HEART-RENDING SCENES ON CARPATHIA.
The Next Day--Caring for the Sick--Meeting of the Survivors--Personal
Wireless Messages Given Precedence--Marconi’s Appeal
Fruitless--Quartermaster Tells Story.
The writer’s narrative continues:
In the hospital and the public rooms lay, in blankets, several others
who had been benumbed by the water. Mrs. Rosa Abbott, who was in the
water for hours, was restored during the day. G. Wikeman, the Titanic’s
barber, who declared he was blown off the ship by the second of the two
explosions after the crash, was treated for bruises. A passenger, who
was thoroughly ducked before being picked up, caused much amusement on
this ship, soon after the doctors were through with him, by demanding a
bath.
Storekeeper Prentice, the last man off the Titanic to reach this ship,
was also soon over the effects of his long swim in the icy waters, into
which he leaped from the poop deck.
The physicians of the Carpathia were praised, as was Chief Steward
Hughes, for work done in making the arrivals comfortable and averting
serious illness.
Monday night on the Carpathia was one of rest. The wailing and sobbing
of the day were hushed as the widows and orphans slept. Tuesday, save
for the crowded condition of the ship, matters took somewhat their
normal appearance.
Tuesday afternoon, in the saloon, a meeting of survivors was held and
plans for a testimonial to the officers and crew of the Carpathia and
the survivors of the Titanic’s crew were discussed. It was decided that
relief of the destitute should first be considered, and the chairman
of the meeting, Samuel Goldenberg, appointed a committee consisting of
I. G. Frauenthal, Mrs. J. J. Brown, William Bushnell and George Stone
to raise a fund. The first subscriptions were for $100 each, and the
amounts were paid largely in travelers’ checks or personal checks, cash
being somewhat scarce among the refugees, who had kept their currency
in the purser’s safe.
Resolutions were adopted praising the Titanic’s surviving officers
and crew and the officers, crew and passengers of the Carpathia,
and declaring that a memorial is needed for “those who in heroic
self-sacrifice made possible the rescue of so many others.” One speaker
suggested that a memorial fund be raised by popular subscription,
mentioning the “World” as a suitable medium. This and other suggestions
were left to the committee to develop.
Rain and fog marked the Carpathia’s homeward course, and those who were
not seasick when New York was reached were none the less sick of the
sea.
CAPTAIN ROSTROM’S RULE.
Captain Rostrom’s rule that personal messages should take precedence
of press messages was not relaxed, even when Tuesday a message from
Guglielm Marconi himself asked the reason why press dispatches were not
sent. The captain posted Marconi’s message on the bulletin board, and
beside it a bulletin stating that no press messages, except a bulletin
to the Associated Press, had been sent. The implication was that none
would be sent, and the most urgent and respectful appeals failed to
change his determination, which, he seemed convinced, was in the best
interest of the survivors and their friends.
My wife was my only active helper in a task which ten newspaper men
could not have performed completely. Mr. S. V. Silverthorne, of St.
Louis, aided greatly by lending me his first cabin passenger list, one
of the few in existence.
Robert Hichens, one of the surviving quartermasters of the Titanic, the
man who was on duty at the wheel when the ship struck the iceberg, told
me the tale of the wreck on the Carpathia Thursday.
Save for the surviving fourth officer, Boxhall, whose lips are sealed,
Hichens saw Sunday night’s tragedy at closer range than any man now
living.
In the hastily compiled list of surviving members of the crew,
the names of Hichens and other quartermasters appear among the
able-bodied seamen; but the star and anchor on the left sleeve of each
distinguishes them in rank from the A. B.’s.
Hichens has followed the sea fifteen years and has a wife and two
children in Southampton. His tale of the wreck, as he told it to me and
as he expects to tell it to a Marine Court of Inquiry, is here given:
“I went on watch at eight o’clock Sunday night and stood by the man at
the wheel until ten. At ten I took the wheel for two hours.
“On the bridge from ten o’clock on were First Officer Murdock, Fourth
Officer Boxhall and Sixth Officer Moody. In the crow’s nest (lookout
tower) were Fleet and another man whose name I don’t know.
SECOND OFFICER ON WATCH.
“Second Officer Lightoller, who was on watch while I stood by, carrying
messages and the like, from eight to ten, sent me soon after eight to
tell the carpenter to look out for the fresh water supply, as it might
be in danger of freezing. The temperature was then 31 degrees. He gave
the crow’s nest a strict order to look out for small icebergs.
“Second Officer Lightoller was relieved by First Officer Murdock at
ten, and I took the wheel then. At 11.40 three gongs sounded from the
crow’s nest, the signal for ‘something right ahead.’
“At the same time one of the men in the nest telephoned to the bridge
that there was a large iceberg right ahead. As Officer Murdoch’s hand
was on the lever to stop the engines the crash came. He stopped the
engines, then immediately by another lever closed the water-tight doors.
“The skipper (Captain Smith) came from the chart room on to the
bridge. His first words were ‘Close the emergency doors.’
