
cally to the contrary.
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 21
Our hopes were buoyed with the information,
imparted through the ship's officers, that there
had been an interchange of wireless messages with
passing ships, one of which was certainly coming
to our rescue. To reassure the ladies of whom I
had assumed special charge, I showed them a
bright white light of what I took to be a ship
about five miles off and which I felt sure was com-
ing to our rescue. Colonel Astor heard me tell-
ing this to them and he asked me to show it and
I pointed the light out to him. In so doing we
both had now to lean over the rail of the ship
and look close in towards the bow, avoiding a
lifeboat even then made ready with its gunwale
lowered to the level of the floor of the Boat Deck
above us and obstructing our view; but instead of
growing brighter the light grew dim and less and
less distinct and passed away altogether. The
light, as I have since learned, with tearful regret
for the lost who might have been saved, be-
longed to the steamer Calif ornian of the Leyland
line. Captain Stanley Lord, bound from London to
Boston. She belonged to the International Mer-
cantile Marine Company, the owners of the
Titanic.
This was the ship from which two of the six
"ice messages'' were sent. The first one received
and acknowledged by the Titanic was one at 7.30
22 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE **TITANIC'*
p. m., an intercepted message to another ship.
The next was about up. m., when the Captain
of the Californian saw a ship approaching from
the eastward, which he was advised to be the
Titanic, and under his orders this message was
sent: *'We are stopped and surrounded by ice."
To this the Titanic^s wireless operator brusquely
replied, *'Shut up, I am busy. I am working Cape
Race." The business here referred to was the
sending of wireless messages for passengers on
the Titanic; and the stronger current of the Cali-
fornian eastward interfered therewith. Though
the navigation of the ship and the issues of life
and death were at stake, the right of way was
given to communication with Cape Race until
within a few minutes of the Titanic* s collision with
the iceberg.
Nearly all this time, until 11.30 p. m., the
wireless operator of the Californian was listen-
ing with 'phones on his head, but at 11.30 p. m.,
while the Titanic was still talking to Cape Race,
the former ship's operator *'put the 'phones down,
took off his clothes and turned in."
The fate of thousands of lives hung in the bal-
ance many times that ill-omened night, but the
circumstances in connection with the S, S. Cali-
fornian (Br. Rep. pp. 43-46), furnish the evidence
corroborating that of the American Investigation,
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 23
viz., that It was not chance, but the grossest neg-
ligence alone which sealed the fate of all the
noble lives, men and women, that were lost.
It appears from the evidence referred to, in-
formation in regard to which we learned after
our arrival in New York, that the Captain of the
Californian and his crew were watching our
lights from the deck of their ship, which remained
approximately stationary until 5.15 a. m. on the
following morning. During this interval it is
shown that they were never distant more than six
or seven miles. In fact, at 12 oVlock, the Cali-
fornian was only four or five miles off at the
point and in the general direction where she was
seen by myself and at least a dozen others, who
bore testimony before the American Committee,
from the decks of the Titanic. The white rockets
which we sent up, referred to presently, were also
plainly seen at the time. Captain Lord was com-
pletely in possession of the knowledge that he
was in proximity to a ship in distress. He could
have put himself into immediate communication
with us by wireless had he desired confirmation
of the name of the ship and the disaster which
had befallen it. His indifference is made appar-
ent by his orders to **go on Morseing," instead of
utilizing the more modern method of the inven-
tive genius and gentleman, Mr. Marconi, which
24 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "TITANIC"
eventually saved us all. "The night was clear ^
and the sea was smooth. The ice by which the
Californian was surrounded," says the British
Report, "was loose ice extending for a distance of
not more than two or three miles in the direction
of the Titanic/^ When she first saw the rockets,
the Californian could have pushed through the ice
to the open water without any serious risk and so
have come to the assistance of the Titanic. A
discussion of this subject is the most painful of all
others for those who lost their loved ones aboard
our ship.
When we realized that the ship whose lights
we saw was not coming towards us, our hopes of
rescue were correspondingly depressed, but the
men's counsel to preserve calmness prevailed; and
to reassure the ladies they repeated the much ad-
vertised fiction of "the unsinkable ship'' on the
supposed highest qualified authority. It was at
this point that Miss Evans related to me the story
that years ago in London she had been told by a
fortune-teller to "beware of water," and now
"she knew she would be drowned." My efforts
to persuade her to the contrary were futile.
Though she gave voice to her story, she presented
no evidence whatever of fear, and when I saw
and conversed with her an hour later when condi-
tions appeared especially desperate, and the last
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 25
lifeboat was supposed to have departed, she was
perfectly calm and did not revert again to the
superstitious tale.
From my own conclusions, and those of others,
it appears that about forty-five minutes had now
elapsed since the colhsion when Captain Smith's
orders were transmitted to the crew to lower the
lifeboats, loaded with women and children first.
The self-abnegation of Mr. and Mrs. Isidor
Straus here shone forth heroically when she
promptly and emphatically exclaimed: "No! I
will not be separated from my husband; as we
have lived, so will we die together;" and when he,
too, declined the assistance proffered on my ear-
nest solicitation that, because of his age and help-
lessness, exception should be made and he be al-
lowed to accompany his wife in the boat. ^'Nol"
he said, *'I do not wish any distinction in my fa-
vor which is not granted to others.'' As near as
I can recall them these were the words which
they addressed to me. They expressed them-
selves as fully prepared to die, and calmly sat
down in steamer chairs on the glass-enclosed Deck
A, prepared to meet their fate. Further en-
treaties to make them change their decision were
of no avail. Later they moved to the Boat Deck
above, accompanying Mrs. Straus's maid, who en-
tered a lifeboat.
26 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
When the order to load the boats was received
I had promptly moved forward with the ladies in
my charge toward the boats then being lowered
from the Boat Deck above to Deck A on the port
side of the ship, where we then were. A tall,
slim young Englishman, Sixth Officer J. P.
Moody, whose name I learned later, with other
members of the ship's crew, barred the progress
of us men passengers any nearer to the boats.
All that was left me was then to consign these
ladies in my charge to the protection of the ship's
officer, and I thereby was relieved of their respon-
sibihty and felt sure that they would be safely
loaded in the boats at this point. I remember a
steward rolling a small barrel out of the door of
the companionway. "What have you there?"
said I. "Bread for the lifeboats," was his quick
and cheery reply, as I passed inside the ship for
the last time, searching for two of my table
companions, Mrs. Churchill Candee of Wash-
ington and Mr. Edward A. Kent. It was
then that I met Wright, the racquet player, and
exchanged the few words on the stairway already
related.
Considering it well to have a supply of blankets
for use in the open boats exposed to the cold, I
concluded, while passing, to make another, and my
last, descent to my stateroom for this purpose, only
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 27
to find it locked, and on asking the reason why
was told by some other steward than CuUen that
it was done "to prevent looting." Advising him
of what was wanted, I went with him to the cabin
stewards* quarters nearby, where extra blankets
were stored, and where I obtained them. I then
went the length of the ship inside on this glass-
enclosed Deck A from aft, forwards, looking in
every room and corner for my missing table com-
panions, but no passengers whatever were to be
seen except in the smoking room, and there all
alone by themselves, seated around a table, were
four men, three of whom were personally well
known to me. Major Butt, Clarence Moore and
Frank Millet, but the fourth was a stranger, whom
I therefore cannot identify. All four seemed per-
fectly oblivious of what was going on on the decks
outside. It is impossible to suppose that they did
not know of the collision with an iceberg and that
the room they were in had been deserted by all
others, who had hastened away. It occurred to me
at the time that these men desired to show their
entire indifference to the danger and that if I ad-
vised them as to how seriously I regarded it, they
would laugh at me. This was the last I ever saw
of any of them, and I know of no one who testi-
fies to seeing them later, except a lady who men-
tions having seen Major Butt on the bridge five
28 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TITANIC
minutes before the last boat left the ship.* There
is no authentic story of what they did when the
water reached this deck, and their ultimate fate is
only a matter of conjecture. That they went
down in the ship on this Deck A, when the steer-
age passengers (as described later) blocked the
way to the deck above, is my personal belief,
founded on the following facts, to wit : First, that
neither I nor anyone else, so far as I know,
ever saw any of them on the Boat Deck,
and second, that the bodies of none of them
were ever recovered, indicating the possibility
that all went down inside the ship or the enclosed
deck.
