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One after the other the boats went over the side. Then a cry was set up: “There are no more boats!” was the shout. Consternation seized upon all that remained. They had believed there would be room for all. Uncontrollable terror seized many. They fought for the life belts. Some frantically tried to tear loose deck fittings hoping to make small rafts that would sustain them until help would come. But everything was bolted fast. Then, fearful that they would be dragged to death in theswirling suction that would follow, the men began to leap into the ice filled ocean.
They jumped in groups, seemingly to an agreed signal, according to the stories of the survivors tonight. Some who jumped were saved, coming up near lifeboats and being dragged into them by the occupants.
Slowly, steadily and majestically, the liner sank. One deck after the other was submerged. Whether the boilers exploded is a question. Robert W. Daniel, a Philadelphia banker, says that when the icy water poured into the boiler room two separate explosions followed that tore the interior out of the liner. Others say they did not hear any explosions.
Pistol shots were fired. Some survivors say they were fired at men who tried to force women and children out of the way. No one who claimed to be an eye-witness to the shooting could be located. One account related in circumstantial detail that the captain and his first officer shot themselves, but Daniel and other passengers positively say they saw the white bearded, grizzled face of the veteran mariner over the top of the bridge just before the railing disappeared. They say that not until then did he jump into the ocean to drown in the suction that marked the last plunge of the Titanic.
The plight of the survivors in the boats was pitiful in the extreme. Few of the women or children had sufficient clothing, and they shivered in the bitter cold blasts that came from the great field of ice which surrounded them. The bergs and cakes of drift ice crashed and thundered bringing stark terror to the helpless victims.
Frail women aided with the heavy oars tearing their tender hands until the blood came. Few of the boats were fully manned, sailors had stood aside deliberately, refusing life that the women might have a chance for safety although their places were in the boats.
Daybreak found the little flotilla bobbing and tossing on thesurface of the ocean. It was not known whether help was coming. Panic seized some of the occupants, some of the women tried to jump into the water, and had to be forcibly restrained. The babies, little tots, just old enough to realize their position, found themselves heroes. They set an example which moved their elders to tears as they told of it to-night. Some tried to comfort their stricken parents.
Finally, off in the distant horizon, a sailor in the leading boat, discerned smoke. “We are saved,” went up the cry, and the rescue came just in time, for before the Carpathia had taken aboard the occupants of the last frail craft the waves were increasing in height, kicked up by the wind that had increased with the rising of the sun.
All were tenderly cared for on the Cunard liner. The regular passengers willingly gave up their cabins to their unfortunate refugees, medical aid was forthcoming, and nothing left undone that could relieve the distress.
“It was his face, more than anything else, which made me fearful,” continued Mr. Stengel. “He looked like an old, old man. I heard him give instructions to his officers, and they took their stations at the boats. I did not see anyone shot during the whole wreck. They fired three shots in the air to show the steerage men that the guns were loaded, but I was on the boat almost to the last, and I didn’t see anyone shot. The boat which saved me was not a regular lifeboat, but a light emergency boat. There was a great rush for it. By the time it was launched the first fear had subsided. It was the last to be lowered from the starboard side.
“The Titanic seemed to be floating safely, and a lot of people preferred it to the flimsy looking rowboats. A deckhand told me that there was a vacant place in it. There I found Sir Cosmo Duff-Gordon, Lady Duff-Gordon and their maid, Miss Francatelli. Just as the boat was being lowered Mr. A. L. Solomon jumped in. We had gone but a little way from the ship when thefirst boiler explosion came. It was followed in quick succession by three others, at intervals of about one second apart.”
In the boat which harbored Mr. Stengel were three stokers and two members of the steerage. Mr. Stengel told graphically of the last plunges of the ship and its final sinking. He declared that there was a little eddy and no whirlpool when it sank. Many of the men on the Titanic jumped into sea before the decks were awash. In telling of the long night on the sea Mr. Stengel gave great credit to a member of the crew who had taken three green lanterns on board just as the small lifeboat was manned.
He said that it was the only beacon which the other lifeboats had for guidance, and said that without it many more would surely have been lost.
Mrs. Stengel spoke particularly of the calmness of the night.
“When the sun rose there was not a ripple on the water,” she said. “It was as calm as a little lake in Connecticut. Words cannot express the wonderful terrible beauty of it all—but of course I couldn’t appreciate it, because I thought my husband had gone down in the sea.
“The shout of ‘land’ ever uttered by an explorer was not half so joyful as the shout of ‘ship!’ which went up when the Carpathia appeared on the horizon that morning,” she said. “The first dim lights which appeared were eagerly watched and when it was really identified as a ship, men and women broke down and wept.”
The reunion of Mr. and Mrs. Stengel was on the Carpathia. Each was mourning the other as lost for more than an hour after they had been on the vessel, when they met on the promenade deck. Their separation and subsequent reunion was generally considered one of the most remarkable in the history of the wreck.
Barber Says Good Word for Accused Shipowner—Claims He was a Witness—Saw the Whole Scene—Woman Tells Different Tale—Mrs. Carter’s Thrilling Narrative—Barber’s Story Differs From Ismay’s Own.
Barber Says Good Word for Accused Shipowner—Claims He was a Witness—Saw the Whole Scene—Woman Tells Different Tale—Mrs. Carter’s Thrilling Narrative—Barber’s Story Differs From Ismay’s Own.
J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the White Star Line, who has been widely charged with cowardice in saving himself when the Titanic was wrecked, has found his first defender in the person of August H. Weikman, “commodore” barber of that company’s fleet, who was chief ship’s barber on the ill-fated vessel.
Weikman declares that he was a witness of the scene when Ismay left the vessel, and that he literally was thrown into the lifeboat by a seaman, who did not recognize him, and thought he was interfering with the work. He asserts that Ismay was striving valiantly to help in the work of launching the boats, and went overboard only under physical compulsion.
Weikman was accompanied to his home in Palmyra, N. J., by his brothers-in-law, A. H. and John Henricks, who tell of a vexatious experience in getting him off the Carpathia. Weikman was badly injured when he was blown off the ship by the explosion of the boilers.
A. H. Henricks charges that the custom officials refused him a pass to the pier because he wanted to get a member of the ship’s crew, and the official said they were not bothering about the crew. The brothers finally made their way to the pier by running between double lines of automobiles. Weikman was brought off the Carpathia on a rolling chair too late to catch the special train which came to this city, and the Pennsylvania Railroad officials provided him with a berth free of charge.