“‘They’re already closed, sir,’ Mr. Murdock replied.
“‘Send to the carpenter and tell him to sound the ship,’ was the
skipper’s next order. The message was sent to the carpenter. The
carpenter never came up to report. He was probably the first man on
that ship to lose his life.
[Illustration: COLUMBIA AND BRITANNIA MOURN FOR THE “TITANIC’S” DEAD.]
“The skipper looked at the commutator, which shows in what direction
the ship is listing. He saw that she carried five degrees list to the
starboard.
“The ship was then rapidly settling forward. All the steam sirens were
blowing. By the skipper’s orders, given in the next few minutes, the
engines were put to work at pumping out the ship, distress signals
were sent by Marconi and rockets were sent up from the bridge by
Quartermaster Rowe. All hands were ordered on deck and life belts were
sewed to the crew and to every passenger.
“The stewards and other hands helped the sailors in getting the boats
out. The order ‘women and children first’ was given and enforced. There
was no panic.
“I was at the wheel until 12.25. It was my duty to stay there until
relieved. I was not relieved by anyone else, but was simply sent away
by Second Officer Lightoller, who told me to take charge of a certain
boat and load it with ladies.
“I did so, and there were thirty-two ladies, a sailor and myself in the
boat when it was lowered, some time after 1 o’clock--I can’t be sure of
the time.
ALL BOATS BUT ONE GET AWAY SAFELY.
“The Titanic had sixteen lifeboats and two collapsible boats. All of
them got away loaded, except that one of the collapsibles did not open
properly and was used as a raft. Forty sailors and stewards who were
floating in the water, got on this raft, and later had to abandon the
raft, and were picked up by the different boats. Some others were
floating about on chairs when picked up.
“Every boat, so far as I saw, was full when it was lowered, and every
boat that set out reached the Carpathia. The green light on one of the
boats helped to keep us together, but there were other lights. One was
an electric flashlight that a gentleman had carried in his pocket.
“Our boat was 400 yards away when the ship went down. The suction
nearby must have been terrific, but we were only rocked somewhat.
“I have told only what I know, and what I shall tell any marine court
that may examine me.”
G. Whiteman, of Palmyra, N. J., the Titanic’s barber, was lowering
boats on deck A, after the collision, and declares the officers on
the bridge, one of them Second Officer Murdock, promptly worked the
electrical apparatus for closing the water-tight compartments. He
believes the machinery was in some way so damaged by the crash that the
front compartments failed to close tightly, although the rear ones were
secure.
Whiteman’s manner of escape was unique. He was blown off the deck by
the second of the two explosions of the boilers, and was in the water
more than two hours before he was picked up by a raft.
“The explosions,” Whiteman said, “were caused by the rushing in of the
icy water on the boilers. A bundle of deck chairs, roped together, was
blown off the deck with me, and struck my back, injuring my spine, but
it served as a temporary raft.
“The crew and passengers had faith in the bulkhead system to save the
ship, and we were lowering a Benthon collapsible boat, all confident
the ship would get through, when she took a terrific dip forward and
the water rushed up and swept over the deck and into the engine rooms.
BLOWN FIFTEEN FEET.
“The bow went clean down, and I caught the pile of chairs as I was
washed up against the rail. Then came the explosions and blew me
fifteen feet.
“After the water had filled the forward compartments the ones at the
stern could not save her. They did delay the ship’s going down. If it
wasn’t for the compartments hardly any one could have got away.
“The water was too cold for me to swim and I was hardly more than one
hundred feet away when the ship went down. The suction was not what one
would expect and only rocked the water around me. I was picked up after
two hours. I have done with the sea.”
Whiteman was one of those who heard the ship’s string band playing
“Nearer, My God, to Thee” a few moments before she went down.
R. Norris Williams, a Philadelphia youth on his way home from England
to take the Harvard entrance examinations, was one of the few saloon
passengers at the rail excluded by the women-first order from the boats
who was saved. His father, Duane Williams, was lost.
“There is much, and yet there is little, to tell of my experience,”
said young Williams. “My father and I had about given up our hope for
life and were standing together, resolved to jump together and keep
together if we could, so long as either of us lived. I had on my fur
coat.
“The forward end, where we stood, was sinking rapidly, and before
we could jump together the water washed my father over. Then, with
the explosions, the ship seemed to break in two, and the forward end
bounded up again for an instant. I leaped, but with dozens in the water
between us my father was lost to me.
SWAM AND DRIFTED NEARLY TWO HOURS.
“I swam and drifted nearly two hours before I was pulled aboard the
raft or collapsible boat which served for a time as a raft. Later, with
the abandonment of the raft, I was taken aboard a boat.”
Frederic K. Seward, who sat next to W. T. Stead at the Titanic’s saloon
table, told of the veteran English journalist’s plans for his American
visit. His immediate purpose was to aid in the New York campaign of the
Men and Religion Forward Movement.
