Titanic Centenary: April 11, 1912

April 11, 1912

The morning of April 11 was clear but cool, keeping most passengers indoors as the Titanic neared her final stop in Queenstown, Ireland (known today as Cobh). She docked around 11:30am, dropping anchor just outside of Roche's Point, too big to berth at the dock itself. Passengers and mail had to be ferried back and forth on smaller tenders.

Not many passengers disembarked in Ireland, but one of these would later turn out to be a boon for Titanic historians. Francis Browne (later known as Father Browne) had been crossing the channel with the O'Dell family in first class. While he was only on the ship a short time, he brought his camera along and took many photographs of the ship's interiors, some of the only photos that would ever be taken in her short life. A full album of his photographs can be found here.

Another man who got off the ship at Queenstown wasn't supposed to: John Coffey, a Irish fireman who signed on in Southampton, deserted the ship in Queenstown by hiding under some bags of mail. It is thought that he used the ship's voyage as a way to get free passage home. More can be found about him in a previous blog post.

While Titanic is in port, newsmen and others are allowed on board to quickly tour her decks, take pictures and even sell wares to the first class passengers. But not for long, because about two hours after dropping anchor, she is ready to set off again, this time for New York. The photo to the right was taken by Father Browne as he left the ship, the last picture ever taken of Captain Smith, who can be seen peering down from the bridge (top of the image), with one of the lifeboats dangling ominously below.

No first class passengers boarded at Queenstown, and only a few joined the second class, one of which was Nora Keane, who would be placed in a cabin with Edwina Troutt and Susan Webber (both of which are mentioned in DESTINED). The majority of the people coming onto the ship here were third class: immigrants heading to America to start new lives in the New World. Jeremiah Burke, the boy whose "message in a bottle" was found near his hometown a year later (more on him here), was one of these immigrants.

Shortly after 1:30pm, Titanic raised anchor for the last time and headed out to sea. Out on the stern, in the third class promenade, Irishman Eugene Daly (more on his in John Coffey's blog post, above) sat down to play "Erin's Lament" on his pipes, a sad goodbye to the homeland he would not see again for many years.

Once she was underway, a full emergency dress rehearsal took place among the crew, complete with alarm bells and the closing of all the watertight doors. The lifeboat drill for the passengers was scheduled for Sunday morning, April 14. It would not take place, skipped by the Captain for an unknown reason.

The rest of the day would unfold normally, starting up a routine of relaxing, socializing and dining that would continue on throughout the voyage.

What may be the last photograph taken of the Titanic, as she steams away from Ireland's coast.

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Don’t forget the Destined Blog Tour going on this week. Today's stop: Rainy Day Ramblings

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Titanic Centenary: April 10

April 10, 1912

April 10 was a busy day for Titanic. It was sailing day, the first day of her maiden voyage. She would set off from her first port in Southampton, England, at noon, heading across the English Channel for Cherbourg, France.

Titanic's crew arrived first, around sunrise, filling the port and filing on board to get ready to receive her first passengers. All but one officer was on board, having spent the night on the ship in preparation. The last officer to arrive was Captain Edward Smith, who boarded around 7:30am. Around 9:00am, a mandatory lifeboat drill was carried out, where two of the lifeboats were filled with a few crew members, lowered to the water, then raised back up.

Around the time the lifeboat drill ended, J. Bruce Ismay, Director of the White Star Line, boarded with his family. Many would board the ship this day to tour her decks, then leave before she sailed. The train carrying the ship's second and third class passengers also arrived from London around this time, and boarding officially began. Among these passengers was William H. Harbeck and his companion, Henriette Yrois.

Deep inside the ship, in coal bunker #6, a fire was burning. This wasn't uncommon on a ship that used coal, and the Chief Engineer assured everyone that it would not damage the hull in any way. Some believe today that the fire may have, in fact, weakened the steel in that part of the hull, allowed it to be breached by the collision with the iceberg. The fire was not put out for two or three days.