“I was in my barber shop reading,” said Weikman, “when I felt a slight jar and realized we had struck something. I went to the gymnasium to see whether others had noticed it. I found some of the men punching the bag, while Colonel Astor, Mr. Widener and a number of others were watching them.
“I had known Mr. Widener for some time, and I advised him to put on a life belt. He laughed at me.
“‘What sense is there in that? This boat isn’t going to sink,’ he said to me. ‘There is plenty of time. We’re safer here than in a small boat, anyway.’
“Then came the order to man the boats and I went on deck to help. I saw Mr. Ismay at the rail, directing and helping the men. One of them did not recognize him and said: ‘What are you interfering for? You get back out of the way.’
“Another seaman warned the first man that he was speaking to the head of the line. ‘I don’t care who he is; he’s got to get back or go overboard. We can’t be bothered with him and his orders now,’ was the reply. Mr. Ismay stuck to his place and continued giving orders and directing the men.
“The rule was observed of sending over four women and then a man to look after them. When four women had been put over, the seaman turned to Mr. Ismay and ordered him over the side. Mr. Ismay refused to go, when the seaman seized him, rushed him to the rail and hurled him over. I saw that myself, and I know that Mr. Ismay did not go of his own accord and that the charge of cowardice is unfair and untrue.
“While I was still helping at the boats there came an explosion from below-decks and the ship took an awful lunge, throwing everybody into a heap. I was hurled clear of the vessel’s side and landed on top of a bundle of deck-chairs which was floating on the water. I was badly bruised and my back wassprained. My watch stopped at 1.50 A. M. and I believe it was at that time I was thrown into the water.
“While I lay floating on the bundle of chairs there came another terrific explosion and the ship seemed to split in two. There was a rain of wreckage and a big piece of timber fell on me, striking my lifebelt. I believe if it had not been for the belt I would have been killed. I floated for what I believe was about two hours. Then arms reached down and drew me aboard a life raft. The man who did this was a seaman named Brown, whose life I probably had saved two years ago by hurrying him to a hospital in England when he was taken ill suddenly.
“There were six persons on the raft and others were in the water up to their necks, hanging on to the edges of the raft. The raft was already awash, and we could not take them aboard. One by one, as they became chilled through, they bade us good-bye and sank. In the bottom of the raft was a man whom I had shaved that morning, and whom I had been told was worth $5,000,000. I did not know his name. He was dead.
“And so we floated on the raft, bereft of hope and stupefied by the calamity, until picked up by the Carpathia. I was so badly injured they had to take me on board in a boatswain’s chair.”
The happiness of husbands at seeing their wives put in the way of safety from the Titanic was described by Mrs. Turrell Cavendish, daughter of Henry Siegel. She said: “I was with my husband in our stateroom when the accident happened. He awakened me, I remember it was midnight and told me something was the matter with the boat.
“My husband kissed me and put me into a boat, in which were twenty-three women. He told me to go and that he would stay on the ship with the other men. They were happy to see their wives lowered away in the boats. They kept telling us they would be all right because the ship could not sink.
“We were lowered into the water without any light, only one man tried to get into the boat. He was pushed back by asailor. Most of the women in the boat I was in were in their bare feet. I can still see those husbands kissing their wives and telling them good-bye. I can see the sailors standing by so calm and brave. The sight of those good men who gave their lives for others will always be with me. Words can’t tell the tale of their sacrifice.
“The hours we spent in that small boat after those heroic men went down were hours of torture. When we got on the Carpathia we were treated with the utmost consideration.
“I saw Mr. Ismay when he came on board. He was trembling from head to foot and kept saying, ‘I’m Ismay, I’m Ismay’.”
Immediately upon their disembarkation from the Carpathia Mr. and Mrs. William E. Carter, Miss Lucille Carter and William E. Carter, Jr., of Newport, Bryn Mawr, and 2116 Walnut street, Philadelphia, about whom so much anxiety was felt for the first twenty-four hours after the news of the Titanic disaster reached the mainland, went in taxicabs to the home of William Dickerman, at 89 Madison avenue. Mr. Dickerman is a brother-in-law of Mr. Carter.
“I kissed my husband good-bye and as he stood on the deck I went down the side to a lifeboat. There were no seamen there. It was life or death. I took an oar and started to row,” said Mrs. Carter, who was formerly Miss Lucille Polk, of Baltimore, when seen later at the Madison avenue house.
Mrs. Carter had just come from the ship, and the tears were still in her eyes; glad tears from the welcome she had received from her relatives, among whom was Anderson Polk, who had come to New York to meet her. She told of being roused from her sleep at fourteen minutes of twelve on Sunday night by the sudden crash, of rushing out on the deck to find the chaos of destruction quickly form itself into the decisive action of brave men about to face their death.
Clasping her hands tightly she told how the men had stood back or else helped to lower away the lifeboats, and then, kissingtheir wives, bade them a good-bye which they thought would be forever. In brief words, tensely spoken, she told of going into the lifeboat and taking an oar. At ten minutes past 1 o’clock there was a sudden explosion and the giant hulk of the Titanic blew up, rearing in the water like a spurred horse and then sinking beneath the waves.
She had to pull hard with her oars in the desperate attempt which the poorly manned lifeboat had to make to keep from being sucked down with the diving Titanic. After minutes of work with the desperation of death, they made their way out of the suction and were saved. It was not until she was taken aboard the Carpathia that she met her husband, saved because he had to man an oar in another lifeboat.
“We had a pleasant voyage from England,” began Mrs. Carter. “The ship behaved splendidly, and we did not anticipate any trouble at all. I had retired on Sunday night, an hour before we struck the iceberg. The men were in the cabin smoking. Most of them were in the smoking-room when the ship hit.
“The first I knew of the accident was a tremendous thump which nearly threw me out of my berth. I realized that something must have happened, and feared that it was a bad accident. A moment later my husband came down to the stateroom and told me that we had struck an iceberg.
“There was no confusion. I dressed myself hurriedly and went on deck with my children. The ship was badly damaged. The officers thought at first that she would not sink and we were told to be calm. But it was not long before we knew that the ship could not long stand the strain of the water which was pouring into the bow and bearing the ship down on her forward part.
“Then came the time when we knew that it must either be the lifeboats or stay on the ship and sink with her. The seamen began to lower away the lifeboats. One after another they released whatever machinery held them and they dropped into the ocean. There was ice all about us and the night being comparatively clear we could see the floes around us when we peered down over the side of the ship.
“When the boats had been lowered then it was that the time of parting came. There was no excitement. Every one of the men whose wives or women folk were with them took them to the side of the ship where a lifeboat was waiting and kissed them over the side.
