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The Ship of Dreams
THE SHIP OF DREAMS
The Sinking of the Titanic and the End of the Edwardian Era
Gareth Russell
Copyright
William Collins
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
WilliamCollinsBooks.com
This eBook first published in Great Britain by William Collins in 2019 as The Darksome Bounds of a Failing World
Copyright © Gareth Russell 2019
Cover Image © Universal History Archive/UIG/Bridgeman Images
Gareth Russell asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins
Source ISBN: 9780008263201
Ebook Edition © March 2020 ISBN: 9780008263171
Version: 2020-02-03
Praise
‘[The Ship of Dreams] installs a fresh lens onto a drama that most of us first heard as children … As Mr Russell moves to the fateful Sunday of the voyage, the suspense becomes terrifying.’
Roger Lowenstein, The Wall Street Journal
‘The Titanic sinking does offer a metaphor for its era … Many authors have referenced this, but Gareth Russell is the first I am aware of who has comprehensively explored these and charted in detail the context … Russell does this deftly and intriguingly.’
Irish Independent
‘A fascinating look at life during a doomed era … Russell’s observations are sharp and witty … The wider history he presents is packed with interesting details.’
The Times, Book of the Week
‘Russell relates this drama in thrilling, vivid detail – an extraordinary story of human courage.’
Times Literary Supplement
‘Russell explores the tragedy of the sinking of the Titanic both as a human reality and a metaphor … to sketch the world beyond the ship in this engrossing history … The detail richly evokes the scale and texture of Titanic life … This masterly reconstruction renders the Titanic story vital again.’
Mail on Sunday
‘Brilliantly narrates the story of the Titanic … with admirable research and rhetoric … Anyone fascinated by Erik Larson’s Dead Wake or by James Cameron’s Titanic will be drawn in by Russell’s well-crafted wit and reportage.’
Publishers Weekly
‘Russell tells these stories in gripping detail … The attention to detail is astonishing, if you’ve ever wondered how passengers booked a hot bath, look no further.’
Sunday Times
‘Gareth Russell has chosen a handful of passengers on the doomed liner and by training a spotlight on every detail of their lives, he has given us a meticulous, sensitive, and at times harsh picture of the early 20th century in Britain and America. A marvellous piece of work.’
Julian Fellowes, creator of Downton Abbey
‘Deeply researched and lushly detailed, the book shines new light on both the bygone Golden Age and the iconic tragedy that marked the beginning of its end.’
Lynn Vincent, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Indianapolis
‘This absorbing account proves that there are many levels to the endless fascination of the Titanic story … Gareth Russell skilfully constructs an eloquent and gripping narrative that is essentially a microcosm of the moribund Edwardian class system that would go down with the Titanic and finally be obliterated by war in 1914.’
Helen Rappaport, author of Four Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Romanov Grand Duchesses
‘A meticulously researched retelling of history’s most infamous voyage … Through the eyes of this select group of privileged individuals, we are witness to the end of a glamorous crossing and an era, neither of which could be sustained or remain afloat.’
Denise Kiernan, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Castle and The Girls of Atomic City
Dedication
For my great-grandparents,
Thomas Hutton and Elizabeth Johnston-Clarke,
The first to tell me stories of the Titanic,
And my father,
Who encouraged me to write them.
Epigraph
And as the smart ship grew
In stature, grace, and hue,
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.
Alien they seemed to be;
No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history,
Or sign that they were bent
By paths coincident
On being anon two halves of one august event,
Till the Spinner of the Years
Said ‘Now!’ And each one hears,
And consummation comes, and jars two hemispheres.
Thomas Hardy, The Convergence of the Twain
(Lines on the loss of the ‘Titanic’) (1912)