Around 11:30am, the train carrying Titanic's first class arrived at the dock, and the ship's elite began to board. Among them: John Jacob Astor and his new, pregnant wife; Mr. and Mrs. Isador Straus, owners of Macy's department store; and Col. Archibald Gracie, who would later write a popular book about the sinking of the ship. Before Titanic left port, her second class passengers were allowed to tour the first class public areas, giving them a quick glimpse at how the other half lived.

At noon, the ship began to edge away from the dock. As she turned into the channel to head out, her size and increasing speed churned up the water enough that a suction was created, pulling two nearby ships, the Oceanic and New York away from their moorings. Ropes snapped, and the New York was set free. Captain Smith was made aware of the imminent danger and went into action, calling for the engines to be reversed, halting her movement. The New York was corralled by tugs and stopped before Titanic began to move forward again. While this was going on, more lines were added to Oceanic to prevent her from breaking free, and after a tense hour, Titanic was once again on her way. Her voyage had begun, but the incident with the other ships had delayed her an hour, and she would now arrive at her next destination late. A bad omen?

In Cherbourg, France, passengers waiting to begin their own journeys received news that the ship would be late. With no choice but to wait, they wandered the area, perhaps vented to one another about the inconvenience. Among them would be Benjamin Guggenheim, Sir Cosmo and Lady Duff Gordon, and Margaret Brown, known today as Molly, all traveling in first class.

Despite the late start, Titanic did not try to make up time as it crossed the Channel. Shortly after clearing the English coast, the bugle sounded, announcing dinner. Passengers congregated in the dining halls for their first meal on board. Conversation around the tables were surely excited after the recent near-collision.

The sun was beginning to set as Titanic finally arrived at the French port. She dropped anchor around 6:30pm and tenders began to ferry the cross-channel passengers and mail off. Other tenders carried the Cherbourg passengers to the ship, along with more mail. The entire process took about 90 minutes, and by 8:00pm, the sun had set and she was ready to set off for Ireland, lights blazing from every porthole. She must have been quite the sight to behold. The photo here was taken shortly after she dropped anchor, before it was fully dark.

At 8:10pm, the anchor was raised and Titanic set off down the English Channel towards Ireland, her final stop before heading out to sea.

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Don’t forget the Destined Blog Tour going on this week. First stop: Bona Fide Reflections

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Titanic centenary news stories

This week, I plan on doing a day-to-day posting of the Titanic’s maiden voyage, although I haven’t yet figured out what I will write on April 12-13, since those two days were relatively boring on board the ship. Since the ship’s maiden voyage didn’t begin until April 10, here’s a post you can refer back to as the week goes on for news stories around the world. Many news sites have Titanic sections where they link each new article as it goes up, so check back every day to see what’s been posted! I’ll try to add to this as I find things as well.

New York TImes

• Includes PDFs of articles from 1912. Interesting stuff, especially some of them that were printed as they were following the news via wireless, and didn’t know if anyone was going to survive.
• An interesting article written by the grandson of Lawrence Beesley

Irish Central 

• They recently posted an article about Jeremiah Burke that adds a little more information to what I had in an earlier post.
• Also, an article about Eugene Daly that includes his own account of the sinking, including his story about an officer shooting two men and then himself. It’s a pretty interesting read if you have the time.
• A short article about Catherine Walsh, a 2nd Class Stewardess and one of the few female crew members to die in the sinking.
• A profile of Nora Keane, one of Edwina Troutt’s roommates. Includes her first-hand account of the sinking.

BBC.co.uk  Includes an interesting article listing some of the myths perpetuated by various films

The Liverpool Echo

TheJournal.ie

The Guardian

The Telegraph

Huffington Post

The History Channel

Ottawa Citizen

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Update on various things

So far, this year has been a lot busier than I’d anticipated. Good, I suppose, except that I would have liked more of that busyness to be writing-related. Maybe that will be the second half of my year. *fingers crossed* Instead, I’ve been busy with day job stuff, family stuff and more fun (but still not writing-related) trip-to-Paris-planning stuff.