I next find myself forward on the port side,
part of the time on the Boat Deck, and part on
the deck below it, called Deck A, where I re-
joined Clinch Smith, who reported that Mrs.
Candee had departed on one of the boats. We
remained together until the ship went down. I
was on the Boat Deck when I saw and heard the
first rocket, and then successive ones sent up at in-
tervals thereafter. These were followed by the
Morse red and blue lights, which were signalled
near by us on the deck where we were; but we
looked in vain for any response. These signals
of distress indicated to every one of us that the
* See page — .
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 29
ship's fate was sealed, and that she might sink
before the lifeboats could be lowered.
And now I am on Deck A again, where I helped
in the loading of two boats lowered from the deck
above. There were twenty boats in all on the
ship: 14 wooden lifeboats, each thirty feet long
by nine feet one inch broad, constructed to carry
sixty-five persons each; 2 wooden cutters, emer-
gency boats, twenty-five feet two inches long by
seven feet two inches broad, constructed to carry
forty persons each; and 4 Engelhardt "surf-
boats" with canvas collapsible sides extending
above the gunwales, twenty-five feet five inches
long by eight feet broad, constructed to carry
forty-seven persons each. The lifeboats were
ranged along the ship's rail, or its prolongation
forward and aft on the Boat Deck, the odd num-
bered on the starboard and the even numbered on
the port side. Two of the Engelhardt boats were
on the Boat Deck forward beneath the Emergency
boats suspended on davits above. The other
Engelhardt boats were on the roof of the officers'
house forward of the first funnel. They are
designated respectively by the letters, A. B. C. D;
A and C on the starboard, B and D on the port
sides. They have a rounded bottom like a canoe.
The name "collapsible boat" generally applied has
given rise to mistaken impressions in regard to
30 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE '^TITANIc'*
them, because of the adjustable canvas sides
above-mentioned.
At this quarter I was no longer held back
from approaching near the boats, but my as-
sistance and work as one of the crew in the
loading of boats and getting them away as
quickly as possible were accepted, for there
was now no time to spare. The Second Officer,
Lightoller, was in command on the port side
forward, where I was. One of his feet was
planted in the lifeboat, and the other on the rail
of Deck A, while we, through the wood frames
of the lowered glass windows on this deck, passed
women, children, and babies in rapid succession
without any confusion whatsoever. Among this
number was Mrs. Astor, whom I lifted over the
four-feet high rail of the ship through the frame.
Her husband held her left arm as we carefully
passed her to Lightoller, who seated her in the
boat. A dialogue now ensued between Colonel
Astor and the officer, every word of which I lis-
tened to with intense interest. Astor was close
to me in the adjoining window-frame, to the left
of mine. Leaning out over the rail he asked per-
mission of Lightoller to enter the boat to protect
his wife, which, in view of her delicate condition,
seems to have been a reasonable request, but the
officer, intent upon his duty, and obeying orders,
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 3 1
and not knowing the millionaire from the rest of
us, replied: "No, sir, no men are allowed in these
boats until women are loaded first." Colonel As-
tor did not demur, but bore the refusal bravely
and resignedly, simply asking the number of the
boat to help find his wife later in case he also was
rescued. ^'Number 4,'' was Lightoller's reply.
Nothing more was said. Colonel Astor moved
away from this point and I never saw him again.
I do not for a moment believe the report that he
attempted to enter, or did enter, a boat and it is
evident that if any such thought occurred to him
at all it must have been at this present time and
in this boat with his wife. Second Officer Lightol-
ler recalled the incident perfectly when I reminded
him of it. It was only through me that Colonel
Astor's identity was established in his mind. "I
assumed," said he, "that I was asked to give the
number of the lifeboat as the passenger intended,
for some unknown cause, to make complaint about
me." From the fact that I never saw Colonel As-
tor on the Boat Deck later, and also because his
body, when found, was crushed (according to the
statement of one who saw it at Halifax, Mr.
Harry K. White, of Boston, Mr. Edward A.
Kent^s brother-in-law, my schoolmate and friend
from boyhood), I am of the opinion that he met
his fate on the ship when the boilers tore through
it, as described later.
32 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^'tITANIC*'
One of the incidents I recall when loading the
boats at this point was my seeing a young woman
clinging tightly to a baby in her arms as she ap-
proached near the ship's high rail, but unwilling
even for a moment to allow anyone else to hold
the little one while assisting her to board the life-
boat. As she drew back sorrowfully to the outer
edge of the crowd on the deck, I followed and per-
suaded her to accompany me to the rail again,
promising if she would entrust the baby to me I
would see that the officer passed it to her after she
got aboard. I remember her trepidation as she
acceded to my suggestion and the happy expres-
sion of relief when the mother was safely seated
with the baby restored to her. "Where is my
baby?*' was her anxious wail. "I have your
baby," I cried, as it was tenderly handed along. I
remember this incident well because of my feeling
at the time, when I had the babe in my care;
though the interval was short, I wondered how I
should manage with it in my arms if the lifeboats
got away and I should be plunged into the water
with it as the ship sank.
According to Lightoller's testimony before the
Senate Committee he put twenty to twenty-five
women, with two seamen to row, in the first boat
and thirty, with two seamen, in the second.
Our labors in loading the boats were now
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 33
shifted to the Boat Deck above, where Clinch
Smith and I, with others, followed LIghtoller and
the crew. On this deck some difficulty was expe-
rienced in getting the boats ready to lower. Sev-
eral causes may have contributed to this, viz., lack
of drill and insufficient number of seamen for such
emergency, or because of the new tackle not work-
ing smoothly. We had the hardest time with the
Engelhardt boat, lifting and pushing it towards
and over the rail. My shoulders and the whole
weight of my body were used in assisting the crew
at this work. Lightoller's testimony tells us that
as the situation grew more serious he began to
take chances and in loading the third boat he filled
it up as full as he dared to, with about thirty-five
persons. By this time he was short of seamen,
and in the fourth boat he put the first man passen-
ger. *^Are you a sailor?" LIghtoller asked, and
received the reply from the gentleman addressed
that he was "a yachtsman." LIghtoller told him
if he was "sailor enough to get out over the bul-
warks to the lifeboat, to go ahead." This pas-
senger was Major Arthur Peuchen, of Toronto,
who acquitted himself as a brave man should. My
energies were so concentrated upon this work of
loading the boats at this quarter that lapse of
time, sense of sight and sense of hearing recorded
no impressions during this interval until the last
34 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
boat was loaded; but there is one fact of which I
am positive, and that is that every man, woman,
officer and member of the crew did their full duty
without a sign of fear or confusion. Lightoller's
strong and steady voice rang out his orders in
clear firm tones, inspiring confidence and obe-
dience. There was not one woman who shed
tears or gave any sign of fear or distress. There
was not a man at this quarter of the ship who in-
dicated a desire to get into the boats and escape
with the women. There was not a member of
the crew who shirked, or left his post. The cool-
ness, courage, and sense of duty that I here wit-
nessed made me thankful to God and proud of
my Anglo-Saxon race that gave this perfect and
superb exhibition of self-control at this hour of
severest trial. *'The boat's deck was only ten feet
from the water when I lowered the sixth boat,'*
testified Lightoller, '^and when we lowered the
first, the distance to the water was seventy feet.
We had now loaded all the women who were in
sight at that quarter of the ship, and I ran along
the deck with Clinch Smith on the port side some
distance aft shouting, "Are there any more
women?" "Are there any more women?" On
my return there was a very palpable list to port as
if the ship was about to topple over. The deck
was on a corresponding slant. "All passengers to
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 35
the Starboard side/' was Lightoller's loud com-
mand, heard by all of us. Here I thought the
final crisis had come, with the boats all gone, and
when we were to be precipitated into the sea.