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Praise
Dedication
Epigraph
Dramatis Personae
Author’s Note
1. The Lords Act
2. The Sash My Father Wore
3. Southampton
4. A Contest of Sea Giants
5. A Safe Harbour for Ships
6. The Lucky Holdup
7. A Decent Wee Man
8. A Kind of Hieroglyphic World
9. Its Own Appointed Limits Keep
10. Two More Boilers
11. A Thousand Uneasy Sparks of Light
12. Going Up to See the Fun
13. Music in the First-Class Lounge
14. Vox faucibus haesit
15. Be British
16. Over the Top Together
17. The Awful Spectacle
18. Grip Fast
19. Where’s Daddy?
20. Extend Heartfelt Sympathy to All
21. The Spinner of the Years
Picture Section
Footnotes
Notes
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgements
About the Author
By the Same Author
About the Publisher
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
THE COUNTESS OF ROTHES
LUCY-NOËLLE-MARTHA LESLIE, Countess of Rothes
NORMAN LESLIE, 19TH EARL OF ROTHES, her husband
MALCOLM, VISCOUNT LESLIE, their eldest son, later 20th Earl of Rothes
THE HONOURABLE JOHN LESLIE, their youngest son
GLADYS CHERRY, the Earl’s cousin and the Countess’s travelling companion
CLEMENTINA and THOMAS DYER-EDWARDES, the Countess’s parents
ROBERTA (‘CISSY’) MAIONI, the Countess’s lady’s maid
THOMAS ANDREWS
THOMAS ANDREWS, Managing Director of the Harland and Wolff shipyard
HELEN ANDREWS, his wife
ELIZABETH ANDREWS, their daughter
WILLIAM, 1ST LORD PIRRIE, Thomas’s uncle, Chairman of Harland and Wolff
THE STRAUSES
IDA STRAUS, a philanthropist
ISIDOR STRAUS, Ida’s husband, a former congressman for New York and co-owner of Macy’s department store
ELLEN BIRD, Ida’s lady’s maid
JOHN FARTHING, Isidor’s valet
JESSE STRAUS CLARENCE STRAUS PERCY STRAUS SARA HESS MINNIE WEIL HERBERT STRAUS VIVIAN SCHEFTEL
THE THAYERS
JOHN BORLAND THAYER, Second Vice-President of the Pennsylvania Railroad
MARIAN THAYER, his wife
JOHN BORLAND THAYER III (‘JACK’), their eldest child
MARGARET FLEMING, Marian’s lady’s maid
FREDERICK THAYER MARGARET THAYER (LATER TALBOTT) PAULINE THAYER (LATER DOLAN)
DOROTHY GIBSON
DOROTHY GIBSON, an actress
PAULINE GIBSON, her mother
GEORGE BATTIER, Dorothy’s husband
JULES BRULATOUR, a movie producer and Dorothy’s lover
LEONARD GIBSON, Dorothy’s stepfather
OTHER RELEVANT PASSENGERS
RHODA ABBOTT, a Salvation Army officer, travelling in Third Class
MADELEINE and COLONEL JOHN JACOB ASTOR IV
ALGERNON BARKWORTH, a landowner from Yorkshire
LAWRENCE BEESLEY, a science teacher, travelling in Second Class, subsequently author of The Loss of the S.S. Titanic
MAJOR ARCHIBALD BUTT, Military Aide to President William Howard Taft
CHARLOTTE DRAKE CARDEZA, a socialite from Pennsylvania
ELEANOR CASSEBEER, returning home to New York
LUCY, LADY DUFF GORDON, a fashion designer
ELIZABETH EUSTIS and MARTHA STEPHENSON, sisters and neighbours of the Thayers
COLONEL ARCHIBALD GRACIE IV, an historian and friend of the Strauses
J. BRUCE ISMAY, Managing Director of the White Star Line
FRANCIS (‘FRANK’) MILLET, a painter, author and sculptor
ALFRED NOURNEY, a car salesman travelling under the pseudonym of a German baron
EMILY and ARTHUR RYERSON, friends of the Thayers, returning home after their son’s death
FREDERIC SEWARD, a New York-based lawyer and a bridge partner of Dorothy Gibson
WILLIAM SLOPER, an American stockbroker, who also played bridge with Dorothy Gibson
ELEANOR and GEORGE WIDENER, prominent members of Philadelphia Society and friends of the Thayers
RELEVANT MEMBERS OF THE CREW
HAROLD BRIDE, the Titanic’s Junior Wireless Operator
HARRY ETCHES, a steward in First Class
VIOLET JESSOP, a stewardess in First Class
THOMAS JONES, Able Seaman, put in charge of Lifeboat 8
MARY SLOAN, a stewardess in First Class
ANNIE ROBINSON, a stewardess in First Class
CAPTAIN EDWARD J. SMITH, Commander of the Titanic
CAPTAIN ARTHUR ROSTRON, Commander of the Carpathia
DR FRANCIS (‘FRANK’) MCGEE, the Carpathia’s Surgeon
DR WILLIAM O’LOUGHLIN, the Titanic’s Surgeon
HENRY WILDE, the Titanic’s Chief Officer
WILLIAM MURDOCH, the Titanic’s First Officer
CHARLES LIGHTOLLER, the Titanic’s Second Officer
HERBERT PITMAN, the Titanic’s Third Officer
JOSEPH BOXHALL, the Titanic’s Fourth Officer
HAROLD LOWE, the Titanic’s Fifth Officer
JAMES MOODY, the Titanic’s Sixth Officer
AUTHOR’S NOTE
On Sunday 14 April 1912, at about 11.40 p.m., the Titanic, an ocean liner operated by a British shipping company with American owners, struck an iceberg. Two hours and forty minutes later, she sank with a loss of life that was variably estimated at 1,502, 1,503, 1,512, 1,517 and 1,522 but which has recently been established at 1,496.[1] A total of 712 survivors in lifeboats were rescued by another British ship, the Carpathia, between two and six hours after the Titanic disappeared. Two inquiries were held, in each of her homelands, and they reached broadly similar conclusions about what had been done in the past and should be done in the future. In 1985, the wreck of the Titanic was discovered 2½ miles under by an expedition led by American oceanographer Robert Ballard.[2]