If I find inspiration for a new book while in Paris, can I claim the trip as a business expense? ;)

I admit I’m using blogging today as a tool to procrastinate. I’m in the middle of re-designing our website at the day job, and after spending all week slowly re-coding the old pages to the new layout, I needed a break. Tomorrow, I’m going to see the Hunger Games movie (woo!), so I feel a little guilty that I’m using my one free weekend day to slack off, but that’s what weekends are made for, right?

I do have a feel things of note to mention, but before I get to the actual updating, I felt this post needed a pretty picture. A few weeks back, I took a photography tour at one of my most favorite places, Big Cat Rescuse. It was a Christmas present (thanks, Mom & Dad!), and while the cats weren’t as active as I had hoped, I managed to get some nice shots. Everything, in my opinion, is made better with cats. Especially gorgeous ones like this cougar.

Now for the updates. The next few months are going to be busy for me. Not only will I be editing my next book and preparing for my Paris trip in May, but April is the 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster. Because of this, I’m aiming to do some extra promotion for DESTINED, in the hopes that whatever interest the anniversary raises will trickle down to me in the form of new readers.

First bit of promotion: I’m donating a copy of DESTINED to Ruby’s Reads Birthday Giveaway Hop, which will be happening from April 12-24. When I have more details, I’ll be sure to post them here.

Second, I’m going to be doing my very own (and very first) blog tour. It’s a short one, due to the late notice (I only got the idea last week. Whoops!) and because it coincides with the Titanic anniversary, which is less than a week. The blog tour will run for 5 days, from April 10 – April 14. The wonderful Parajunkee is organizing it for me, and is currently finalizing the list of bloggers that will be involved. If this tour goes well, I’ll probably do a longer one for the release of my next book. (If I ever find enough time to get the damn thing edited!) Again, I’ll update here once I know more.

Third, I’m hoping to do a series of posts here that same week about the Titanic, as a kind of tribute to the ship’s maiden—and final—voyage. It will depend on if I have the time to write that many posts in advance, but my aim is to do something each day about that corresponding day of the voyage, along with a short spoiler-free snippet from DESTINED that goes along with the day featured.

In blog-related news, thanks to a post I stumbled across today over at Fiction VIxen’s blog, I discovered my own blog settings weren’t really optimal. I’ve remedied that, and now anyone can comment to my posts without having to log in or register somewhere first, and no one should have to use Captcha anymore. Hopefully these new settings won’t get me spammed to high heaven. I really want this blog to be user-friendly, and since I personally hate dealing with Captcha and don’t comment if I have to register first, it was pretty hypocritical to expect my own readers to deal with both roadblocks. I promise, it was never intentional. It must have been the default Blogger settings, and I never caught them before. So thank you to Fiction Vixen for inspiring me check it out!

Now that the updates are out of the way, I think I’m going to use the what’s left of my afternoon editing the still-untitled (I suck at titles) next book.

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Titanic Tuesday: Myths & Legends

The Titanic has always been a subject of interest for people, even before the movie in 1997 brought it back to the forefront of public attention. And now, with the 100th anniversary of the disaster approaching, I imagine it’s going to be popping up everywhere again. Books, movies, documentaries, you name it. I’m excited, because I can never get enough Titanic (though I doubt I will be seeing the 3D re-release of the film, despite it being my favorite movie. 3D gives me a headache, and it’s been my experience that movies converted into 3D after the fact aren’t very effective. I prefer to watch it in its original format. I don’t need the iceberg coming out of my screen at me, or Rose’s hand reaching out towards me during the cargo hold scene – and you know they won’t be able to resist doing that.).

But with all the renewed interest and publicity, many long-standing myths and legends are bound to pop up again. “Facts” that get told over and over despite being untrue, passed along because people hear it often enough, they assume it’s reality. After all, we no longer have any first-hand witnesses living to set us straight, and even if we did, not all of them were always 100% reliable. Eyewitness testimony is hardly infallible, after all. Some people insisted to their dying day that the ship went down intact, and we know that’s not the case now that the wreck has been found. Others have conflicting stories about gunshots, officer suicides, where Captain Smith was, and how/if the third class was trapped belowdecks. For most of these, we’ll never really know the truth, because unlike Apolline in Destined (shameless self-promotion shout-out!), we can’t go back and see it for ourselves.