“Major Archibald Butt remained on board and went down with the ship. Colonel Astor also went down with the ship. Mrs. Astor was in my boat. The Colonel took her to the side and kissed her and saw her over the side.
“When I went over the side with my children and got in the boat there were no seamen in it. Then came a few men, but there were oars with no one to use them. The boat had been filled with passengers and there was nothing else for me to do but to take an oar.
“We could see now that the time of the ship had come. She was sinking and we were warned by the cries from the men above to pull away from the ship quickly. Mrs. Thayer, wife of the Vice president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, was in my boat, and she, too, took an oar.
“It was cold and we had no time to clothe ourselves with warm overcoats. The rowing warmed me. We started to pull away from the ship. We could see the dim outlines of the decks above, but we could not recognize anybody.
“We had pulled our lifeboat away from the Titanic for a distance of about a city block, that is about all, I should say—when the Titanic seemed to shake to pieces. The ship had struck about fourteen minutes to 12. It was ten minutes past 1 when we saw her lunge.
“She had exploded. There was a rumbling noise within her, then she gave a lurch and started to go down. We realized what it meant. That the sinking ship would suck us under with her. It was a moment later that the suction struck us. It wasall we could do to keep from being caught, so strong was the drag down that followed the Titanic.
“But we pulled away at last, after straining as hard as we could at the oars. Then we were alone in the boat, and it seemed darker. We remained in the boat all night waiting for daylight to come. It came at last, and when it broke over the sea we saw ice floes all about it.
“It was about 8.30 o’clock when the Carpathia came into sight. I can’t tell how I felt when I saw her. I had believed that my husband had gone down on the ship. It was not until after we were taken over the side of the Carpathia that I saw him.
“Mr. Carter had been compelled to take an oar in a lifeboat that was not sufficiently manned. That is how he came to be saved. All of the men waited for the women to go first. Mr. Carter was among the number. When he put me into a lifeboat he stayed back, and I had thought when I saw the ship blow up and sink that he had gone down with her.
“Mr. Ismay does not deserve any criticism for being saved. He was another of those who had to man an oar in a lifeboat, so as to get the boats out of danger by being sucked under by the sinking Titanic.”
Three French survivors, Fernand Oment, Pierre Marechal, son of the well-known French Admiral, and Paul Chevre, the sculptor, conjointly cabled to the “Matin” a graphic narrative of the disaster to the Titanic, in which they repeatedly insist that more lives could have been saved if the passengers had not had such dogged faith that the Titanic was unsinkable. Several boats, they declared, could have carried double the number.
The three Frenchmen say that they were playing bridge with a Philadelphian when a great, crunching mass of ice packed up against the port holes. As they rushed on deck there was much confusion, but this quickly died down. One of the officers when questioned by a woman passenger humorously replied:
“Do not be afraid. We are merely cutting a whale in two.”
Presently the captain appeared to become somewhat nervous and ordered all to put on life preservers. The boats were then lowered, but only a few people stirred and several of the boats put off half empty, one with only fifteen persons in it.
When the Frenchmen’s boat rowed off for half a mile the Titanic presented a fairylike picture illuminated from stem to stern. Then suddenly the lights began to go out and the stern reared up high in the air. An immense clamor rose on all sides, and during an hour anguished cries rang out.
It was, say the narrators, like a great chorus chanting a refrain of death with wild obstinacy. Sometimes the cries died out and then the tragic chorus began again more terribly and more despairingly.
The narrative continues:
“Those shrieks pursued us and haunted us as we pulled away in the night. Then one by one the cries ceased, and only the noise of the sea remained. The Titanic was engulfed almost without a murmur. Her stern quivered in a final spasm and then disappeared.”
The Frenchmen and their companions suffered bitterly from the cold. They cried out to attract attention, and a German baron, who was with them, emptied his revolver in the air. When finally the Carpathia appeared a feeble hurrah went up from the small boats, every one of which moved as swiftly as possible toward the liner.
The Frenchmen related tragic incidents as they were leaving the sides of the Titanic. After all the boats had been launched many of the passengers who had stayed behind too long tried to embark on a collapsible raft, which worked badly. Fifty persons climbed onto the raft, which was half filled with water.
One after another the passengers on the raft were drowned, or perished with the cold. When a body was found in the way it was thrown overboard, and only fifteen of the fifty who had taken refuge on the raft were saved by the Carpathia.
Survivors’ Stirring Stories—How Young Thayer Was Saved—His Father, Second Vice President of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Drowned—Mrs. Straus’ Pathetic Death—Black Coward Shot—Countess Aids in Rowing Boat.
Survivors’ Stirring Stories—How Young Thayer Was Saved—His Father, Second Vice President of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Drowned—Mrs. Straus’ Pathetic Death—Black Coward Shot—Countess Aids in Rowing Boat.
Standing at the rail of the main deck of the ill-fated Titanic, Arthur Ryerson, of Gray’s lane, Haverford, Pa., waved encouragement to his wife as the lifeboat in which she and her three children—John, Emily and Susan—had been placed with his assistance glided away from the doomed ship. A few minutes later, after the lifeboat with his loved ones had passed beyond the range of his vision, Mr. Ryerson met death in the icy water into which the crushed ship plunged.
It is now known that Mr. Ryerson might have found a place in one of the first lifeboats to be lowered, but made no effort to leave the ship’s deck after assuring himself that his wife and children would be saved.
It was not until the Carpathia reached her dock that relatives who were on hand to meet the survivors of the Ryerson family knew that little “Jack” Ryerson was among the rescued. Day by day since the first tidings of the accident to the Titanic were published, “Jack” had been placed among the missing.
Perhaps of all those who came up from the Carpathia with the impress of the tragedy upon them, the homecoming of Mrs. Ryerson was peculiarly sad.
While motoring with J. Lewis Hoffman, of Radnor, Pa., on the Main Line, on Monday a week before, Arthur L. Ryerson, her son, was killed. His parents abandoned their plans for a summer pleasure trip through Europe and took passage on the first home-bound ship, which happened to be the Titanic, to attend the funeral of their son. And now upon one tragedy a second presses.
Upon leaving the Carpathia Mrs. Ryerson, almost too exhausted and weak to tell of her experiences, was taken in a taxicab to the Hotel Belmont. With her were her son “Jack” and her two daughters, Miss Emily and Miss Susan Ryerson.
The young women were hysterical with grief as they walked up from the dock, and the little lad who had witnessed such sights of horror and tragedy clung to his mother’s hand, wide eyed and sorrowful.
