VIVID RECOLLECTIONS AND PICTURES OF THE WRECK BY MORE OF THE RESCUED
Mrs. Turrell Cavendish, who was Miss Julia Siegel, daughter of the former Chicago millionaire merchant and clubman, Henry Siegel, was one of the survivors who landed from the Carpathia. Her husband was drowned. Mrs. Cavendish’s father, Mr. Siegel, is part owner of Siegel, Cooper & Co. and is interested in a number of big ventures. Mrs. Cavendish is well known in Chicago society circles. Following is her story of the Titanic’s sinking:
“I was asleep when Mr. Cavendish awoke me and said the ship had met with an accident. I hurriedly put on a wrapper and one of my husband’s overcoats and we both rushed to the upper deck.
“There were many persons there and the stewards were assuring them that the steamer was in no danger of sinking. They started to fill the lifeboats with women passengers when the cry, ‘Save your lives!’ rang out.
“I was in the second boat. My husband kissed me and bade me to remain in the boat, declaring he was all right. There was no light, but the sky was clear.
“Just as the lifeboat was lowered, I again kissed my husband.
“One man tried to get into the boat, but a sailor, after questioning him, threw him aside. A Canadian, who stated that he could row, turned to a group of men on the deck who were watching the proceedings and said:
“‘I can row, but if there is room for one more let it be a woman. I am not a coward.’
“The women in the boat beseeched the man to row the boat for them, and those on the deck urged him to do so. With a parting handclasp he lowered himself by a rope to the boat and took his position there.
“I am prostrated by the loss of my husband, but rejoice in the fact that my two-year-old baby is saved, having been left at home.”
Miss Daisy Minahan, of Fond du Lac, Wis., who was with her brother, Dr. W. E. Minahan and his wife, told a graphic story of the shipwreck and the rescues. Dr. Minahan, she said, did his part in the saving of the women. Then with a farewell smile and the last words, “Be brave,” to his wife, he went back on the deck, which even then was awash under his feet.
“There were more than a score of brides in our party on the Titanic, all coming back after their happy honeymoons abroad. We brought twenty of them, widowed by the terrible catastrophe, to homes of mourning and tears instead of happiness and bliss.
“We were sitting on the Titanic’s deck in the evening enjoying the crisp air and the starlit night. Old sailors told us the sea never had seemed so calm and glassy. About 9:30 o’clock the atmosphere took a sudden drop, which drove everybody inside the cabins.
“We must have been going at a terrific rate right in the direction of the icebergs, for the air became so chilly in a few minutes that we found it impossible to keep warm even when we put wraps and blankets around us.
“We had retired when there was a dull shaking of the Titanic, which was not so much like a shake as it was a slowing down of the massive craft. I noticed that our boat had come to a standstill and then we heard the orders of the captain and went on deck to see what it all meant.
“I never saw such composure and cool bravery in my life as the men of the first and second cabins displayed. Colonel Astor seemed to be the controlling figure. He, Major Butt, Mr. Guggenheim, Mr. Widener and Mr. Thayer clustered in a group as if they were holding a quick consultation as to what steps should be taken next.
“Then Colonel Astor came forward with the cry, ‘Not a man until every woman and child is safe in the boats.’
“Many of the women did not seem to want to leave the vessel. Mrs. Astor clung to her husband, begging him to let her remain on the Titanic with him. When he insisted that she save herself, she threw her arms around him and begged him with tears to permit her to share his fate.
“Colonel Astor picked her up bodily and carried her to a boat, which was the one just ahead of ours, and placed her in it.
“I lingered with my brother and his wife, loath to leave them, although we all knew the ship was sinking and that the ocean would soon swallow up all that remained of the steamer. We both begged my brother to come with us, but he said: ‘No, I will remain with the others, no matter what happens.’
“Then, when it was time to go, when the last boat was being lowered to the water line, we were hurried into it by my brother, who bade us goodbye and said calmly but with feeling: ‘Be brave; no matter what happens, be brave.’ Then he waved his hand and our boat shot out just in time to escape being borne down by the suction of the Titanic, as it went down.
“As the ship settled there was a terrific explosion, which rent it in two, and as it sank beneath the waves we could see my brother waving his hand to us, although it is hardly possible that he could see us, for none of us had a light. We had nothing except the clothes we had hastily donned. None of us had thought of putting provisions or water in the boats, for we knew the Carpathia had been signaled to come to our rescue and was on its way.
“We heard a number of shots as the boats were being lowered, but we were told it was the officers who were keeping the steerage passengers from stampeding into the small boats, which they repeatedly tried to do.
“There were no outcries anywhere except from the steerage.
“I shall never forget the calmness and quiet bravery that the men on board showed as they stood on deck and awaited the inevitable doom. Occasionally some of them would peer into the night toward our boats and wave at us. Then they would walk back to a group and everything would grow still again.
“I saw Guggenheim, Widener, Thayer and Ismay in conversation with Colonel Astor just after the ship struck the berg.”
Thomas Whitley, a waiter on the Titanic, who was sent to a hospital with a fractured leg, was asleep five decks below the main saloon deck. He ran upstairs and saw the iceberg towering high above the forward deck of the Titanic.
“It looked like a giant mountain of glass. I saw that we were in for it. Almost immediately I heard that stokehold No. 11 was filling with water and that the ship was doomed. The watertight doors had been closed, but the officers fearing that there might be an explosion below decks called for volunteers to go below to draw the fires.
“Twenty men stepped forward almost immediately, and started down. To permit them to enter the hold it was necessary for the doors to be opened again, and after that one could almost feel the water rushing in. It was but a few minutes later when all hands were ordered on decks with life belts.”