Prayerful thoughts now began to rise in me that
my Hfe might be preserved and I be restored to
my loved ones at home. I weighed myself in the
balance, doubtful whether I was thus deserving of
God's mercy and protection. I questioned myself
as to the performance of my religious duties ac-
cording to the instructions of my earliest Precep-
tor, the Rev. Henry A. Coit, whose St. Paul's
School at Concord, N. H., I had attended. My
West Point training in the matter of recognition
of constituted authority and maintenance of com-
posure stood me in good stead.
My friend, Clinch Smith, urged immediate obe-
dience to Lightoller's orders, and, with other men
passengers, we crossed over to the starboard quar-
ter of the ship, forward on the same Boat Deck
where, as I afterwards learned, the officer in com-
mand was First Officer Murdoch, who had also
done noble work, and was soon thereafter to lose
his life. Though the deck here was not so notice-
ably aslant as on the port side, the conditions ap-
peared fully as desperate. All the Hfeboats had
been lowered and had departed. There was some-
what of a crowd congregated along the rail. The
36 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
light was sufficient for me to recognize distinctly
many of those with whom I was well acquainted.
Here, pale and determined, was Mr. John B.
Thayer, Second Vice-President of the Pennsyl-
vania Railroad, and Mr. George D. Widener.
They were looking over the ship's gunwale, talking
earnestly as if debating what to do. Next to them
it pained me to discover Mrs. J. M. Brown and
Miss Evans, the two ladies whom more than an
hour previous I had, as related, consigned to the
care of Sixth Officer Moody on Deck A, where he,
as previously described, blocked my purpose of ac-
companying these ladies and personally assisting
them into the boat. They showed no signs of
perturbation whatever as they conversed quietly
with me. Mrs. Brown quickly related how they
became separated, in the crowd, from her sisters,
Mrs. Appleton and Mrs. Cornell. Alas ! that they
had not remained on the same port side of the
ship, or moved forward on Deck A, or the Boat
Deck! Instead, they had wandered in some un-
explained way to the very furthest point diag-
onally from where they were at first. At the time
of introduction I had not caught Miss Evans'
name, and when we were here together at this crit-
ical moment I thought it important to ask, and
she gave me her name. Meantime the crew were
working on the roof of the officers' quarters to
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 37
cut loose one of the Engelhardt boats. All this
took place more quickly than it takes to write it.
Meantime, I will describe what was going on at
the quarter where I left LightoUer loading the last
boat on the port side. The information was ob-
tained personally from him, in answer to my care-
ful questioning during the next few days on board
the Carpathia, when I made notes thereof, which
were confirmed again the next week in Washing-
ton, where we were both summoned before the
Senate Investigating Committee. *'Men from the
steerage,'' he said, ''rushed the boat.'' "Rush"
is the word he used, meaning they got in without
his permission. He drew his pistol and ordered
them out, threatening to shoot if they attempted
to enter the boat again. I presume it was in con-
sequence of this incident that the crew established
the line which I encountered, presently referred to,
which blocked the men passengers from approach-
ing the last boat loaded on the port side forward,
where we had been, and the last one that was
safely loaded from the ship.
During thi^ very short interval I was on the
starboard side, as described, next to the rail, with
Mrs. Brown and Miss Evans, when I heard a
member of the crew, coming from the quarter
where the last boat was loaded, say that there was
room for more ladies in it. I immediately seized
38 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TITANIc''
each lady by the arm, and, with Miss Evans on my
right and Mrs. Brown on my left, hurried, with
three other ladles following us, toward the port
side; but I had not proceeded half-way, and near
amidship, when I was stopped by the aforesaid
line of the crew barring my progress, and one of
the officers told me that only the women could
pass.
The story of what now happened to Mrs.
Brown and Miss Evans after they left me must
be told by Mrs. Brown, as related to me by her-
self when I rejoined her next on board the Car-
pathia. Miss Evans led the way, she said, as they
neared the rail where what proved to be the last
lifeboat was being loaded, but in a spirit of most
heroic self-sacrifice Miss Evans insisted upon
Mrs. Brown's taking precedence in being assisted
aboard the boat. "You go first,'' she said. "You
are married and have children." But when Miss
Evans attempted to follow after, she was unable
to do so for some unknown cause. The women in
the boat were not able, it would appear, to pull
Miss Evans in. It was necessary for her first to
clear the four feet high ship's gunwale, and no
man or member of the crew was at this particular
point to lift her over. I have questioned Mr.
LightoUer several times about this, but he has not
been able to give any satisfactory explanation and
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 39
cannot understand it, for when he gave orders to
lower away, there was no woman in sight. I have
further questioned him as to whether there was
an interval between the ship's rail and the life-
boat he was loading, but he says, "No,'* for until
the very last boat he stood, as has already been de-
scribed, with one foot planted on the ship's gun-
wale and the other in the lifeboat. I had thought
that the list of the ship might have caused too
much of an interval for him to have done this.
Perhaps what I have read in a letter of Mrs.
Brown may furnish some reason why Miss Evans'
efforts to board the lifeboat, in which there was
plenty of room for her, were unavailing. "Never
mind," she is said to have called out, "I will go
on a later boat." She then ran away and was not
seen again; but there was no later boat, and it
would seem that after a momentary impulse, be-
ing disappointed and being unable to get into the
boat, she went aft on the port side, and no one
saw her again. Neither the second officer nor I
saw any women on the deck during the interval
thereafter of fifteen or twenty minutes before the
great ship sank.
An inspection of the American and British Re-
ports shows that all women and children of the
first cabin were saved except five. Out of the one
hundred and fifty these were the five lost: (i)
40 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
Miss Evans; (2) Mrs. Straus; (3) Mrs. H. J.
Allison, of Montreal; (4) her daughter, Miss
Allison, and (5) Miss A. E. Isham, of New York.
The first two have already been accounted for.
Mrs. Allison and Miss Allison could have been
saved had they not chosen to remain on the ship.
They refused to enter the lifeboat unless Mr. Alli-
son was allowed to go with them. This statement
was made in my presence by Mrs. H. A. Casso-
beer, of New York, who related it to Mrs. Alli-
son's brother, Mr. G. F. Johnston, and myself.
Those of us who survived among the first cabin
passengers will remember this beautiful Mrs. Alli-
son, and will be glad to know of the heroic mould
in which she was cast, as exemplified by her fate,
which was similar to that of another, Mrs. Straus,
who has been memorialized the world over. The
fifth lady lost was Miss A. E. Isham, and she is
the only one of whom no survivor, so far as I can
learn, is able to give any information whatever as
to where she was or what she did on that fateful
Sunday night. Her relatives, learning that her
stateroom. No. C, 49, adjoined mine, wrote me in
the hope that I might be able to furnish some in-
formation to their sorrowing hearts about her last
hours on the shipwrecked Titanic, It was with
much regret that I replied that I had not seen my
neighbor at any time, and, not having the pleasure
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 41
of her acquaintance, identification was impossible.
I was, however, glad to be able to assure her fam-
ily of one point, viz., that she did not meet with
the horrible fate which they feared, in being
locked in her stateroom and drowned. I had re-
visited my stateroom twice after being aroused by
the collision, and am sure that she was fully
warned of what had happened, and after she left
her stateroom it was locked behind her, as was
mine.