Mrs. Ryerson said that she and her husband were asleep in their staterooms, as were their children, when the terrible grating crash came and the ship foundered.
The women threw kimonos over their night gowns and rushed barefooted to the deck. Master Ryerson’s nurse caught up a few articles of the little boy’s clothing and almost as soon as the party reached the deck they were numbered off into boats and lowered into the sea.
Mrs. John M. Brown, whose husband was formerly a well-known Philadelphian, but now lives in Boston, described her experience on the Titanic as the “most harrowing and terrible that any living soul could undergo.”
“Oh, it was heart-rending to see those brave men die,” Mrs. Brown said, half-sobbingly, after she had left the pier in a taxicab brought by her husband.
Mr. Brown, for his part, said the days of agony which he had experienced, when the lists of Titanic survivors were altered, diminished and published incomplete, leaving him indecisive as to his wife’s fate, was almost on a par what she had undergone.
In contradiction to several other statements, Mrs. Brown declared that she saw no signs of panic or disorder on the Titanic and did not know until later that there had been shooting on board the vessel.
“I was in my berth when the crash came,” Mrs. Brown said,“and after the first shock when I knew instinctively that the vessel was sinking I was comparatively calm.
“I had hardly reached deck when an officer called to me to enter a lifeboat. I did so, and saw the huge liner split in half, with a pang almost as keen as if I had seen somebody die.”
Mrs. Brown said that John B. Thayer, Jr., after jumping from the deck of the liner, clad only in pajamas, swam through cakes of floating ice to a broken raft. He was picked up by the boat of which Mrs. Brown was an occupant.
Mrs. Brown said that it was about two hours after the Titanic sank that their boat came within sight of an object bobbing up and down in the cakes of ice, about fifty yards away.
Nearing, they made out the form of a boy clinging with one leg and both arms wrapped around the piece of wreckage. Young Thayer uttered feeble cries as they pulled alongside.
The lad was pulled into the already crowded lifeboat exhausted. With a weak, faint smile, Mrs. Brown said, the lad collapsed.
Women, who were not rowing or assisting in maneuvering the boat, by vigorous rubbing soon brought Thayer to consciousness and shared part of their scanty attire to keep him from dying from exposure. In the meantime the boat bobbed about on the waves like a top, frequently striking cakes of ice.
Mrs. Brown said for several hours more they battled with the sea before help arrived.
“It was a blessed sight when all saw the Carpathia heading in our din,” she declared. “We had hopes that a ship would come to our rescue and all on board prayed for safe deliverance.
“No one can realize our feeling of gratitude when the Carpathia hoved into sight. With increased energy the men, aided by the women, pulled on the oars. We were soon taken aboard. Young Thayer was hurried into the hospital on board the boat and was given stimulants and revived.
“Three survivors died soon after; they were buried at sea.Mrs. Brown said that Mrs. John Jacob Astor, the wife of Colonel John Jacob Astor, who proved himself a hero, was also an occupant of her boat.
“Mrs. Astor was frantic when she learned that her husband had gone with the Titanic, but between sobs said he died a hero,” Mrs. Brown said.
“The colonel kissed her and pushing his bride to the side of the ship told her to hurry to the lifeboats awaiting below.
“Mrs. Astor refused to listen to her husband’s entreaties until he assured her that he would follow on the next boat, although all the time he knew that he would sink.”
“The following horrors have never left me, day or night,” Mrs. Brown continued.
“I saw dead bodies of brave men float past the lifeboats. I heard the death cries of women and saw the terrible desolation of the wreck by dawn.”
In the boat with Mrs. Brown were her two sisters, Mrs. Robert Cornell, wife of Judge Robert Cornell, and Mrs. S. P. Appleton.
They followed each other down the long, roughly constructed rope ladder, a distance of more than fifty feet, into the tenth lifeboat. All were thinly clad. They had retired for the night and were tumbled from their berths when the crash came.
When the Titanic sank and the first news came of the disaster, there appeared in the list of first cabin passengers the name of “Washington Logue.” Until J. Washington Logue, of Philadelphia, could be found to explain that he was not on the high seas, many of his friends feared that he had been on the Titanic.
When he landed from the Carpathia, Washington Dodge, of San Francisco, was told how his name had been confused in the wireless reports from the Olympic. He said he congratulated Mr. Logue on having been no closer to disaster than this.
Mr. Dodge, who is a millionaire; Mrs. Dodge and their four-year-old son, Washington Dodge, Jr., were among the first toland on the dock from the Cunarder. Mr. Dodge carried a life preserver of the Titanic as a memento.
“Nearly all the passengers had retired when the crash came, about twenty minutes passed 10 o’clock,” said Mr. Dodge. “The liner was struck on the starboard side, near the bow. The bow, it seemed, withstood the crash, but water rushed into several compartments at the same time.”
“There was complete order among the passengers and crew. We really didn’t think there was any danger. We were assured that the ship would float and that there were plenty vessels in the reach of wireless to come to our aid if that should become necessary.
“Then the sinking of the Titanic by the head began and the crew was ordered to man the boats. There was no panic. The officers told the men to stand back and they obeyed. A few men were ordered into the boats. Two men who attempted to rush beyond the restraint line were shot down by an officer who then turned the revolver on himself. I could see Mrs. Isador Straus. She clung to her husband and refused to leave him.
“We floated for four hours until we were picked up. Mr. Ismay left the Titanic on a small boat.
“I did not see the iceberg. When we got into the boat she was gone.
“As the Titanic went down, Major Archibald Butt was standing on the deck. I saw him.”
The body of one black coward, a member of the Titanic’s crew, lies alone in the wireless “coop” on the highest deck of the shadowy bulk of what was once the world’s greatest ship two miles down in the dark of unplumbed ocean depths. There is a bullet hole in the back of his skull.
This man was shot by Harold Bride, the second wireless man aboard the Titanic, and assistant to the heroic Phillips, chief operator, who lost his life. Bride shot him from behind just at the instant that the coward was about to plunge a knife intoPhillips’ back and rob him of the life preserver which was strapped under his arm pits. He died instantly and Phillips, all unconscious at that instant that Bride was saving his life, had but a brief little quarter of an hour added to his span by the act of his assistant, and then went down to death.
This grim bit of tragedy, only a little interlude in the whole terrible procession of horror aboard the sinking boat, occurred high above the heads of the doomed men and women who waited death in the bleak galleys of the decks.
“I had to do it,” was the way Bride put it.
“I could not let that coward die a decent sailor’s death, so I shot him down and left him alone there in the wireless coop to go down with the hulk of the ship. He is there yet, the only one in the wireless room where Phillips, a real hero, worked madly to save the lives of two thousand and more people.”