Mrs. Henry B. Harris, wife of the theatrical manager, who lost his life, told the following story:
“We were in our stateroom when the word was passed for all passengers to put on life preservers and go on deck. This order followed within a few seconds after the ship struck. We did not realize the seriousness of the crash, thinking some slight trouble had happened to the engines. Even when the order was brought to us to put on life preservers and come on deck we still failed to realize the situation.
“As we went on deck we passed groups of men and women who were laughing and joking. When we reached the main deck, forward, and saw the lifeboats being swung overboard the seriousness of the matter began to dawn on us. Then came the command: ‘Women and children first.’
“Officers and members of the crew went about repeating the words ‘women and children first.’ Many women had to be forced into the boats; some thinking it was a joke and others refusing to be parted from their husbands, fathers or brothers.
“When the passengers saw the seriousness with which the officers and crew of the Titanic went about their business they began to realize that something terrible had happened and began to make their way towards the lifeboats.
“Colonel Astor and Mrs. Astor were standing near us. When the men of the Titanic came to her and told her to get into a lifeboat she refused to leave her husband’s side. Then I was asked to enter one of the boats. My husband told me to go but I did not want to leave him. He reassured me, saying the danger was not serious and that he would follow after me in a short time. Still I could not believe that everything was as he said. I felt that if I left him something terrible would happen. The officers told me I would have to get into a lifeboat. My husband told me to and finally I was led to the side and lowered into a boat.
“Mrs. Astor had left her husband and had been placed in another boat. As I was being lowered over the side I saw my husband and Colonel Astor standing together. Jacques Futrelle was standing near them. My husband waved his hand. That was the last I saw of him.
“For hours we sat freezing in the lifeboat. Then we saw the Carpathia and the men began to row in her direction. Then the Carpathia stopped and ropes were thrown to us and we were pulled against her side. Then rope ladders and swings were lowered and I was placed in a swing and pulled up to the deck. I stood watching the boats as they arrived and the passengers came on deck thinking every moment that my husband would appear. And then, when the last boat had been emptied I began to realize that he had gone down with the Titanic, which was nowhere in sight.”
When there was only one seat left in the last lifeboat of the Titanic, had Mrs. John Burke taken it the chances are that Miss Annie Kelly, a seventeen-year-old Chicago girl, might be at the bottom of the sea. So she told friends who gathered at her home to celebrate her lucky escape when the ship sank.
Miss Kelly told in a graphic manner the conditions in the steerage at the time the ship struck the iceberg and also how she was pushed into the last seat in the last boat.
With Miss Kelly when she arrived in Chicago was fifteen-year-old Annie McGowan, niece of Thomas McDermott, of Chicago, whose aunt, Miss Kate McGowan, perished in the lost ship. The girl was wrenched from her aunt’s side and thrust into a boat, which pushed away from the ship. She never saw her relative again.
Annie Kelly and Annie McGowan embarked in the third cabin of the Titanic with the Burke family, which consisted of Mr. and Mrs. John Burke, who were coming to Chicago on their honeymoon; and Catherine and Margaret Burke, cousins of John and Margaret Manion, who were bound for Chicago to join their brother, Edward Manion. This is Miss Kelly’s account:
“I should not have been saved except for Mrs. Burke’s refusal to leave her husband and the Misses Burke saying they would not go if their uncle and aunt could not go with them. I went in the very last boat and I was the very last passenger. The officer said there was room for just one more.
“I was aroused by the call of the stewardess, who told us all to dress as quickly as we could, though she did not explain what was the trouble. I dressed and went up on the second deck. Annie McGowan was with me when I was going up the stairs, but she became separated from me at the head of the stairway, and was carried by the throng over to the other side of the ship. I did not see her again until I was on the Carpathia.
“On the side where I was carried, some wild-looking men were trying to rush into boats, and the officers and crew fired at them. Some of the men fell. Others were beaten back by the officers, who used pistols on them.”
Survivors of the Titanic, especially those from the steerage, told of the heroism of two Catholic priests who, after assisting women and children into the last boat, gathered about them the doomed passengers and calmly sought to comfort them in the face of approaching death.
The story of hope and faith evidenced in that hour by Father Byles of England and Father Peruschoetz, a German, entitles them to a high place in the roll of honor.
The two priests had held Sunday services in the morning and evening—for the Catholics of various nationalities, addressing them in German and English. The rosary and litanies had been recited by all.
The first news of the disaster brought the priests to the scene, where they joined with the other men in assisting to preserve order and insure the safety of the women and children. When men of all nationalities gathered about them and sought comfort and hope the two priests raised their voices and calmly, as if in the sanctuary, repeated over and over again the rosary.
No man, according to the story of those present, was turned away. The priests ministered to Catholics and non-Catholics alike. As the sinking vessel listed more and more the crowd about the priests grew larger, and all joined fervently in the prayers. Those in the boats pulling away from the vessel could see the men kneeling on the deck, but it is related that in the last moment, when the lights went out, no shrieks were heard nor cries of terror from the group where the faithful pastors serenely and devoutly sought to comfort those about them.
Another story of self-possession and undaunted courage in the face of death was that of Captain E. G. Crosby, of Milwaukee, veteran Lake Michigan navigator and president of the Crosby Transportation Company. “Better dress; all the other passengers are doing it,” were his calm words to his wife and daughter as he entered their stateroom shortly after the collision. Captain Crosby was lost, but his wife and daughter were saved.
The majority of those who perished were caught sound asleep in their berths, according to Miss Crosby. The warning to his wife and daughter given, Captain Crosby hurried on deck to assist the other men. That was the last seen of him by Mrs. Crosby or her daughter. They were helped into the next to the last boat that left the vessel.