The simple statement of fact that all of the first
cabin women were sent off in the lifeboats and
saved, except five — three of whom met heroic
death through choice and two by some mischance
— is in itself the most sublime tribute that could
be paid to the self-sacrifice and the gallantry of the
first cabin men, including all the grand heroes who
sank with the ship and those of us who survived
their fate. All authentic testimony of both first
and second cabin passengers is also in evidence
that the Captain's order for women and children
to be loaded first met with the unanimous approval
of us all, and in every instance was carried out
both in letter and in spirit. In Second Officer Ligh-
toller^s testimony before the Senate Committee,
when asked whether the Captain's order was a
rule of the sea, he answered that it was "the rule
of human nature." There is no doubt in my mind
42 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
that the men at that quarter where we were would
have adopted the same rule spontaneously whether
ordered by the Captain, or not. Speaking from
my own personal observation, which by compari-
son with that of the second officer I find in ac-
cord with his, all six boat loads, including the last,
departed with women and children only, with not
a man passenger except Major Peuchen, whose
services were enlisted to replace the lack of crew.
I may say further that with the single exception of
Colonel Astor's plea for the protection of his wife,
in delicate condition, there was not one who made
a move or a suggestion to enter a boat.
While the light was dim on the decks it was al-
ways sufficient for me to recognize anyone with
whom I was acquainted, and I am happy in being
able to record the names of those I know beyond
any doubt whatever, as with me In these last ter-
rible scenes when Lightoller^s boats were being
lowered and after the last Hfeboat had left the
ship. The names of these were: James Clinch
Smith, Colonel John Jacob Astor, Mr. John B.
Thayer and Mr. George D. Widener. So far as
I know, and my research has been exhaustive, I am
the sole surviving passenger who was with or as-
sisted Lightoller in the loading of the last boats.
When I first saw and realized that every lifeboat
had left the ship, the sensation felt was not an
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 43
agreeable one. No thought of fear entered my
head, but I experienced a feeling which others may
recall when holding the breath in the face of some
frightful emergency and when ^'vox faucibus
hassit/' as frequently happened to the old Trojan
hero of our school days. This was the nearest ap-
proach to fear, if it can be so characterized, that
is discernible in an analysis of my actions or feel-
ings while in the midst of the many dangers which
beset me during that night of terror. Though
still worse and seemingly many hopeless conditions
soon prevailed, and unexpected ones, too, when I
felt that "any moment might be my last," I had
no time to contemplate danger when there was
continuous need of quick thought, action and com-
posure withal. Had I become rattled for a mo-
ment, or in the slightest degree been undecided
during the several emergencies presently cited, I
am certain that I never should have lived to tell the
tale of my miraculous escape. For it is eminently
fitting, in gratitude to my Maker, that I should
make the acknowledgment that I know of no re-
corded instance of Providential deliverance more
directly attributable to cause and effect, illustrat-
ing the efficacy of prayer and how "God helps
those who help themselves." I should have only
courted the fate of many hundreds of others had I
supinely made no effort to supplement my prayers
44 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tiTANIC"
with all the strength and power which He has
granted to me. While I said to myself, '^Good-
bye to all at home," I hoped and prayed for es-
cape. My mind was nerved to do the duty of the
moment, and my muscles seemed to be hardened
in preparation for any struggle that might come.
When I learned that there was still another boat,
the Engelhardt, on the roof of the officers* quar-
ters, I felt encouraged with the thought that here
was a chance of getting 'away before the ship sank;
but what was one boat among so many eager to
board her?
During my short absence in conducting the
ladies to a position of safety, Mr. Thayer and Mr*
Widener had disappeared, but I know not whither.
Mr. Widener's son, Harry, was probably with
them, but Mr. Thayer supposed that his young
son, Jack, had left the ship in the same boat with
his mother. Messrs. Thayer and Widener must
have gone toward the stern during the short in-
terval of my absence. No one at this point had
jumped into the sea. If there had been any, both
Clinch Smith and I would have known it. After
the water struck the bridge forward there were
many who rushed aft, climbed over the rail and
jumped, but I never saw one of them.
I was now working with the crew at the davits
on the starboard side forward, adjusting them,
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 45
ready for lowering the Engelhardt boat from the
roof of the officers' house to the Boat Deck below.
Some one of the crew on the roof, where it was,
sang out, "Has any passenger a knife?" I took
mine out of my pocket and tossed it to him, say-
ing, "Here is a small penknife, if that will do any
good." It appeared to me then that there was
more trouble than there ought to have been in
removing the canvas cover and cutting the boat
loose, and that some means should have been
available for doing this without any delay. Mean-
time, four or five long oars were placed aslant
against the walls of the officers' house to break the
fall of the boat, which was pushed from the roof
and slipped with a crash down on the Boat Deck,
smashing several of the oars. Clinch Smith and I
scurried out of the way and stood leaning with
our backs against the rail, watching this procedure
and feeling anxious lest the boat might have been
stove in, or otherwise injured so as to cause her to
leak in the water. The account of the junior
Marconi operator, Harold S. Bride, supplements
mine. "I saw a collapsible boat," he said, "near
a funnel, and went over to it. Twelve men were
trying to boost it down to the Boat Deck. They
were having an awful time. It was the last boat
left. I looked at it longingly a few minutes; then
I gave a hand and over she went."
46 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TITANIC
About this time I recall that an officer on the
roof of the house called down to the crew at this
quarter, "Are there any seamen down there among
you?" "Aye, aye, sir," was the response, and
quite a number left the Boat Deck to assist in
what I supposed to have been the cutting loose
of the other Engelhardt boat up there on the roof.
Again I heard an inquiry for another knife. I
thought I recognized the voice of the second of-
ficer working up there with the crew. Lightoller
has told me, and has written me as well, that
"boat A on the starboard side did not leave the
ship," * while "B was thrown down to the Boat
Deck," and was the one on which he and I even-
tually climbed. The crew had thrown the Engel-
hardt boat to the deck, but I did not understand
why they were so long about launching it, unless
they were waiting to cut the other one loose and
launch them both at the same time. Two young
men of the crew, nice looking, dressed in white,
one tall and the other smaller, were coolly debat-
ing as to whether the compartments would hold
the ship afloat. They were standing with their
backs to the rail looking on at the rest of the crew,
and I recall asking one of them why he did not
assist.
* With the evidence on the subject presented later he recog-
nizes that Boat A floated away and was afterwards utiliaed,
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 47
At this time there were other passengers
around, but Clinch Smith was the only one asso-
ciated with me here to the last. It was about this
time, fifteen minutes after the launching of the last
lifeboat on the port side, that I heard a noise that
spread consternation among us all. This was no
less than the water striking the bridge and gur-
gling up the hatchway forward. It seemed mo-
mentarily as if it would reach the Boat Deck. It
appeared as if it would take the crew a long time
to turn the Engelhardt boat right side up and lift
it over the rail, and there were so many ready to
board her that she would have been swamped.
Probably taking these points into consideration.
Clinch Smith made the proposition that we should
leave and go toward the stern, still on the star-
board side, so he started and I followed imme-
diately after him. We had taken but a few steps
in the direction indicated when there arose before
us from the decks below, a mass of humanity sev-
eral lines deep, covering the Boat Deck, facing us,
and completely blocking our passage toward the
stern.
There were women in the crowd, as well
as men, and they seemed to be steerage passengers
who had just come up from the decks below. In-
stantly, when they saw us and the water on the
deck chasing us from behind, they turned in the
48 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TITANIC
opposite direction towards the stern. This
brought them at that point plumb against the iron
fence and railing which divide the first and second
cabin passengers. Even among these people there
was no hysterical cry, or evidence of panic, but oh,
the agony of it! Clinch Smith and I instantly saw
that we could make no progress ahead, and with
the water following us behind over the deck, we
were in a desperate place. I can never forget the
exact point on the ship where he and I were lo-
cated, viz., at the opening of the angle made by
the walls of the officers^ house and only a short
distance abaft the Titanic's forward ^'expansion
joint." Clinch Smith was immediately on my left,
nearer the apex of the angle, and our backs were
turned toward the ship^s rail and the sea. Look-
ing up toward the roof of the ofKcers' house I
saw a man to the right of me and above lying on
his stomach on the roof, with his legs dangling
over. Clinch Smith jumped to reach this roof, and
I promptly followed. The efforts of both of us
failed. I was loaded down with heavy long-skirted
overcoat and Norfolk coat beneath, with clumsy
life-preserver over all, which made my jump fall
short. As I came down, the water struck my right
side. I crouched down into it preparatory to
jumping with it, and rose as if on the crest of a
wave on the seashore. This expedient brought the
STRUCK BY AN ICEBERG 49
attainment of the object I had in view. I was able
to reach the roof and the iron railing that is along
the edge of it, and pulled myself over on top of the
officers' house on my stomach near the base of the
second funnel. The feat which I instinctively ac-
complished was the simple one, familiar to all
bathers in the surf at the seashore. I had no time
to advise Clinch Smith to adopt it. To my utter
dismay, a hasty glance to my left and right
showed that he had not followed my example, and
that the wave, if I may call it such, which had
mounted me to the roof, had completely covered
him, as well as all people on both sides of me, in-
cluding the man I had first seen athwart the roof.