Miss Alice Farnan Leader, a New York physician, escaped from the Titanic on the same boat which carried the Countess Rothes.
“The Countess is an expert oarswoman,” said Dr. Leader, “and thoroughly at home on the water. She took command of our boat, when it was found that the seamen who had been placed at the oars could not row skilfully. Several of the women took their places with the Countess at the oars and rowed in turns while the weak and unskilled stewards sat quietly in one end of the boat.”
“The men were the heroes,” said Mrs. Churchill Candee, of Washington, one of the survivors, “and among the bravest and most heroic, as I recall, were Mr. Widener, Mr. Thayer and Colonel Astor. They thought only of the saving of the women and went down with the Titanic, martyrs to their manhood.
“I saw Mr. and Mrs. Isador Straus on the deck of the Titanic as I was lowered into one of the lifeboats. Mrs. Straus refused to leave the ship unless her husband could accompany her. They were on the top deck, and I heard her say she would not leaveher husband. She went down with him as she had lived and traveled with him. Life without him did not concern her, seemingly. ‘I’ve always stayed with my husband, so why should I leave him now? I’ll die with him,’ I heard her say.
“Captain Smith, I think, sacrificed safety in a treacherous ice field for speed. He was trying to make 570 miles for the day, I heard. The captain, who had stood waist deep on the deck of the Titanic as she sank, jumped as the ship went down, but he was drowned. All of the men had bravely faced their doom for the women and children.
“The ship settled slowly, the lights going out deck after deck as the water reached them. The final plunge, however, was sudden and accompanied by explosions, the effect of which was a horrible sight. Victims standing on the upper deck toward the stern were hurled into the air and fell into the treacherous ice-covered sea. Some were rescued, but most of them perished. I cannot help recalling again that Mr. Widener and Mr. Thayer and Colonel Astor died manfully.
“The ice pack which we encountered,” explained Mrs. Candee, “was fifty-six miles long, I have since heard. When we collided with the mountainous mass it was nearly midnight Sunday. There were two distinct shocks, each shaking the ship violently, but fear did not spread among the passengers immediately. They seemed not to realize what had happened, but the captain and other officers did not endeavor to minimize the danger.
“The first thing I recall was one of the crew appearing with pieces of ice in his hands. He said he had gathered them from the bow of the boat. Some of the passengers were inclined to believe he was joking. But soon the situation dawned on all of us. The lifeboats were ordered lowered and manned and the word went around that women and children were to be taken off first. The men stood back as we descended to the frail craftor assisted us to disembark. I now recall that huge Woolner Bjomstrom was among the heroic men.”
“The Philadelphia women behaved heroically.”
This was the way Mrs. Walter B. Stephenson, of Haverford, a survivor of the wreck of the fated Titanic, began her brief but graphic account of the disaster at her home in Haverford, which she reached on the special train that brought Mrs. John B. Thayer and others over from New York.
Worn by hours of terrible uncertainty on the frail lifeboats in the open sea, almost distracted by the ordeal of waiting for news of those left behind on the big liner, Mrs. Stephenson bore herself as did the women whom she described heroically indeed.
She told how John B. Thayer, Jr., fell overboard when the boats were launched, and how he was saved from the death that his father met, by the crew of the lifeboat. She described tersely, to linger sadly as she finished with the words, “But we never saw Mr. Thayer, Sr., at all.”
Mrs. Thayer, Mrs. J. Boulton Earnshaw, of Mt. Airy, and Mrs. George D. Widener were occupants of the same boat that carried Mrs. Stephenson to safety, and, like Mrs. Stephenson, they witnessed the final plunge of the Titanic.
“We were far off,” said Mrs. Stephenson, “but we could see a huge dark mass behind us. Then it disappeared.” That was all she could tell of the fate of those left on board.
“Then it disappeared,” she paused and her voice choked. “We weren’t sure but what we might have been mistaken. A lingering hope remained until long after the Carpathia picked us up. Then the wireless told the terrible tidings. We were the sole survivors.”
Mrs. Stephenson wore the same dress that she hastily donned when the crash occurred. It was a simple gown of dark texture, showing the wear in its crumpled shape. Over it she had managed to throw a cape, and to the covering she clung, as if yet fearful of the icy blasts of the Northern Ocean.
Conveyed in a taxicab to the Pennsylvania Railroad Station from the Cunard wharf, Mrs. Stephenson alighted, hastened across the train shed and into a waiting elevator. She walked unaided. Relatives who had rushed from Philadelphia to convey her in safety, were solicitous for her welfare, but she assured them that she was well.
“And she is well,” said T. DeWitt Cuyler, a director of the Pennsylvania Railroad who met the train. “She has borne up remarkably under the strain.”
“I was wakened in my cabin by the shock,” Mrs. Stephenson began. “It was nearly 12 o’clock, but I cannot be sure. The shock was great, but not as great as the one I experienced in the San Francisco earthquake. I was staying in the St. Francis Hotel at the time of the earthquake. Even this terrible disaster cannot shake the memory of that night from my mind.
“I rose hastily from my berth and was about to hasten to the deck when my maid assured me that there was no immediate danger and that I would have time to dress; I put on this dress that I am wearing and threw a cape around my shoulders. Then I went on deck.
“Scarcely had I gotten out in the air when an officer ordered me to don a life belt. I returned to the cabin to buckle one around me. When I returned I heard the order to man the lifeboats. There was no disorder. The crew was under perfect discipline. Quickly and without any excitement I was lifted into a lifeboat. Beside me I found Mrs. Thayer, Mrs. Earnshaw and Mrs. Widener. Like myself they had no clothing except what they wore.
“John B. Thayer, Jr., was with us. As the boat was lowered by the davits, he slipped and fell into the water; luckily he wore a life belt and was kept afloat until a sailor lifted him safely aboard. We never saw Mr. Thayer, Sr., at all.
“As the boat pushed off from the ship Mrs. Widener collapsed. She was finally revived. The Philadelphia women behaved heroically. They stood up splendidly under the suspense, which was terrible. The sailors rowed our boat some distance away. We thought we saw the Titanic sink, but we couldn’t be sure. Behind us we could see a dark shape. Then it disappeared. We despaired of any others being saved, but some hope remained until long after the Carpathia had picked us up. Then the wireless told the sad tale.
Lola and Momon, the little waifs of the Titanic disaster, snatched from the sea and kept for a month in a big, strange land, were clasped in the arms of their mother Mme. Marcelle Navratil, who arrived in New York, on May 16, from France on the White Star liner Oceanic.
