As soon as the dangerous condition of the ship was realized, messages
were sent by the master's orders to all steamers within reach. At 12.15
a. m. the distress signal CQD was sent. This was heard by several
steamships and by Cape Race. By 12.25 Mr. Boxall, the fourth officer,
had worked out the correct position of the _Titanic_, and then another
message was sent: "Come at once, we have struck a berg." This was heard
by the Cunard steamer _Carpathia_, which was at this time bound from New
York to Liverpool and 58 miles away. The _Carpathia_ answered, saying
that she was coming to the assistance of the _Titanic_. This was
reported to Capt. Smith on the boat deck. At 12.26 a message was sent
out, "Sinking; can not hear for noise of steam." Many other messages
were also sent, but as they were only heard by steamers which were too
far away to render help, it is not necessary to refer to them. At 1.45 a
message was heard by the _Carpathia_, "Engine-room full up to boilers."
The last message sent out was "CQ" which was faintly heard by the
steamer _Virginian_. This message was sent at 2.17. It thus appears that
the Marconi apparatus was at work until within a few minutes of the
foundering of the _Titanic_.
Meanwhile Mr. Boxall was sending up distress signals from the deck.
These signals (rockets) were sent off at intervals from a socket by No.
1 emergency boat on the boat deck. They were the ordinary distress
signals, exploding in the air and throwing off white stars. The firing
of these signals began about the time that No. 7 boat was lowered (12.45
a. m.), and it continued until Mr. Boxall left the ship at about 1.45.
Mr. Boxall was also using a Morse light from the bridge in the direction
of a ship whose lights he saw about half a point on the port bow of the
_Titanic_ at a distance, as he thought, of about 5 or 6 miles. He got no
answer. In all, Mr. Boxall fired about eight rockets. There appears to
be no doubt that the vessel whose lights he saw was the _Californian_.
The evidence from the _Californian_ speaks of eight rockets having been
seen between 12.30 and 1.40. The _Californian_ heard none of the
_Titanic's_ messages; she had only one Marconi operator on board and he
was asleep.