I was thus parted forever from my friend.
Clinch Smith, with whom I had agreed to remain
to the last struggle. I felt almost a pang of re-
sponsibility for our separation; but he was not in
sight and there was no chance of rendering assis-
tance. His ultimate fate is a matter of conjecture.
Hemmed in by the mass of people toward the
stern, and cornered in the locality previously de-
scribed, it seems certain that as the ship keeled
over and sank, his body was caught in the angle or
in the coils of rope and other appurtenances on the
deck and borne down to the depths below. There
could not be a braver man than James Clinch
Smith. He was the embodiment of coolness and
50 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
courage during the whole period of the disaster.
While in constant touch and communication with
him at the various points on the ship when we
were together on this tragic night, he never showed
the slightest sign of fear, but manifested the same
quiet imperturbable manner so well known to all of
his friends, who join with his family in mourn-
ing his loss. His conduct should be an inspiration
to us all, and an appropriate epitaph to his mem-
ory taken from the words of Christ would be:
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man
lay down his life for his friend."
CHAPTER III
THE FOUNDERING OF THE ''tITANIC''
**There is sorrow on the sea; it cannot be quiet.'*
— Jeremiah 49:23.
BEFORE I resume the story of my personal
escape It is pertinent that I should, at this
juncture, discuss certain points wherein the
statements of survivors are strangely at variance.
First: Was there an explosion of the ship's
boilers?
I am of opinion that there was none, because I
should have been conscious of It. When aboard
ship I should have heard It and felt It, but I did
not. As my senses were on the lookout for every
danger, I cannot conceive It possible that an ex-
plosion occurred without my being made aware of
It. When I went down holding on to the ship and
was under water, I heard no sound Indicating any-
thing of the sort, and when I came to the surface
there was no ship in sight. Furthermore, there
was no perceptible wave which such a disturbance
would have created.
The two ranking surviving officers of the Ti-
51
52 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE *'tITANIC"
tank, viz., Second Officer Lightoller and Third
Officer Pitman, with whom I had a discussion on
this and other points in almost daily conversation
in my cabin on the Carpathia, agreed with me that
there was no explosion of the boilers. The second
officer and myself had various similar experiences,
and, as will be noticed in the course of this narra-
tive, we were very near together during all the
perils of that awful night. The only material dif-
ference worth noting was the manner in which
each parted company with the ship, and finally
reached the bottom-up Engelhardt boat on top
of which we made our escape. According to his
testimony before the Senate Committee, he stood
on the roof of the officers' quarters in front of
the first funnel, facing forward, and as the ship
dived, he dived also, while I held on to the iron
railing on the same roof, near the second funnel,
as has been described, and as the ship sank I was
pulled down with it. The distance between us on
the ship was then about fifteen yards.
There are so many newspaper and other pub-
lished reports citing the statements of certain sur-
vivors as authority for this story of an explosion
of the boilers that the reading world generally has
been made to believe it. Among the names of
passengers whose alleged statements (I have re-
ceived letters repudiating some of these inter-
FOUNDERING OF THE TITANIC 53
views) are thus given credence, I have read those
of Miss Cornelia Andrews, of Hudson, N. Y.;
Mrs. W. E. Carter, of Philadelphia, Pa.; Mr.
John Pillsbury Snyder, of Minneapolis, Minn.;
Miss Minahan, of Fond du Lac, Wis., and Lady
Duff Gordon, of England, all of whom, according
to the newspaper reports, describe their position
in the lifeboats around the ship and how they
heard, or saw, the "ship blow up,'' or "the boilers
explode" with one or two explosions just before
the ship sank out of their sight. On the other
hand, Mr. Hugh Woolner told me on the Car-
pathia that from his position in the lifeboat, which
he claims was the nearest one to the Titanic when
she sank some seventy-five yards away, there
was a terrific noise on the ship, as she slanted to-
wards the head before the final plunge, which
sounded like the crashing of millions of dishes of
crockery. Woolner and I when on board the
CarpathiUy as presently described, had our cabin
together, where we were visited by Oflicers Ligh-
toUer and Pitman. This was one of the points we
discussed together, and the conclusion was at once
reached as to the cause of this tremendous crash.
Since then, Lightoller has been subjected to rigid
examination before this country's and England's
Investigating Committees, and has been a party
to discussions with experts, including the designers
54 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^'tiTANIC"
and builders of the Titanic. His conclusion ex-
pressed on the Carpathia is now strengthened, and
he says that there was no explosion of the boilers
and that the great noise which was mistaken for
it was due to "the boilers leaving their beds" on
E Deck when the ship was aslant and, with their
great weight, sliding along the deck, crushing and
tearing through the doomed vessel forward to-
ward the bow. Third Officer Pitman also gave
his testimony on this, as well as the next point con-
sidered. Before the Senate Committee he said:
"Then she turned right on end and made a big
plunge forward. The Titanic did not break
asunder. I heard reports like big guns in the dis-
tance. I assumed the great bulkheads had gone
to pieces." Cabin-steward Samuel Rule said: "I
think the noise we heard was that of the boilers
and engines breaking away from their seatings
and falling down through the forward bulkhead.
At the time it occurred, the ship was standing
nearly upright in the water."
The peculiar way in which the Titanic is
described as hesitating and assuming a ver-
tical position before her final dive to the depths
below can be accounted for only on this hypothesis
of the sliding of the boilers from their beds. A
second cabin passenger, Mr. Lawrence Beesley,
a Cambridge University man, has written an ex-
FOUNDERING OF THE "TITANIC"' 55
cellent book about the Titanic disaster, dwelling
especially upon the lessons to be learned from it.
His account given to the newspapers also contains
the most graphic description from the viewpoint
of those in the lifeboats, telling how the great ship
looked before her final plunge. He *Svas a mile
or two miles away," he writes, "when the oars-
men lay on their oars and all in the lifeboat were
motionless as we watched the ship in absolute si-
lence — save some who would not look and buried
their heads on each others' shoulders.
As we gazed awe-struck, she tilted slightly up, re-
volving apparently about a centre of gravity just
astern of amidships until she attained a vertical
upright position, and there she remained — motion-
less! As she swung up, her lights, which had
shown without a flicker all night, went out sud-
denly, then came on again for a single flash and
then went out altogether; and as they did so there
came a noise which many people, wrongly, I think,
have described as an explosion. It has always
seemed to me that it was nothing but the engines
and machinery coming loose from their place and
bearings and falling through the compartments,
smashing everything in their way. It was partly
a roar, partly a groan, partly a rattle and partly a
smash, and it was not a sudden roar as an explo-
sion would be; it went on successively for some
56 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
seconds, possibly fifteen or twenty, as the heavy
machinery dropped down to the bottom (now the
bows) of the ship; I suppose It fell through the
end and sank first before the ship. (For evidence
of shattered timbers, see Hagan's testimony, page
85.) But it was a noise no one had heard before
and no one wishes to hear again. It was stupefy-
ing, stupendous, as it came to us along the water.
It was as if all the heavy things one could think
of had been thrown downstairs from the top of a
house, smashing each other, and the stairs and
everything in the way.