Hurrying down the gangplank, after kindly customs officials had facilitated her landing, Mme. Navratil, who is an Italian, 24 years old, of remarkable beauty, rushed to Miss Margaret Hays, the rescuer of the two little boys, who, with her father, was waiting on the pier. They took her in a cab to the Children’s Society rooms, and there she was reunited with her children.
The little boys, four and two years old, were thrust into one of the last of the lifeboats to leave the sinking Titanic by an excited Frenchmen, who asked that they be cared for. A steward told him he could not enter the boat and he said he did not want to, but must save his boys.
Arriving in New York on the Carpathia, Miss Hays at first could learn nothing of the children’s identity, and she planned to care for them. Then developed another chapter of the weird story of the disaster in the ice fields. The Frenchman’s body was recovered and taken to Halifax, where it was found that he was booked on the passenger list under the name of “Hoffman.”
Cable messages to France brought the information that Mme. Navratil’s husband, from whom she was separated, had kidnapped her children and said he was going to America. He often used the name “Hoffman.” Photographs of the boys were sent to Mme. Navratil in France, and she identified them as her children.
How Astor Went to Death—“I Resign Myself to My Fate,” He Said—Kissed Wife Fond Farewell—Lifted Cap to Wife as Boat Left Ship—Crushed to Death By Ice—Famous Novelist’s Daughter Hears of His Death—Philadelphia Millionaires’ Heroism—Last to See Widener Alive—Major Butt Dies a Soldier’s Death.
How Astor Went to Death—“I Resign Myself to My Fate,” He Said—Kissed Wife Fond Farewell—Lifted Cap to Wife as Boat Left Ship—Crushed to Death By Ice—Famous Novelist’s Daughter Hears of His Death—Philadelphia Millionaires’ Heroism—Last to See Widener Alive—Major Butt Dies a Soldier’s Death.
The heroism of the majority of the men who went down to death with the Titanic has been told over and over again. How John Jacob Astor kissed his wife and saluted death as he looked squarely into its face; the devotion of Mrs. Isidor Straus to her aged husband and the willingness with which she went to her doom with his loving arms pressed tenderly around her, the tales of life sacrificed that women might be saved brought some need of comfort to the stricken.
G. A. Brayton, of Los Angeles, Cal, says: “John Jacob Astor went to one of the officers and told them who he was, and asked to go in the lifeboat with his wife. The officer told him he could not go in the lifeboat. Astor then kissed his wife good-bye and she was put in the lifeboat. Astor said: ‘I resign myself to my fate’ and saluted in farewell.”
“Colonel Astor and Major Archibald Butt died together on the bridge of the ill-fated ship,” said Dr. Washington Dodge, of San Francisco, one of the survivors. “I saw them standing there side by side. I was in one of the last boats, and I could not mistake them. Earlier during the desperate struggle to get the boats cleared I had seen them both at work quieting passengers and helping the officers maintain order.
“A few minutes before the last I saw Colonel Astor helphis wife, who appeared ill, into a boat, and I saw him wave his hand to her and smile as the boat pulled away.”
Before the lifeboats left the ship, not far from the woman who would not let her husband meet death alone, Colonel Astor stood supporting the figure of his young bride, says another survivor. A boat was being filled with women. Colonel Astor helped his wife to a place in it. The boat was not filled, and there seemed no more women near it. Quietly the Colonel turned to the second officer, who was superintending the loading.
“May I go with my wife? She is ill,” he asked. The Officer nodded. The man of millions got into the boat. The crew were about to cast off the falls. Suddenly the Colonel sprang to his feet, shouting to them to wait. He had seen a woman running toward the boat. Leaping over the rail, he helped her to the place he had occupied.
Mrs. Astor screamed and tried to climb from the boat. The Colonel restrained her. He bent and tenderly patted her shoulder.
“The ladies first, dear heart,” he was heard to say.
Then quietly he saluted the second officer and turned to help in lowering more boats.
Miss Margaret Hayes gave another version of the manner in which Colonel Astor met his death: “Colonel Astor, with his wife, came out on deck as I was being assisted into a lifeboat,” said Miss Hayes, “and both got into another boat. Colonel Astor had his arms about his wife and assisted her into the boat. At the time there were no women waiting to get into the boats, and the ship’s officer at that point invited Colonel Astor to get into the boat with his wife. The Colonel, after looking around and seeing no women, got into the boat, and his wife threw her arms about him.
“The boat in which Colonel Astor and his wife were sitting was about to be lowered when a woman came running out of the companionway. Raising his hand, Colonel Astor stoppedthe preparations to lower his boat and, stepping out, assisted the woman into the seat he had occupied.
“Mrs. Astor cried out, and wanted to get out of the boat with her husband, but the Colonel patted her on the back and said something in a low tone of voice.”
A nephew of Senator Clark, of Butte, Montana, said Astor stood by the after rail looking after the lifeboats until the Titanic went down.
Brayton says: “Captain Smith stood on the bridge until he was washed off by a wave. He swam back, stood on the bridge again and was there when the Titanic went to the bottom.” Brayton says that Henry B. Harris, the theatrical manager, “tried to get on a lifeboat with his wife, but the second officer held him back with a gun. A third-class passenger who tried to climb in the boats was shot and killed by a steward. This was the only shooting on board I know of.”
Another account of Captain Smith’s death is as follows:
Captain Smith died a hero’s death. He went to the bottom of the ocean without effort to save himself. His last acts were to place a five-year-old child on the last lifeboat in reach, then cast his life belt to the ice ridden waters and resign to the fate that tradition down the ages observed as a strict law.
It was left to a fireman of the Titanic to tell the tale of the death of Captain Smith and the last message he left behind him. This man had gone down with the vessel and was clinging to a piece of wreckage about half an hour before he finally joined several members of the Titanic’s company on the bottom of a boat which was floating among other wreckage.
Harry Senior, the fireman, with his eight or nine companions in distress, had just managed to get a firm hold on the upturned boat, when they saw the Titanic rearing preparatory to her final plunge. At that moment, according to the fireman’s tale, Captain Smith jumped into the sea from the promenade deck of the Titanic with an infant clutched tenderly in his arms.
It only took a few strokes to bring him to the upturned lifeboat, where a dozen hands were stretched out to take the little child from his arms and drag him to safety.
“Captain Smith was dragged on the upturned boat,” said the fireman. “He had on a life buoy and a life preserver. He clung there a moment and then he slid off again. For a second time he was dragged from the icy water. Then he took off his life preserver, tossed the life buoy on the inky waters and slipped into the water again with the words; ‘I will follow the ship.’”
