A Night to Remember (5 page)

“This will hurt,” protested the mining and smelting king. Etches finally took the belt off altogether, made some adjustments, put it on again. Next, Guggenheim wanted to go on deck as he was, but Etches was adamant—it was much too cold. Ultimately Guggenheim submitted; Etches pulled a heavy sweater over him and sent him packing off topside.

Some of the passengers were even more difficult. At C-78, Etches found the door locked. When he knocked loudly with both hands, a man inside asked suspiciously, “What is it?” and a woman added, “Tell us what the trouble is.” Etches explained and again tried to get them to open the door. He had no luck, and after a few minutes’ pleading he finally passed on to the next cabin.

In another part of the ship a locked door raised a different problem. It was jammed, and some passengers broke it down to release a man inside. At this point a steward arrived, threatening to have everybody arrested for damaging company property when the
Titanic
reached New York.

At 12:15 it was hard to know whether to joke or be serious—whether to chop down a door and be a hero, or chop it down and get arrested. No two people seemed to have the same reaction.

Mrs. Arthur Ryerson felt there wasn’t a moment to lose. She had long since abandoned the idea of letting Mr. Ryerson sleep; now she scurried about trying to keep her family together. There were six to get ready—her husband, three children, governess, and maid—and the children seemed to slow. Finally she gave up on her youngest daughter; just threw a fur coat over her nightgown and told her to come on.

There seemed all the time in the world to Mrs. Lucien Smith. Slowly and with great care she dressed for whatever the night might bring—a heavy woolen dress, high shoes, two coats, and a warm knitted hood. All the while Mr. Smith chatted away about landing in New York, taking the train south, never mentioning the iceberg. As they started for the deck, Mrs. Smith decided to go back for some jewelry. Here Mr. Smith drew the line. He suggested it might be wiser not to bother with “trifles.” As a compromise Mrs. Smith picked up two favorite rings. Closing the door carefully behind them, the young couple headed up toward the Boat Deck.

The things people took with them showed how they felt. Adolf Dyker handed his wife a small satchel containing two gold watches, two diamond rings, a sapphire necklace, and 200 Swedish crowns. Miss Edith Russell carried a musical toy pig (it played the
Maxixe).
Stewart Collett, a young theological student traveling Second Class, took the Bible he promised his brother he’d always carry until they met again. Lawrence Beesley stuffed the pockets of his Norfolk jacket with the books he had been reading in bed. Norman Campbell Chambers pocketed a revolver and compass. Steward Johnson, by now anticipating far more than “another Belfast trip,” stuck four oranges under his blouse. Mrs. Dickinson Bishop left behind 11,000 dollars in jewelry, then sent her husband back for her muff.

Major Arthur Peuchen looked at the tin box on the table in C-104. Inside were 200,000 dollars in bonds, 100,000 dollars in preferred stock. He thought a good deal about it as he took off his dinner jacket, put on two suits of long underwear and some heavy clothes.

Then he took a last look around the little cabin—the real brass bed … the green mesh net along the wall for valuables at night… the marble washstand … the wicker armchair … the horsehair sofa … the fan in the ceiling … the bells and electrical fixtures that on a liner always look as if they were installed as an afterthought.

Now his mind was made up. He slammed the door, leaving behind the tin box on the table. In another minute he was back. Quickly he picked up a good-luck pin and three oranges. As he left for the last time, the tin box was still on the table.

Out in the C Deck foyer, Purser Herbert McElroy was urging everyone to stop standing around. As the countess of Rothes passed, he called, “Hurry, little lady, there is not much time. I’m glad you didn’t ask me for your jewels as some ladies have.”

Into the halls they poured, gently prodded along by the crew. One room steward caught the eye of Miss Marguerite Frolicher as she came down the corridor. Four days before, she had playfully teased him for putting a life belt in her stateroom, if the ship was meant to be so unsinkable. At the time he had laughed and assured her it was just a formality … she would never have to wear it. Remembering the exchange, he now smiled and reassured her, “Don’t be scared; it’s all right.”

“I’m not scared,” she replied, “I’m just seasick.”