There are, however, many facts about the ship we do know, and myths that have been busted, yet still linger on. So I thought I’d take the opportunity in today’s Titanic Tuesdays post to point some of them out.

• There was not a mummy in the cargo hold. I’m not sure where that myth started, but it pops up now and then, even today. Researchers have never found proof that such a thing existed on the ship. Some believe the story came about because one of the passengers, William T. Stead, told his dinner companions about the mummy, which was on display in London at the time, and after the disaster, memories became jumbled and his story about the mummy turned into a story that it was on board the ship (and due to a curse, the cause of the disaster).
• The Titanic was not the first ship to use S.O.S. as a distress call. While it is true that S.O.S. was relatively new at the time (up until then, the standard distress call was C.Q.D.), the signal was used first by Germans in 1905, then adopted as a the new worldwide standard in 1908. It took time to catch on, which is why most ships took a while to switch over from the CQD they were used to.
• The officers (or White Star Line) were not trying to make a speed record on Titanic’s maiden voyage. Her maximum speed, with all boilers lit, was only 21 knots, and there were already faster ships out there. However, all of her boilers were never lit, and she was following a longer, more southerly route in order to (irony alert) avoid icebergs. Also, if they had tried to get into port on Tuesday night, rather than Wednesday, as many rumors stated, it would have been a huge inconvenience to everyone on board. Just imagine the uproar from the elite in First Class at being brought to shore the night before they had made arrangements to be picked up or transferred to trains (not to mention all the hotel reservations starting on Wednesday)!
• J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the White Star Line, was not quite the villain many believe. His biggest crime was surviving. He did not sneak onto a boat to save himself. He helped load the boats along with the other officers, and according to witnesses, entered a half-filled boat as it was being lowered only after being ordered to. It makes you think, really: many other men survived without being vilified for it, and many who perished tried to get on boats with little regard to the others around them. It’s a shame that Ismay had to live out the rest of his life under such a cloud when he did not really do anything wrong by getting on that boat. If it truly was already being lowered, the seat he took would have remained empty had he not boarded. If he had stayed on the ship, he would have died, but no one else would have survived in his place. Sadly, if he had stayed on board, he would probably be considered a hero today, right up there with Captain Smith and Thomas Andrews.
• Another common story about Ismay is that he was pressuring Captain Smith to go faster (again, the speed record myth). We’ll never know for sure if this was true, though some passengers claimed to have overheard him talking to the Captain about picking up speed. Still, Smith was too experienced a sailor to take direction from a businessman like Ismay. He would not have altered his course or speed just to please him.
• The Titanic was not felled by a 300-foot-long gash in her hull. While the damaged portion of the hull is still buried in sand, it has been determined that such a large gash is not likely. Instead, scientists say that the sinking was caused by the steel plates buckling under the force of the iceberg as it scraped along the side of the ship, popping off rivets as it went. Some believe the quality of the steel used in making the rivets was sub-par, and therefore caused them to fail. As the rivets popped off, seams were opened and water rushed in.
• No one ever claimed the Titanic was unsinkable. While the ship was described as “practically unsinkable” by Shipbuilder magazine, no one ever declared it as such. It was true that she was built so that she would be very difficult to sink, but as fate would have it, the iceberg struck in just the right way to remind everyone that something that large and heavy can, in fact, sink. Had Titanic hit the berg head-on, it is very possible she would have limped away damaged, but still seaworthy. The watertight compartments were designed so that the ship would stay afloat if any two were filled, and even if the four forward compartments were filled. Unfortunately, sideswiping the berg meant six compartments filled, sending more water into the ship than she could handle. And as anyone who has seen the movie knows, the bulkheads separating the watertight compartments only reached up to E Deck. Once the ship started going down at the bow, water flowed over the tops of the bulkheads and began filling more compartments. The compartment in the front of the ship, however, reached higher, and therefore might have kept water from flowing back into the ship had it been the only section of the hull compromised.