At that time there was only a circle of troubled water and some wreckage to show the spot where the biggest of all ocean steamers had sunk out of sight.
“No,” said the stoker, as he waved a sandwich above his head, holding a glass of beer in the other hand, “Captain Smith never shot himself. I saw what he did. He went down with that ship. I’ll stake my life on that.”
Oddly enough, a Swedish stoker and survivor, named Oscar Ingstrom, at another hotel in the same vicinity, gave to one of the most prominent Swedish newspaper men in New York City practically the same tale that Senior told.
Wilson Potter, whose mother, Mrs. Thomas Potter, Jr., of Mt. Airy, Pa., was one of the survivors, told how she had urged Colonel Astor and his wife to leave the Titanic before the vessel went down.
“My mother was one of the first to leave the Titanic,” he said. “As the lifeboats were filling up, she called to Colonel and Mrs. Astor to come aboard. Mrs. Astor waved her off, exclaiming, ‘We are safer here than in that little boat.’
“Hundreds of other passengers thought the same way. So much so, that the first lifeboat, which my mother boarded, was large enough to hold forty persons besides the crew; still only ten came along. All were of the opinion that the Titanic would remain afloat until aid came from another steamer.”
Mr. Potter also related another version of how J. B. Thayer, Jr., and his mother were rescued.
“As the crash came Mrs. Thayer fainted. Young Mr. Thayer carried her to one of the lifeboats. As she was lifted in father and son lost their hold and fell between the sinking steamer and the lifeboat.
“After struggling in the water for several minutes Young Mr. Thayer was picked up by a raft. Two hours later the raft was found by the Carpathia.”
A third remarkable escape as related by Mr. Potter was that of Richard Norris Williams.
“Mr. Williams remained on the stern of the Titanic,” said Mr. Potter. “He says the stern of the boat went down, then came up. As it started to go down a second time Mr. Williams says he dived off and swam to a raft, which was picked up two hours later by the Carpathia.”
When utterly exhausted from her experience, Mrs. John Jacob Astor was declared by Nicholas Biddle, a trustee of the Astor estate, to be in no danger whatever. Her physicians, however, have given orders that neither Mrs. Astor nor her maid, who was saved with her, be permitted to talk about the disaster.
On landing from the Carpathia, the young bride, widowed by the Titanic’s sinking, told members of her family what she could recall of the circumstances of the disaster. Of how Colonel Astor met his death, she has no definite conception. She recalled, she thought, that in the confusion, as she was about to be put into one of the boats, the Colonel was standing by her side. After that, as Mr. Biddle recounted her narrative, she had no very clear recollection of the happenings until the boats were well clear of the sinking steamer.
Mrs. Astor, it appears, left in one of the last boats which got away from the ship. It was her belief that all the womenwho wished to go had been taken off. Her impression was that the boat she left in had room for at least fifteen more persons.
The men, for some reason, which, as she recalled it, she could not and does not now understand, did not seem to be at all anxious to leave the ship. Almost every one seemed dazed.
“I hope he is alive somewhere. Yes, I cannot think anything else,” the young woman said of her husband to her father as she left the latter to go to the Astor home, according to some who overheard her parting remarks.
The chief steerage steward of the Titanic, who came in on the Carpathia, says that he saw John Jacob Astor standing by the life ladder as the passengers were being embarked. His wife was beside him, the steward said. The Colonel left her to go to the purser’s office for a moment, and that was the last he saw of him.
Mrs. May Futrelle, whose husband, Jacques Futrelle, the writer, went down with the ship, was met here by her daughter, Miss Virginia Futrelle, who was brought to New York from the Convent of Notre Dame in Baltimore.
Miss Futrelle had been told that her father had been picked up by another steamer. Mrs. Charles Copeland, of Boston, a sister of the writer, who also met Mrs. Futrelle, was under the same impression.
“I am so happy that father is safe, too,” declared Miss Futrelle, as her mother clasped her in her arms. It was some time before Mrs. Futrelle could compose herself.
“Where is Jack?” Miss Copeland asked.
Mrs. Futrelle, afraid to let her daughter know the truth, said: “Oh! he is on another ship.”
Mrs. Copeland guessed the truth and became hysterical. Then the writer’s daughter broke down.
“Jack died like a hero,” Mrs. Futrelle said, when the party became composed. “He was in the smoking-room when the crash came—the noise of the smash was terrific—and I was going to bed. I was hurled from my feet by the impact. I hardly found myself when Jack came rushing into the stateroom.
“The boat is going down, get dressed at once!” he shouted. When we reached the deck everything was in the wildest confusion. The screams of women and the shrill orders of the officers were drowned intermittently by the tremendous vibrations of the Titanic’s bass foghorn.
“The behavior of the men was magnificent. They stood back without murmuring and urged the women and children into the lifeboats. A few cowards tried to scramble into the boats, but they were quickly thrown back by the others. Let me say now that the only men who were saved were those who sneaked into the lifeboats or were picked up after the Titanic sank.
“I did not want to leave Jack, but he assured me that there were boats enough for all and that he would be rescued later.
“Hurry up, May, you’re keeping the others waiting,” were his last words, as he lifted me into a lifeboat and kissed me good-bye. I was in one of the last lifeboats to leave the ship. We had not put out many minutes when the Titanic disappeared. I almost thought, as I saw her sink beneath the water, that I could see Jack, standing where I had left him and waving at me.”
Mrs. Futrelle said she saw the parting of Colonel John Jacob Astor and his young bride. Mrs. Astor was frantic. Her husband had to jump into the lifeboat four times and tell her that he would be rescued later. After the fourth time, Mrs. Futrelle said, he jumped back on the deck of the sinking ship and the lifeboat bearing his bride made off.
George D. Widener and his son, Harry Elkins Widener, lost in the wreck of the Titanic, died the death of heroes. They stood back that the weaker might have a chance of being saved.
Mrs. Widener, one of the last women to leave the ship, fought to die with her husband and her son. She would havesucceeded probably had not sailors literally torn her from her husband and forced her on to a life-raft.
As she descended the ladder at the ship’s side, compelled to leave despite her frantic, despairing pleas, she called to Mr. Widener and to her son pitifully:
“Oh, my God!” she cried. “Good-bye! George! Harry! Good-bye! Good-bye! Oh, God! this is awful!” And that was the last she saw of her husband and of her son, who waved a brave farewell as she disappeared down the ladder.
