Sir Ernest Shackleton expressed strong opinions about the sacrifice of safety for speed: British Inquiry, June 18, 1912, pp. 720–721. Emily Ryerson had expressed concerns to Bruce Ismay and felt rebuffed by him: letter to D. Brown on decision to testify, Apr. 18, 1913, p. 2, L/P file, pp. 327–328.
Juliette Laroche could deal with the prejudice of her time, but the Titanic itself disturbed her, as memorialized in a letter from Queenstown, preserved by her children and reported by Oliver Mendez, “Mademoiselle Louise Laroche: A Titanic Survivor,” Titanic Commutator 19, no. 2 (Aug. 1995): 44–45. Juliette and the children departed in boat 10: Judith Geller, Titanic: Women and Children First (New York: W. W. Norton, 1998), 95–96.
Charles Lightoller was working on the false (and deadly) assumption that the new lifeboats were frail and could be launched only half fulclass="underline" John Hardy, American Inquiry, Apr. 25, 1912, p. 592; Lightoller, American Inquiry, Apr. 19, 1912, p. 77, and Apr. 24, 1912, p. 434. Lightoller was working under the further assumption that the lifeboats were not for adult males and people from third class: Lightoller, American Inquiry, Apr. 19, 1912, pp. 57, 71, 74–75, 1107; Lightoller, British Inquiry, May 21, 1912, p. 314.
Harold Lowe followed the Lightoller assumptions and added a barrier against nonwhites: Lowe, American Inquiry, Apr. 24, 1912, pp. 417–419. An “apology” of sorts by Lowe was logged in the American Inquiry, Apr. 30, 1912, p. 1100; he conceded that not all the dark-complexioned people against whom he drew his gun were Italians, so he was wrong to describe them all as Italians.
Ellen Betty Phillips, the unborn child whose future would be torn apart by the Titanic, is another of the Titanic’s least-known stories. Dennis Cocrane reported the saga of the Marshall necklace in “Love of the Sea,” New York, International Gem and Jewelry Show, Inc., 1998. Further details on Ellen Betty Phillips: letters from John R. Hodges and E. B. Phillips, Apr. 27, 2001; “Life after the Titanic,” The West, 2001; and Millvina Dean (whose mother was on the same lifeboat with Kate Phillips), personal communications, 1994, 1996, 2001.
As an example of how Henry Morley’s story about leaving because of lung infections became believable to his family, and how common infections turned deadly all too easily in 1912, infection death rates in a single Titanic family were instructive: Violet Jessop with J. Maxtone Graham, Violet Jessop: Titanic Survivor 13, 19, 22–24, 26–27, 31–32, 34. The Pasteur Institute developed a treatment for diphtheria just in time to save Jessop’s two younger brothers.
By five past midnight, Lawrence Beesley encountered the unforgettable sights and sounds of the library and the dining saloon, as described in his memoir, in Jack Winocour, ed., The Story of the Titanic as Told by Its Survivors (New York: Dover, 1960), p. 22.
Tracing the final resting places of the Titanic’s on-board mail was addressed with Walter Lord, personal communication, Sept. 13, 1993, L/P file, pp. 37, 60–63.
Masabumi Hosono’s overly hasty departure from his room and its consequences were recorded in a letter to his wife written on Titanic stationery aboard the Carpathia: M. Findlay, “A Matter of Honor,” Voyage 27, Winter 1998, p. 122.
Strange statements heard among the boat-deck runners were recorded in Helen Candee’s unpublished memoir, Sealed Orders, May 1912, p. 2, L/P file, p. 172.
Violet Jessop had survived the collision between the Olympic and the Hawke seven months earlier, and though frightened by news that the Titanic might sink, she turned her attention to the safety and comfort of her passengers: Violet Jessop with J. Maxtone Graham, Violet Jessop: Titanic Survivor (New York: Sheridan House, 1997), 102–103, 106, 121, 126–127. This was affirmed by Annie Robinson at the British Inquiry, May 20, 1912, pp. 298–299, and in a letter by Jessop to a friend, July 27, 1958, L/P file, p. 539. The Olympic-Hawke incident can be referenced (with photos of the aftermath) in Robert Ballard, Titanic: The Last Great Images (Toronto: Madison Press, 2008), 50.
The curious encounter between Colonel Archibald Gracie and Frederick Wright was memorialized by Gracie in Jack Winocour, ed., The Story of the Titanic as Told by Its Survivors (New York: Dover, 1960), 119, and by Walter Lord, A Night to Remember (New York: Holt, 1955), 39.
A story about Jenny and her kittens safely departing the Titanic in Belfast and saving a scullion named Jim “Mulholland” when he followed them has turned out to be untrue. The actual story is contained in Violet Jessop with J. Maxtone Graham, Violet Jessop: Titanic Survivor (New York: Sheridan House, 1997), 118. The legend of Jenny and Jim went from an Internet blog to the Belfast News in 1997 (based on a story by ninety-two-year-old Paddy Scott, who claimed that his friend Jim Mulholland had been none other than Violet Jessop’s friend Jim and that he had been saved by a cat’s intuition). An article by Anne Hailes, published in the Belfast News, went to the Associated Press and the world—where it was eventually memorialized in such places as Marty Crisp’s and Robert Papp’s exquisitely illustrated book, Titanicat (Chelsea, MI: Sleeping Bear Press, 2008).
Jessop, a firsthand eyewitness, had a habit of changing the names of many people to protect them, including her own siblings; with great effort, John Maxtone Graham and Walter Lord were able to sort out the identities of her siblings, William Murdoch, Henry Sleeper Harper, and others, so Scott’s naming of Jim Mulholland was itself a compass pointing toward the truth. Jessop stated very clearly that her friend Jim made the voyage along with the cats and that the real story did not end for them as happily as the legends of cyberspace would have it.
Charles Joughin organized his staff into a rescue effort, fully aware of the victimizing mathematics that had taken rule of the night: British Inquiry, May 10, 1912, pp. 140, 144–145; letter to Walter Lord, Nov. 2, 1955, p. 2, L/P file, p. 427. Joughin refused orders to take command of a lifeboat, decided that he would conduct rescues till the last possible minute, then follow Dr. Will O’Loughlin’s advice to meet death indoors, deep within the ship, after drinking quickly and heavily: Walter Lord, transcript of conversations with Joughin, Sept. 13, 1993, p. 2, L/P file, p. 426.
Nearly a century later, deep-ocean archaeologists named an area of debris from Joughin’s region (found near the stern section) “Hell’s Kitchen,” as noted in the documentary Titanica, made by the first Russian-American expedition, Stephen Low, IMAX, 1991.
4. NIGHT OF THE LIGHTNING DOLPHINS
Samuel Hemming’s hatch is still wide open: Charles Pellegrino, video log, Expedition Titanic XIII, Sept. 22, 2001. The common rat-tailed fish, often seen lurking around the Titanic, is a perfect example of organisms we could see that remained around our bright searchlights because they don’t see us. Parks Stephenson, in a letter to author, Dec. 24, 2010, wrote of his 2005 encounter: “I watched a rat-tail fish run smack into a projecting beam and then, startled, swim off in another direction. He didn’t react to our presence the entire time. Not only are [these] fish blind, but they don’t often see the submersibles as danger.”