^'Several apparently authentic accounts have been
given in which definite stories of explosions have
been related — in some cases even with wreckage
blown up and the ship broken in two ; but I think
such accounts will not stand close analysis. In
the first place, the fires had been withdrawn and
the steam allowed to escape some time before she
sank, and the possibility from explosion from this
cause seems very remote.'*
Second: Did the ship break in two?
I was on the Carpathia when I first heard any
one make reference to this point. The seventeen-
year-old son of Mr. John B. Thayer, **Jack"
Thayer, Jr., and his young friend from Philadel-
phia, R. N. Williams, Jr., the tennis expert, in de-
scribing their experiences to me were positive that
FOUNDERING OF THE TITANIC 57
they saw the ship split in two. This was from
their position in the water on the starboard quar-
ter. *^Jack" Thayer gave this same description to
an artist, who reproduced it in an illustration in
the New York Herald, which many of us have
seen. Some of the passengers, whose names I
have just mentioned, are also cited by the news-
papers as authority for the statements that the
ship ''broke in two," that she "buckled amidships,"
that she **was literally torn to pieces," etc. On
the other hand, there is much testimony available
which is at variance with this much-advertised sen-
sational newspaper account. Summing up its in-
vestigation of this point the Senate Committee's
Report reads: "There have been many conflicting
statements as to whether the ship broke in two,
but the preponderance of evidence is to the effect
that she assumed an almost end-on position and
sank intact." This was as LightoUer testified be-
fore the Committee, that the Titanic^ s decks were
"absolutely intact" when she went down. On this
point, too, Beesley is in accord, from his viewpoint
in the lifeboat some distance away out of danger,
whence, more composedly than others, he could
see the last of the ill-fated ship as the men lay on
their oars watching until she disappeared. "No
phenomenon," he continues, "like that pictured in
some American and English papers occurred —
58 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TITANIC
that of the ship breaking in two, and the two ends
being raised above the surface. When the noise
was over, the Titanic was still upright like a col-
umn; we could see her now only as the stern and
some 150 feet of her stood outlined against the
star-specked sky, looming black in the darkness,
and in this position she continued for some min-
utes — I think as much as five minutes — but it may
have been less. Then, as sinking back a little at
the stern, I thought she slid slowly forwards
through the water and dived slantingly down."
From my personal viewpoint I also know that
the Titanic' s decks were intact at the time she sank,
and when I sank with her, there was over seven-
sixteenths of the ship already under water,
and there was no indication then of any im-
pending break of the deck or ship. I recently
visited the sister ship of the Titanic, viz., the
Olympic, at her dock in New York harbor.
This was for the purpose of still further
familiarizing myself with the corresponding locali-
ties which were the scene of my personal expe-
riences on the Titanic, and which are referred to
in this narrative. The only difference in the deck
plan of the sister ship which I noted, and which
the courteous officers of the Olympic mentioned, is
that the latter ship^s Deck A is not glass-enclosed
like the Titanic s; but one of the principal points of
FOUNDERING OF THE "tITANIC'' 59
discovery that I made during my investigation con-
cerns this matter of the alleged breaking in two
of this magnificent ship. The White Star Line
officers pointed out to me what they called the
ship's ^'forward expansion joint," and they
claimed the Titanic was so constructed that she
must have split in two at this point, if she did so
at all. I was interested in observing that this "ex-
pansion joint" was less than twelve feet forward
from that point on the Boat Deck whence I
jumped, as described (to the iron railing on the
roof of the officers' quarters). It is indicated by
a black streak of leather-covering running trans-
versely across the deck and then up the vertical
white wall of the officers' house. This "joint" ex-
tends, however, only through the Boat Deck and
Decks A and B, which are superimposed on Deck
C. If there was any splitting in two, it seems to
me also that this superstructure, weakly joined,
would have been the part to split; but it certainly
did not. It was only a few seconds before the
time of the alleged break that I stepped across this
dividing line of the two sections and went down
with the after section about twelve feet from this
"expansion joint."
One explanation which I offer of what must
be a delusion on the part of the advocates of the
"break-in-two" theory is that when the forward
6o THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tiTANIC"
funnel fell, as hereafter described, it may have
looked as If the ship itself was splitting in two, par-
ticularly to the young men who are cited as au-
thority.
Third: Did either the Captain or the First Of-
ficer shoot himself?
Notwithstanding all the current rumors and
newspaper statements answering this question af-
firmatively, I have been unable to find any passen-
ger or member of the crew cited as authority for
the statement that either Captain Smith or First
Officer Murdoch did anything of the sort. On the
contrary, so far as relates to Captain Smith, there
are several witnesses, including Harold S. Bride,
the junior Marconi operator, who saw him at the
last on the bridge of his ship, and later, when sink-
ing and struggling in the water. Neither can I dis-
cover any authentic testimony about First Officer
Murdoch's shooting himself. On the contrary, I
find fully sufficient evidence that he did not. He
was a brave and efficient officer and no sufficient
motive for self-destruction can be advanced. He
performed his full duty under difficult circum-
stances, and was entitled to praise and honor.
During the last fifteen minutes before the ship
sank, I was located at that quarter forward on the
Boat Deck, starboard side, where Murdoch was
in command and where the crew under him were
FOUNDERING OF THE "tITANIC" 6 1
engaged in the vain attempt of launching the
Engelhardt boat. The report of a pistol shot dur-
ing this interval ringing in my ears within a few
feet of me would certainly have attracted my at-
tention, and later, when I moved astern, the dis-
tance between us was not so great as to prevent my
hearing it. The "big wave" or "giant wave," de-
scribed by Harold Bride, swept away Murdoch
and the crew from the Boat Deck first before it
struck me, and when I rose with it to the roof of
the officers' house. Bride's reported testimony fits
in with mine so far as relates to time, place, and
circumstance, and I quote his words as follows :
"About ten minutes before the ship sank, Captain
Smith gave word for every man to look to his own
safety. I sprang to aid the men struggling to
launch the life raft (Engelhardt boat), and we
had succeeded in getting it to the edge of the ship
when a giant wave carried it away." Lightoller
also told me on board the Carpathia that he saw
Murdoch when he was engulfed by the water and
that if before this a pistol had been fired within
the short distance that separated them, he also is
confident that he would have heard It.
Fourth: On which side did the ship list?
The testimony on this point, which at first blush
appears conflicting, proves on investigation not at
all so, but just what was to be expected from the
62 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ^'tITANIC**
mechanical construction of the ship. We find the
most authoritative testimony in evidence that the
Titanic listed on the starboard side, and again, on
equally authoritative testimony, that she listed on
the port side. Quartermaster Hitchens, who was
at the wheel when the iceberg struck the ship, tes-
tified on this point before the Senate Committee
as follows : ''The Captain came back to the wheel
house and looked at the commutator (clinome-
ter) in front of the compass, which is a little in-
strument like a clock to tell you how the ship is
listing. The ship had a list of five degrees to the
starboard about five or ten minutes after the im-
pact. Mr. Karl Behr, the well-known tennis
player, interviewed by the New York Tribune is
quoted as saying: "We had just retired when the
collision came. I pulled on my clothes and went
down the deck to the Beckwith cabin and, after I
had roused them, I noted that the ship listed to the
starboard, and that was the first thing that made
me think that we were in for serious trouble." On
the other hand, the first time I noticed this list was,
as already described in my narrative, when I met
Clinch Smith in the companionway and we saw a
slight list to port, which gave us the first warning
of how serious the accident was. The next and
last time, as has also been described, was when
Second Officer Lightoller ordered all pasengers to
FOUNDERING OF THE *'tiTANIC" 6^
the starboard side because of the very palpable
list to port, when the great ship suddenly appeared
to be about to topple over. Lightoller also cor-
roborates the statement as to this list on the port
side. Other witnesses might be quoted, some of
whom testify to the starboard list, and others to
the one to port. The conclusion, therefore, is
reached that the Titanic listed at one time to star-
board and at another time to port. This is as it
should be because of the transverse water-tight
compartments which made the water, immediately
after the compact, rush from the starboard quar-
ter to the port, and then back again, keeping the
ship balancing on her keel until she finally sank.