“Mr. Stead talked much of spiritualism, thought transference and the
occult,” said Seward. “He told a story of a mummy case in the British
Museum which, he said, had had amazing adventures, but which punished
with great calamities any person who wrote its story. He told of one
person after another who, he said, had come to grief after writing the
story, and added that, although he knew it, he would never write it. He
did not say whether ill-luck attached to the mere telling of it.”
Stead also told, Seward said, of a strange adventure of a young woman
with an admirer in an English railroad coach, which was known to him
as it happened, and which he afterward repeated to the young woman,
amazing her by repeating everything correctly save for one small detail.
Had Harold Cotton, Marconi operator on the Carpathia, gone to bed
Sunday night at his usual time, the Carpathia would have known nothing
of the Titanic’s plight, and the lifeboats, without food or water,
might have been the scenes of even greater tragedy than the great death
ship itself.
The Carpathia, an easy going Mediterranean ship, has only one Marconi
man, and when Cotton had not the receiver on his head the ship was out
of communication with the world.
Cotton, an Englishman of twenty-one years, told me the morning after
the wreck how he came to receive the Titanic’s C Q D.
JUST ABOUT TO TURN IN WHEN CALLED BY C. Q. D.
“I was relaying a message to the Titanic Sunday night, shortly after 11
o’clock by my time,” he said, “and told Phillips, the Titanic’s Marconi
man, that I had been doing quite a bit of work for him, and that if he
had nothing else for me I would quit and turn in for the night. Just
as I was about to take the receiver off my head came ‘C Q D.’ This was
followed with ‘We’ve hit something. Come at once.’
“I called a sailor and sent word to an officer, and a few minutes later
the Captain turned the Carpathia, at eighteen knots, in the direction
of the Titanic, which was sixty miles or more from us.
“Before I could tell the Titanic we were coming, came their ‘S O S,’
and the operator added ‘I’m afraid we’re gone.’ I told him we were
coming, and he went on sending out signals in every direction.”
An assistant Marconi man from the Titanic, not on duty at the time of
the wreck, was among the survivors and assisted Cotton in his work
after Wednesday, having been laid up the two previous days by the shock
of the chill he suffered in the water and by injuries to his legs.
He denied a report, generally circulated on this ship, that Jack
Binns, of Republic fame, was on the Titanic. He said Phillips, the
Titanic’s chief operator, was lost.
Mrs. Edward S. Robert, whose husband, a leading St. Louis attorney,
died last December during her absence in England, and her daughter,
Miss Georgette Madill, have been in close seclusion on the Carpathia
since their rescue from the Titanic. They are accompanied by Mrs.
Robert’s maid.
S. V. Silverthorne, buyer for Nugent’s, was one of three or four saloon
passengers on the Titanic who saw the deadly iceberg just after the
collision.
“I was in the smoking room reading near a bridge whist game at one
of the tables,” he said, “when the crash came. I said, ‘We’ve hit
something,’ and went out on the starboard side to look. None of us was
alarmed. It occurred to me that we might have bumped a whale, or at
most, ran down some small craft.
ORDERED ON DECK AND TOLD TO GET INTO THE BOATS.
“I went back in the smoking room with the others. One of the bridge
players had not left the smoking room at all and was waiting
impatiently for the others to come back and resume the game. They
returned and took up their hands and we were all about to settle down,
when an officer ordered us on deck and told us to get into the boats,
there not being enough women on deck to fill the first ones. We didn’t
like the idea of leaving the ship then, but did as we were told. Had we
been in our rooms we would have had to stand aside, as other men did
then.”
Two orphan French boys, about two and four years old respectively,
whose sur-name is believed to be Hoffman and who called each other
Louis and Lolo, will be cared for by Miss Margaret Hays, of 304 W. 83d
st., New York, while efforts will be made to find their relatives, to
whom their father was thought to have been taking them. The elder boy
has been ill with a fever for three days, the excitement, exposure and
probably grief over the loss of his father having told on the little
fellow. The other, too young to realize what has befallen him, played
around the saloon or sat contentedly in the lap of one of his new made
but devoted friends among the passengers.
The father, who is in the list of second cabin passengers as “Mr.
Hoffman,” is said to have told fellow-passengers on the Titanic the
children’s mother died recently.
Mrs. Sylvia Caldwell, of Bangkok, Siam, is happy in having her husband
and little son. Since she was the last woman to embark, her husband was
able to come with her.
Mrs. Esther Hart, whose husband was lost, was coming, with their
daughter Eva, to visit Mr. Hart’s sister in New York, then to go on
to Winnipeg to make their home. They had sold the property at Ilford,
Essex, England. All their money was lost when Mr. Hart went down with
the Titanic.
Mrs. Lucy Ridsdale, of London, had said good-by to England and had
started for Marietta, O., to make her home with her sisters. She was
saved with the few clothes she wore. She had written letters telling of
a “safe arrival and pleasant voyage” and had them ready to mail. They
went down with the ship.