I was going to continue this with film-specific inaccuracies, but rather than get too long, I’ll leave that for another week.

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Titanic Tuesday: When hobbies collide

In addition to my obsession with all things Titanic, I am somewhat of an amateur genealogist. It’s something I discovered a couple of years ago (thanks to the NBC show, Who Do You Think You Are?, which I highly recommend), and got pretty addicted for a while. This past weekend, my mother (who was also bitten by the genealogy bug) brought something to my attention: we might have had an ancestor of the Titanic.

As it turns out, the man in question (John Coffey) is most likely not related to us, or at least not directly. But his story is an interesting one, and I thought it would be a good post topic. As we’re coming up to the centennial next month, I’m aiming to be more regular with these posts, so now is as good a time as any to get back into it.

Coffey is a name on my mother’s side of the family, and we’ve been able to trace our tree all the way back to an Edward Coffey, who came over to the US from Ireland in the 1600s. So while we do have some John Coffeys in our family tree, they were all born in the United States long before 1912, meaning the John Coffey on the Titanic would only be a very distant cousin, if he were even part of our family at all. Still, it’s a nifty connection, and the closest I’ve come so far to tracing my roots to the ship.

John Coffey was born in Queenstown (now Cobh), Ireland, in 1889. When he was 23, he was living in England after working on Titanic’s sister ship, the RMS Olympic. He then signed on to the Titanic as a fireman (or stoker) in Southampton, but did not remain on board for the full voyage. Instead, he snuck off the ship at Queenstown with the mail. Since the Queenstown dock was too small for the ship, Titanic docked offshore and smaller boats, or tenders, ferried passengers and mail on and off. RMS, after all, stands for Royal Mail Ship, and there was quite a bit of mail to be brought to shore. Coffey claimed to have hidden under the bags of mail on the final tender leaving the ship, and was soon reunited with his family. Most believe this was his reason for deserting the ship: to get a free trip back home. But after the tragedy, he often claimed that he slipped off due to a “bad feeling” about the ship’s fate.

Not much more seems to be known about him (that I can find online, at least), other than he supposedly signed on to the Mauretania after the Titanic sank, and that he eventually passed away in 1957. I did find an old forum comment at Ancestry.com from someone claiming to be his great grandson, but he didn’t offer any information publicly.

Another Irish passenger that has more information available, and connects more directly to my own book, is Eugene Daly. Daly was 29 years old when he boarded the Titanic in Queenstown, and was most known later for playing “Erin’s Lament” on his uilleann pipes (similar to bagpipes) while the ship left port. A third class passenger, he sat out on the bow and played, a somber farewell to his homeland. According to the Encyclopedia Titanica, his pipes went down with the ship, and he later filed a claim for them for $50. A set of pipes was salvaged from the wreck many years later that might have been his, but no one is certain.

Daly survived the sinking. He helped two women into a lifeboat (his cousin and her roommate) and boarded with them, only to be pulled out by an officer. (This from a letter he wrote to his sister) He later jumped overboard and swam to the overturned collapsible. He clung to it all night, as it was too crowded to get on, and later claimed he only survived due to the thick coat he wore. He was mentioned in many articles afterwards, testified in the hearings, and was one of the survivors to claim an officer shot two male passengers who were trying to board a lifeboat, then shot himself. There is a nice article written about him by his daughter here, if anyone is interested: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/eugene-daly-his-daughter.html

According to his daughter, he and his wife sailed back to Ireland in 1921 to tend to his sick mother, and the voyage had him in a panic. He vowed never to sail across the Atlantic again, and they remained in Ireland until the early 1960s, after the death of his wife. At this point, he was able to fly back to the US to live with his daughter, and therefore avoided having to get on another ship. Daly passed away in New York in 1965.

I have read accounts of many survivors who refused to get on another ship again, or who found themselves too nervous or panicked the next time they tried. I can’t really blame them for it. I’m not sure I’d be too keen of sailing again if I’d been there, either!