If she had been constructed otherwise, with longi-
tudinal compartments only, it is evident that after
the impact on the starboard side, the Titanic would
have listed only to the starboard side, and after a
very much shorter interval would have careened
over on that quarter, and a much smaller propor-
tion of lives would have been saved.
CHAPTER IV
STRUGGLING IN THE WATER FOR LIFE
*'Out of the deep have I called unto Thee^ O Lord."
— Ps. 130:1.
I NOW resume the narrative description of my
miraculous escape, and it is with consider-
able diffidence that I do so, for the personal
equation monopolizes more attention than may be
pleasing to my readers who are not relatives or
intimate friends.
As may be noticed in Chapter II, it was Clinch
Smith's suggestion and on his initiative that we
left that point on the starboard side of the Boat
Deck where the crew, under Chief Officer Wilde
and First Officer Murdoch, were in vain trying to
launch the Engelhardt boat B which had been
thrown down from the roof of the officers' quar-
ters forward of the first funnel. I say "Boat B"
because I have the information to that effect in a
letter from Second Officer Lightoller. Confirma-
tion of this statement I also find in the reported
interview of a Saloon Steward, Thomas Whitely,
in the New York Tribune the day after the Car-
64
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 65
pathia!s arrival. An analysis of his statement
shows that Boat A became entangled and was
abandoned, while he saw the other, bottom up and
filled with people. It was on this boat that he
also eventually climbed and was saved with the
rest of us. Clinch Smith and I got away from this
point just before the water reached It and drowned
Chief Officer Wilde and First Officer Murdoch,
and others who were not successful In effecting a
lodgment on the boat as It was swept off the deck.
This moment was the first fateful crisis of the
many that Immediately followed. As bearing
upon It I quote the reported statement of Harold
S. Bride, the junior Marconi operator. His ac-
count also helps to determine the fate of Captain
Smith. He says : "Then came the Captain's voice
[from the bridge to the Marconi operators],
'Men, you have done your full duty. You can do
no more. Abandon your cabin. Now, it is every
man for himself.' '' ''Phillips continued to work,"
he says, "for about ten minutes or about fifteen
minutes after the Captain had released him. The
water was then coming into our cabin. ... I
went to the place where I had seen the collapsible
boat on the Boat Deck and to my surprise I saw
the boat, and the men still trying to push it off.
They could not do it. I went up to them and was
just lending a hand when a large wave came awash
66 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC"
of the deck. The big wave carried the boat off.
I had hold of an oarlock and I went off with it.
The next I knew I was in the boat. But that was
not all. I was in the boat and the boat was up-
side down and I was under it. . . . How I
got out from under the boat I do not know, but I
felt a breath at last."
From this it appears evident that, so far
as Clinch Smith is concerned, it would have
been better to have stayed by this Engelhardt
boat to the last, for here he had a cThance
of escape like Bride and others of the crew who
clung to it, but which I only reached again after
an incredibly long swim under water. The next
crisis, which was the fatal one to Clinch Smith and
to the great mass of people that suddenly arose
before us as I followed him astern, has already
been described. The simple expedient of jump-
ing with the ''big wave'' as demonstrated above
carried me to safety, away from a dangerous posi-
tion to the highest part of the ship; but I was the
only one who adopted it successfully. The force
of the wave that struck Clinch Smith and the oth-
ers undoubtedly knocked most of them there un-
conscious against the walls of the officers' quarters
and other appurtenances of the ship on the Boat
Deck. As the ship keeled over forward, I believe
that their bodies were caught in the angles of this
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 6^
deck, or entangled in the ropes, and in these other
appurtenances thereon, and sank with the ship.
My holding on to the iron railing justwhen I did
prevented my being knocked unconscious. I pulled
myself over on the roof on my stomach, but before
I could get to my feet I was in a whirlpool of
water, swirling round and round, as I still tried to
cling to the railing as the ship plunged to the
depths below. Down, down, I went: it seemed a
great distance. There was a very noticeable pres-
sure upon my ears, though there must have been
plenty of air that the ship carried down with it.
When under water I retained, as it appears, a
sense of general direction, and, as soon as I could
do so, swam away from the starboard side of the
ship, as I knew my life depended upon it. I swani
with all my strength, and I seemed endowed with
an extra supply for the occasion. I was incited to
desperate effort by the thought of boiling water,
or steam, from the expected explosion of the ship's
boilers, and that I would be scalded to death, like
the sailors of whom I had read in the account of
the British battle-ship Victoria sunk in collision
with the Camperdown in the Mediterranean in
1893. Second Officer Lightoller told me he also
had the same idea, and that if the fires had not
been drawn the boilers would explode and the
water become boiling hot. As a consequence, the
68 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC**
plunge in the icy water produced no sense of cold-
ness whatever, and I had no thought of cold until
later on when I climbed on the bottom of the up-
turned boat. My being drawn down by suction to
a greater depth was undoubtedly checked to some
degree by the life-preserver which I wore, but it
is to the buoyancy of the water, caused by the
volume of air rising from the sinking ship, that I
attributed the assistance which enabled me to strike
out and swim faster and further under water than
I ever did before. I held my breath for what
seemed an interminable time until I could scarcely
stand it any longer, but I congratulated myself
then and there that not one drop of sea-water was
allowed to enter my mouth. With renewed de-
termination and set jaws, I swam on. Just at
the moment I thought that for lack of breath
I would have to give in, I seemed to have been
provided with a second wind, and it was just then
that the thought that this was my last moment
came upon me. I wanted to convey the news of
how I died to my loved ones at home. As I swam
beneath the surface of the ocean, I prayed that
my spirit could go to them and say, *'Good-bye,
until we meet again in heaven." In this connec-
tion, the thought was in my mind of a well authen-
ticated experience of mental telepathy that oc-
curred to a member of my wife's family. Here
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 69
in my case was a similar experience of a ship-
wrecked loved one, and I thought if I prayed hard
enough that this, my last wish to communicate
with my wife and daughter, might be granted.
To what extent my prayer was answered let
Mrs. Gracie describe in her own written words,
as follows : **I was in my room at my sister's
house, where I was visiting, in New York. After
retiring, being unable to rest I questioned myself
several times over, wondering what it was that
prevented the customary long and peaceful slum-
ber, lately enjoyed. What is the matter?' I
uttered. A voice in reply seemed to say, *On
your knees and pray.' Instantly, I literally obeyed
with my prayer book in my hand, which by chance
opened at the prayer Tor those at Sea.' The
thought then flashed through my mind, ^Archie
is praying for me.' I continued wide awake until
a little before five o'clock a. m., by the watch
that lay beside me. About 7 a. m. I dozed a
while and then got up to dress for breakfast. At
8 o'clock my sister, Mrs. Dalliba Button, came
softly to the door, newspaper in hand, to gently
break the tragic news that the Titanic had sunk,
and showed me the list of only twenty names
saved, headed with 'Colonel Archibald Butt' ; but
my husband's name was not included. My head
sank in her protecting arms as I murmured help-
70 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE "tITANIC''
Icssly, *He Is all I have in the whole world.' I
could only pray for strength, and later In the day,
believing myself a widow, I wrote to my daughter,
who was in the care of our housekeeper and ser-
vants In our Washington home, 'Cannot you see
your father in his tenderness for women and
children, helping them all, and then going down
with the ship? If he has gone, I will not live
long, but I would not have him take a boat.' "
But let me now resume my personal narrative.
With this second wind under water there came to
me a new lease of life and strength, until finally
I noticed by the increase of light that I was draw-
ing near to the surface. Though It was not day-
light, the clear star-lit night made a noticeable
difference in the degree of Hght Immediately be-
low the surface of the water. As I was rising,
I came in contact with ascending wreckage, but
the only thing I struck of material size was a
small plank, which I tucked under my right arm.