Up the stairs they trooped—a hushed crowd in jumbled array. Under his overcoat Jack Thayer now sported a greenish tweed suit and vest, with another mohair vest underneath. Mr. Robert Daniel, the Philadelphia banker, had on only woolen pajamas. Mrs. Turrell Cavendish wore a wrapper and Mr. Cavendish’s overcoat … Mrs. John C. Hogeboom a fur coat over her nightgown … Mrs. Ada Clark just a nightgown. Mrs. Washington Dodge didn’t bother to put on stockings under her high-button shoes, which flopped open because she didn’t stop to button them. Mrs. Astor looked right out of a bandbox in an attractive light dress, Mrs. James J. Brown—a colorful Denver millionairess—equally stylish in a black velvet two-piece suit with black and white silk lapels.

Automobiling, as practiced in 1912, affected the attire of many ladies—Mrs. C. E. Henry Stengel wore a veil tightly pinned down over her floral hat, Madame de Villiers a long woolen motoring coat over her nightgown and evening slippers.

Young Alfred von Drachstedt, a 20-year-old youth from Cologne, settled on a sweater and a pair of trousers, leaving behind a brand-new 2,133-dollar wardrobe that included walking sticks and a fountain pen, which he somehow felt was a special badge of distinction.

Second Class was somewhat less elegantly disarrayed. Mr. and Mrs. Albert Caldwell—returning from Siam, where they taught at the Bangkok Christian College—had bought new clothes in London, but tonight they dressed in the oldest clothes they owned. Their baby Alden was wrapped in a blanket. Miss Elizabeth Nye wore a simple skirt, coat, and slippers. Mrs. Charlotte Collyer didn’t bother to put up her hair, just tied it back with a ribbon. Her eight-year-old daughter Marjory had a steamer rug around her shoulders. Mr. Collyer took little trouble dressing, because he expected to be back soon—he even left his watch lying on his pillow.

The scene in Third Class was particularly confusing because the White Star Line primly quartered the single men and single women at opposite ends of the
Titanic.
Now many of the men—who slept toward the bow—hurried aft to join the girls.

Katherine Gilnagh, a pert colleen not quite 16, heard a knock on the door. It was the young man who caught her eye earlier that day playing the bagpipes on deck. He told her to get up—something was wrong with the ship. Anna Sjoblom, an 18-year-old Finnish girl bound for the Pacific Northwest, woke up when a young Danish swain came in to rouse her roommate. He also gave Anna a life belt and urged her to come along. But she was too seasick to care. Eventually there was so much commotion that she went up after all, even though she still felt awful. She was quickly helped into a life belt by Alfred Wicklund, a schoolfriend from home.

Among these young men, Olaus Abelseth was especially worried. He was a 26-year-old Norwegian heading for a South Dakota homestead, and an old family friend had put a 16-year-old daughter in his care until they reached Minneapolis. As he pushed his way aft along the E Deck working alleyway, Minneapolis seemed a long way off.

Abelseth found the girl in the main steerage hallway on E Deck. Then, along with his brother-in-law, a cousin and another girl, they all climbed the broad, steep Third Class stairs to the poop deck at the very stern of the ship.

Into the bitter night the whole crowd milled, each class automatically keeping to its own decks—First Class in the center of the ship, Second a little aft, Third at the very stern or in the well deck near the bow. Quietly they stood around waiting for the next orders … reasonably confident yet vaguely worried. With uneasy amusement they eyed how one another looked in life belts. There were a few half-hearted jokes.

“Well,” said Clinch Smith as a girl walked by carrying a Pomeranian, “I suppose we ought to put a life preserver on the little doggie too.”

“Try this on,” a man told Mrs. Vera Dick as he fastened on her life jacket. “They are the very latest thing this season. Everybody is wearing them now.”

“They will keep you warm if you don’t have to use them,” Captain Smith cheerfully explained to Mrs. Alexander T. Compton of New Orleans.

At about 12:30 Colonel Gracie bumped into Fred Wright, the
Titanic
’s squash pro. Remembering he had reserved the court for 7:30 in the morning, Gracie tried a little joke of his own: “Hadn’t we better cancel that appointment?”

“Yes,” replied Wright. His voice was flat and without enthusiasm, but the wonder is he played along at all. He knew the water was now up to the squash-court ceiling.

In the brightly lit gym, just off the Boat Deck, Mr. and Mrs. Astor sat side by side on a pair of motionless mechanical horses. They wore their life belts, and Mr. Astor had an extra one in his lap. He was slicing it open with his penknife, whiling away the time by showing his wife what was inside.