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Titanic Tuesdays; L’Amour de la Mer

I have been woefully lax in updating my blog lately. Frankly, I’ve been lax in most things related to writing. Work is busier, and I recently began planning a vacation, which seems to have overrun my brain. I’m treating myself to a week-long trip to Paris in May for the birthday. It’ll be my third trip there, but my first time traveling overseas by myself. Should be an adventure! Now that I’ve settled on and booked an apartment, I can take a step away and focus on other things for a little while. First order of business: dust off the blog.

In honor of Valentine’s Day, here’s a story I found that’s rather intriguing. A couple of Second Class passengers named Henry & Kate Marshall boarded at Southampton, only Marshall was not their real name. They were, in reality, Henry Morley and Kate Phillips, and were not married but rather eloping to the United States. Morley, nearly 40 years old, was already married, and had left his wife and daughter for his much younger mistress,19-year-old Kate, whom he met while she was working in one of his confectioner’s shops. He was a wealthy man, and gifted her with a beautiful sapphire necklace (sound familiar?) on board the ship. I have only found one photo of it online, and suspect there is copyright involved, so rather than post it here, I’ll link to it instead: L’Amour de la Mer (Love of the Sea).

As with most TItanic stories, this one ends in tragedy. Henry Morley was not allowed on the lifeboat with his mistress, and died in the sinking. Not long after that, Kate discovered she was pregnant. She gave birth to a daughter, Ellen, on January 11, 1913. Some like to say Ellen was conceived on board the ship, because it’s more romantic that way, but there’s no way to know for sure. It’s just as likely she was already a few weeks pregnant when the Titanic set sail. Some even say that her child might have been conceived after the sinking, but I find that less likely. Kate was a grief-stricken young woman, alone in an unfamiliar country in the early 1900s. When would she have the opportunity to start another love affair? She always insisted her child was Morley’s, and gave Ellen’s birth date and the fact that first pregnancies are said to stretch longer than 9 months (most people I know had their first children after their due dates), it stands to reason that Morley is the most likely paternal candidate.

The tragedy continues: according to Ellen herself, Kate Phillips never quite recovered from what happened to her. She was distant, abusive and self-destructive, and ended her life in a mental institution. Some reports say that Kate sold the sapphire necklace when she fell on hard times, while others say before she died, Kate gave the necklace (as well as the purse and cabin keys she had on her when put in the lifeboat) to Ellen. Ellen’s own granddaughter confirmed part of this, saying that she personally saw the cabin keys, but said that the necklace went down with the ship and was later recovered with other artifacts. It has popped up from time to time as part of Titanic artifact exhibitions.

Ellen’s paternity was never proven. Some say there was a DNA test done, but the results were never publicized. Ellen’s granddaughter as well as a member of Morley’s family have both said that DNA was never done, however, because the Morley family did not agree to it. So unless someone has kept some of Ellen’s hair, it may never be known for sure if she was the result of her mother’s Titanic elopement or not.

Some more links that might be of interest on this story:

Ellen’s story, in her own words: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/ellen_phillips_story.html
Kate’s biography, along with some photos: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-survivor/kate-phillips.html
The ET thread where both Ellen’s and Morley’s family weigh in: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/discus/messages/5811/99997.html?1137698196
Another ET thread where Ellen’s granddaughter pops in: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/discus/messages/5811/54465.html?1089621227
One more ET thread that discusses the DNA rumors further: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/discus/messages/5811/50812.html?1190633087

And then it got stranger. While searching the forums for other posts on the subject, I found a topic from someone else claiming to be descended from Morley. What makes it so strange? They claim he was in Papua New Guinea in 1913-1914, where he married and had 5 children. A year or two after he supposedly died on the Titanic. Hm. Makes for a good story, at least: http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/discus/messages/5667/92353.html?1154695187

This blog started out as a romantic tale, but somehow it descended into weirdness. Still, it’s mysterious and intriguing (and the tale of Henry and Kate is still a romantic one, if you ignore the adultery), like many of the other mysteries that came out of the disaster. It’s no wonder I’ve been so fascinated by the ship for so long. I kind of wish I knew about Henry and Kate while I was still writing DESTINED. I could have given them a cameo. ;)

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