This circumstance brought with it the reflection
that It was advisable for me to secure what best
I could to keep me afloat on the surface until
succor arrived. When my head at last rose above
the water, I detected a piece of wreckage like a
wooden crate, and I eagerly seized it as a nucleus
of the projected raft to be constructed from
what flotsam and jetsam I might collect. Look-
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 7 1
ing about me, I could see no Titanic In sight. She
had entirely disappeared beneath the calm surface
of the ocean and without a sign of any wave.
That the sea had swallowed her up with all her
precious belongings was indicated by the slight
sound of a gulp behind me as the water closed
over her. The length of time that I was under
water can be estimated by the fact that I sank
with her, and when I came up there was no ship
in sight. The accounts of others as to the length
of time it took the Titanic to sink afford the
best measure of the interval I was below the sur-
face.
What impressed me at the time that my
eyes beheld the horrible scene was a thin light-
gray smoky vapor that hung like a pall a few feet
above the broad expanse of sea that was covered
with a mass of tangled wreckage. That it was
a tangible vapor, and not a product of imagina-
tion, I feel well assured. It may have been caused
by smoke or steam rising to the surface around
the area where the ship had sunk. At any rate
it produced a supernatural effect, and the pictures
I had seen by Dante and the description I had
read in my Virgil of the infernal regions, of
Charon, and the River Lethe, were then upper-
most in my thoughts. Add to this, within the
area described, which was as far as my eyes could
72 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ''tITANIC"
reach, there arose to the sky the most horrible
sounds ever heard by mortal man except by those
of us who survived this terrible tragedy. The
agonizing cries of death from over a thousand
throats, the wails and groans of the suffering,
the shrieks of the terror-stricken and the awful
gaspings for breath of those in the last throes of
drowning, none of us will ever forget to our
dying day. *'Help! Help! Boat ahoy! Boat
ahoy!" and '^My God! My God!'' were the
heart-rending cries and shrieks of men, which
floated to us over the surface of the dark waters
continuously for the next hour, but as time went
on, growing weaker and weaker until they died
out entirely.
As I clung to my wreckage, I noticed just
in front of me, a few yards away, a group
of three bodies with heads in the water, face
downwards, and just behind me to my right an-
other body, all giving unmistakable evidence of
being drowned. Possibly these had gone down
to the depths as I had done, but did not have
the lung power that I had to hold the breath and
swim under water, an accomplishment which I
had practised from my school days. There was
no one alive or struggling in the water or calling
for aid within the immediate vicinity of where
I arose to the surface. I threw my right leg
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 73
over the wooden crate in an attempt to straddle
and balance myself on top of it, but I turned
over in a somersault with it under water, and
up to the surface again. What may be of interest
is the thought that then occurred to me of the
accounts and pictures of a wreck, indelibly im-
pressed upon my memory when a boy, because of
my acquaintance with some of the victims, of a
frightful disaster of that day, namely the wreck
of the Ville de Havre in the English Channel in
1873, ^"d I had in mind Mrs. Bulkley's de-
scription, and the picture of her clinging to some
wreckage as a rescue boat caught sight of her,
bringing the comforting words over the water,
*'We are English sailors coming to save you.*' I
looked around, praying for a similar interposition
of Fate, but I knew the thought of a rescuing boat
was a vain one — for had not all the lifeboats,
loaded with women and children, departed from
the ship fifteen or twenty minutes before I sank
with it? And had I not seen the procession of
them on the port side fading away from our
sight?
But my prayerful thought and hope were
answered in an unexpected direction. I espied
to my left, a considerable distance away, a better
vehicle of escape than the wooden crate on which
my attempt to ride had resulted in a second duck-
74 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE **TITANIC*'
ing. What I saw was no less than the same
Engelhardt, or *'surf-boat," to whose launching
I had lent my efforts, until the water broke upon
the ship's Boat Deck where we were. On top of
this upturned boat, half reclining on her bottom,
were now more than a dozen men, whom, by their
dress, I took to be all members of the crew of
the ship. Thank God, I did not hesitate a mo-
ment in discarding the friendly crate that had been
my first aid. I struck out through the wreckage
and after a considerable swim reached the port
side amidships of this Engelhardt boat, which
with her companions, wherever utilized, did good
service in saving the lives of many others. All
honor to the Dane, Captain Engelhardt of Copen-
hagen, who built them. I say '^port side" because
this boat as it was propelled through the water
had Lightoller in the bow and Bride at the stern,
and I believe an analysis of the testimony shows
that the actual bow of the boat was turned about
by the wave that struck it on the Boat Deck and
the splash of the funnel thereafter, so that its
bow pointed in an opposite direction to that of
the ship. There was one member of the crew
on this craft at the bow and another at the stern
who had ''pieces of boarding," improvised pad-
dles, which were used effectually for propulsion.
When I reached the side of the boat I met with
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 75
a doubtful reception, and, as no extending hand
was held out to me, I grabbed, by the muscle of
the left arm, a young member of the crew
nearest and facing me. At the same time I threw
my right leg over the boat astraddle, pulling my-
self aboard, with a friendly lift to my foot given
by someone astern as I assumed a reclining posi-
tion with them on the bottom of the capsized boat.
Then after me came a dozen other swimmers
who clambered around and whom we helped
aboard. Among them was one completely ex-
hausted, who came on the same port side as my-
self. I pulled him in and he lay face downward
in front of me for several hours, until just before
dawn he was able to stand up with the rest of us.
The journey of our craft from the scene of
the disaster will be described in the following
chapter. The moment of getting aboard this up-
turned boat was one of supreme mental relief,
more so than any other until I reached the deck
of the hospitable Carpathia on the next morning.
I now felt for the first time after the lifeboats
left us aboard ship that I had some chance of
escape from the horrible fate of drowning in the
icy waters of the middle Atlantic. Every moment
of time during the many experiences of that night,
it seemed as if I had all the God-given physical
strength and courage needed for each emergency,
76 THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ''tITANIC"
and never suffered an Instant from any exhaustion,
or required the need of a helping hand. The only
time of any stress whatever was during the swim,
just described, under water, at the moment when
I gained my second wind which brought me to
the surface gasping somewhat, but full of vigor.
I was all the time on the lookout for the next
danger that was to be overcome. I kept my
presence of mind and courage throughout It all.
Had I lost either for one moment, I never could
have escaped to tell the tale. This Is in answer
to many questions as to my personal sensations
during these scenes and the successive dangers
which I encountered. From a psychological view-
point also, it may be a study of interest Illustrat-
ing the power of mind over matter. The sensa-
tion of fear has a visible effect upon one. It
palsies one's thoughts and actions. One becomes
thereby short of breath; the heart actually beats
quicker and as one loses one's head one grows
desperate and is gone. I have questioned those
who have been near drowning and who know this
statement to be a fact. It is the same in other
emergencies, and the lesson to be learned Is that
we should —
"Let courage rise with danger^
And strength to strength oppose.**
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE 77
To attain this courage in the hour of danger is
very much a matter of physical, mental and
religious training. But courage and strength
would have availed me little had I not provi-
dentially escaped from being knocked senseless,
or maimed, as so many other strong swimmers
undoubtedly were. The narrow escapes that I
had from being thus knocked unconscious could
be recapitulated, and I still bear the scars on my
body of wounds received at the moment, or
moments, when I was struck by some unde-
fined object. I received a blow on the top of
my head, but I did not notice it or the other
wounds until I arrived on board the Carpathia,
when I found inflamed cuts on both my legs and
bruises on my knees, which soon became black
and blue, and I was sore to the touch all over
my body for several days.
It is necessary for me to turn to the accounts
of others for a description of what happened dur-
ing the interval that I was under water. My
information about it is derived from many sources
and includes various points of general interest,
showing how the Titanic looked when she foun-
dered, the undisputed facts that there was very
little suction and that the forward funnel broke
from the ship, falling on the starboard side into
the sea. Various points of personal interest are
u^,_ . ^^,^»»