While the passengers joked and talked and waited, the crew moved swiftly to their stations. The Boat Deck teemed with seamen, stewards, firemen, chefs, ordered up from below.

A curiously late arrival was Fifth Officer Harold Godfrey Lowe. A tempestuous young Welshman, Lowe was hard to suppress. When he was 14, his father tried to apprentice him to a Liverpool businessman, but Lowe said he “wouldn’t work for nobody for nothing.” So he ran away to sea and a life after his own heart—schooners … square riggers … five years steaming along the West African coast.

Now, at 28, he was making his first trip across the Atlantic. This Sunday night he was off duty and slept right through the collision. Voices outside his cabin on the Boat Deck finally woke him up. When he looked out the porthole and saw everybody in life belts, he catapulted out of bed, into his clothes, and rushed on deck to help. Not exactly an auspicious start, but then, as Lowe later explained to U.S. Senator Smith, “You must remember that we do not have any too much sleep, and therefore when we sleep we die.”

Second Officer Charles Herbert Lightoller was late too, but for an entirely different reason. Like Lowe, he was off duty in his bunk when the
Titanic
hit, but he woke up instantly and, in his bare feet, ran out on the Boat Deck to see what was up. Nothing could be seen on either side of the ship, except on the starboard wing of the bridge, where he dimly made out Captain Smith and First Officer Murdoch. They too were peering into the night.

Lightoller returned to his cabin and thought it over. Something undoubtedly was wrong with the ship—first that jar, now the silent engines. But he was
off
duty, and until called, it was no business of his. When they needed him, they would send for him. When this happened, he should be where they’d expect to find him. Lightoller got back into bed and lay awake waiting …

Five, 15, 30 minutes went by. He could now hear the roar of the funnels blowing off steam, the rising sound of voices, the clanking of gear. But still, his duty was to be where they’d expect to find him.

At 12:10 Fourth Officer Boxhall finally came bursting in: “You know we have struck an iceberg.”

“I know we have struck something,” Lightoller replied, getting up and starting to dress.

“The water is up to F Deck in the mail room,” continued Boxhall, by way of a little prodding. But no urging was needed. Lightoller was already well on the way. Cool, diligent, cautious, he knew his duty to the letter. He was the perfect Second Officer.

On the Boat Deck men began to clear the 16 wooden lifeboats. There were eight on each side—a cluster of four toward the bow, then an open space of 190 feet, then another four toward the stern. Port boats had even numbers, starboard odd. They were numbered in sequence, starting from the bow. In addition, four canvas collapsible lifeboats—known as Englehardts—were stowed on deck. These could be fitted into the empty davits after the two forward boats were lowered. The collapsibles were lettered A, B, C, and D.

All the boats together could carry 1,178 people. On this Sunday night there were 2,207 people on board the
Titanic.

This mathematical discrepancy was known by none of the passengers and few of the crew, but most of them wouldn’t have cared anyhow. The
Titanic
was unsinkable. Everybody said so. When Mrs. Albert Caldwell was watching the deck hands carry up luggage at Southampton, she asked one of them, “Is this ship really nonsinkable?”

“Yes, lady,” he answered. “God himself could not sink this ship.”

So now the passengers stood calmly on the Boat Deck—unworried but very confused. There had been no boat drill. The passengers had no boat assignments. The crew had assignments, but hardly anybody bothered to look at the list. Now they were playing it strictly by ear—yet somehow the crew seemed to sense where they were needed and how to be useful. The years of discipline were paying off.

Little knots of men swarmed over each boat, taking off the canvas covers, clearing the masts and useless paraphernalia, putting in lanterns and tins of biscuits. Other men stood at the davits, fitting in cranks and uncoiling the lines. One by one the cranks were turned. The davits creaked, the pulleys squealed, and the boats slowly swung out free of the ship. Next a few feet of line were paid out, so that each boat would lie flush with the Boat Deck … or, in some cases, flush with Promenade Deck A directly below.

But the going was slow. Second Officer Lightoller, in charge of the port side, believed in channels, and Chief Officer Wilde seemed quite a bottleneck. When Lightoller asked permission to swing out, Wilde said, “No, wait.” Lightoller finally went to the bridge and got orders direct from Captain Smith. Now Lightoller asked Wilde if he could load up. Again Wilde said no; again Lightoller went to the bridge; again Captain Smith gave him the nod: “Yes, put the women and children in and lower away.”