Mr. Widener, according to James B. McGough, 708 West York street, Philadelphia, a buyer for the Gimbel store, one of those rescued, was as calm and collected, except at the time of the final parting from his wife, as though he were “taking a walk on Broad street.”
The financier’s son, too, was calm. The two men helped the women and the children to make their escape, but always stood back themselves when a boat or raft was launched. As soon as the vessel had struck the iceberg Mr. and Mrs. Widener had sought out Captain Smith.
“What is the outlook?” Mr. Widener was heard to inquire.
“It is extremely serious,” was the quick reply. “Please keep cool and do what you can to help us.” And this is what Mr. Widener did.
Mr. McGough, when he returned to his home, contributed to the several versions of the escape of John B. Thayer, Jr., son of John B. Thayer, second Vice president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, who was lost. One version was that the boy jumped from the Titanic just as she sank, and that he swam about among big cakes of ice until taken aboard a lifeboat.
Mr. McGough in his account of the lad’s rescue says the boy jumped as the vessel sank, but that he alighted near a life-raft, to which, half frozen, he clung until taken aboard a boat.
Another statement by Mr. McGough was that when a man, presumably an Associated Press correspondent, boarded theCarpathia off Cape Cod, and tried to wireless a message ashore a ship officer seized it and threw it into the ocean.
Several weeks ago Mr. McGough was sent abroad on a purchasing trip for his firm. With him were J. D. Flynn, of New York, formerly of Philadelphia, and N. P. Calderhead, also a former Philadelphian.
When the gang plank was thrown down from the Carpathia, Mr. McGough was the first passenger from the ill-starred Titanic to land, waiting for him were his wife, Mrs. Mary McGough, and his three brothers, Philip A., Thomas and Andrew McGough, all of 252 South Seventh street, Philadelphia. His wife saw him first. Stretching out her arms, she threw herself from the police lines toward him, and in a moment he had her clasped in his embrace.
Afterward he rushed through the crowd and took a motor car to the home of a relative. Thence he went to the Imperial Hotel. From the hotel he sent a message to his mother at 252 South Seventh street.
“I am here, safe,” the message read.
“The collision which caused the loss of the Titanic,” Mr. McGough said, “occurred about 11.40 o’clock. I had an outer state-room on the side toward the iceberg against which the ship crashed. Flynn who occupied the room with me, had just gone to bed. Calderhead was in bed in a stateroom adjoining.
“When the crash came, I ran to the porthole. I saw the ice pressed close against the side of the ship. Chunks of it were ground off, and they fell into the window. I happened to glance at my watch, and it showed me exactly the hour.
“I knew that something was seriously wrong, and hastily got into my clothes. I took time, also, to get my watch and money. Flynn, in the meantime, had run over to Calderhead’s stateroom and had awakened him. When I had dressed I ran outside.
“I saw the iceberg. The boat deck stood about ninety feetout of the water and the berg towered above us for at least fifty feet. I judge the berg stood between 140 and 150 feet out of the water.
“Many of the women on board, I am sure, did not leave their staterooms at once. They stayed there, at least for a time. I believe that many of them did not awaken to their danger until near the last.
“One statement I want to correct, the lights did not go out, at least not while I was on board. When I ran to the deck I heard Captain Smith order that the air chambers be examined. An effort was made to work the doors closing the compartments, but to no avail. When the ship ran upon the iceberg, the sharp-pointed berg cut through both thicknesses of the bottom and left it in such a position that it filled rapidly.
“I remember that it was a beautiful night. There was no wind and the sea was calm. But for this it is certain that when the boats were launched most all of us would have perished in the ice-covered sea. At first the captain ordered the hatches over the steerage fastened down. This was to prevent the hysterical passengers in that part of the ship rushing to the deck and increasing the panic. Before we left, however, those passengers were released.
“Two sailors were put into each of the boats. When the boats were lowered the women hung back. They feared to go down the long, steep ladder to the water. Seeing them hesitate, I cried: ‘Someone has to be first,’ and started down the ladder.
“I had hardly started before I regretted I had not waited on deck. But I feel if I had not led the way the women would not have started and the death list would have been much larger. Flynn and Calderhead led the way into other boats.
“It was only a short time before the boat was filled. We had fifty-five in our boat, nearly all of them women. We had entered the craft so hastily that we did not take time to get a light.
“For a time we bobbed about on the ocean. Then we started to row slowly away. I shall never forget the screams that flowed over the ocean toward us from the sinking ship. At the end there was a mad rush and scramble.
“It was fearfully hard on the women. Few of them were completely dressed. Some wore only their night gowns, with some light wrapper or kimono over them. The air was pitilessly cold.
“There were so few men in the boat the women had to row. This was good for some of them, as it kept their blood in circulation, but even then it was the most severe experience for them imaginable. Some of them were half-crazed with grief or terror. Several became ill from the exposure.
“I saw Mr. Widener just before I left, and afterward, while we were rowing away from the vessel I had a good glimpse of him. He appeared as calm and collected as though he were taking a walk on Broad st. When the rush for the boats began he and his son Harry, stood back.
“At the end sailors had to tear Mrs. Widener from him, and she went down the ladder, calling to him pitifully. The ship went down at 2.20 o’clock exactly. The front end went down gradually. We saw no men shot, but just before the finish we heard several shots.
“I was told that Captain Smith or one of the officers shot himself on the bridge just before the Titanic went under. I heard also that several men had been killed as they made a final rush for the boats, trying to cut off the women and children.
“While we were floating around the sailors set off some redfire, which illuminated the ocean for miles around. This was a signal of distress. Unfortunately there was no one near enough to answer in time.
“John B. Thayer, Jr., was saved after he had gone down with the ship. Just as the vessel took the plunge he leaped over the side. He struck out for a life raft and reached it. There heclung for several hours until, half-frozen, he was taken into one of the boats which was a trifle less crowded than the others.
“For six hours we bobbed around in the ocean. We rowed over to a boat that was provided with a light, and tied the two small craft together. Finally daylight came, and the sun rose in a clear sky. There we were, a little fleet, alone in the limitless ocean, with the ice cakes tossing about on all sides.
“It was after 8 o’clock in the morning when we saw the masts of a steamship coming up over the horizon. It was the most blessed sight our eyes ever saw. It meant an end to the physical suffering, a relief to the strain under which we had been laboring. Many broke down when they saw it.
“The ship, of course, was the Carpathia. While it was hurrying toward us the crew and passengers had made the most generous preparations for us. When they took us on board they had blankets, clothing, food and warm liquids all ready. Their physicians were ready to care for the sick. The passengers gave up their warm beds to us.