These are the bare facts surrounding a ship that is, arguably, the most famous vessel in history. When compared to nearly any other contender for that epithet, the Titanic’s popular appeal outstrips that of Cleopatra’s barge, the Mayflower, the Lusitania and perhaps even Noah’s Ark. Her name has become a synonym for catastrophe. The story of the largest and most luxurious ship ever built, racing across the Atlantic Ocean in an attempt to break the record for that journey, ignoring numerous ice warnings and then sinking with the loss of thousands, is an entrenched narrative, the belittling of which is surprisingly easy, if one is so inclined. Had she survived her first voyage, the Titanic would have dated like other ocean liners. While she was the largest man-made moving object when she eased off from her Southampton pier in 1912, she would only have held that accolade for the next thirteen months, until the arrival of a German passenger liner with room for a thousand more passengers amid 6,000 more tons.[3] Some of the Titanic’s second-class passengers preferred the accommodation on the Mauretania.[4] Before she sank, the Titanic was eclipsed in fame by her elder and slightly smaller sister ship, the Olympic, which had captured the attention of the world’s press when she set sail a year earlier.[5] Her passenger quarters, while splendid in many places, were soon surpassed – the march of comfort on the sea lanes did not halt in the spring of 1912.
The exceptionalism of the Titanic can be rubbished in other ways. On a more macabre note, she was neither the only great seafaring tragedy of the Edwardian era – two years after her, the Empress of Ireland sank following a collision with another ship as she departed Quebec City, with the loss of just over a thousand lives.[6] Nor, arguably, was she the most important. In 1915, the Titanic’s one-time rival, the Lusitania, foundered off the coast of Ireland with marginally fewer casualties, but far greater and more tangible a political impact. The attack on the Lusitania by the German submarine U-20 irrevocably hardened attitudes towards Imperial Germany in the United States at the height of the First World War, forcing an emergency meeting of the Crown Council in Berlin which effectively altered German naval policy for the next eighteen months and prepared the mood that would bring America into the war against Germany two years later.[7]
However, although the Titanic’s dreadful allure may be easy to unpick, it is impossible to dispel. There are societies dedicated to the study of the Titanic across the world, along with numerous museums, souvenirs, novels, musicals, children’s cartoons, computer games, television shows and movies. The first Titanic motion picture was produced in the weeks immediately after the sinking, another silent movie was produced in Germany later that same year, and an early ‘talkie’, Atlantic, appeared in 1929, heavily inspired by the sinking but with the ship’s name and appearance altered after the Titanic’s still-operational owners, the White Star Line, allegedly threatened a lawsuit.[8] A project in the late 1930s between David O. Selznick and Alfred Hitchcock to dramatise the disaster never moved beyond pre-production, with the result that after Atlantic it was another fourteen years before a motion picture that was both filmed in sound and unambiguously about the Titanic appeared.[9]
On 30 April 1943, Josef Goebbels, the Nazi Minister of Propaganda, banned the movie Titanic, the production of which he had initially authorised.[10] Following the outbreak of the Second World War, Goebbels had overseen a series of anti-British costume dramas that were released in Germany and then, despite some concerns about their potential impact, in various Nazi-occupied territories. Titanic proved to be the last of this politicised genre, which had begun with 1940’s Der Fuchs von Glenarvon and 1941’s Mein Leben für Irland, both dramatising the Irish struggle for independence from Britain. They were joined by Ohm Krüger, set during the Boer wars, and by a biographical drama loosely based on the life of Mary, Queen of Scots, with her English kinswoman, Elizabeth I, cast as a villain who was manipulative to the point of depravity. By the time Titanic went into production, American entry into the war on the Allied side had widened the target of these historical didactics, for which the sinking of the Anglo-American Titanic offered seemingly perfect fodder. The allocated budget made Titanic one of the most expensive motion pictures produced thus far in Germany, dozens of naval personnel were transferred from active duty at the front to serve as extras, and the decommissioned German passenger liner Cap Arcona was provided as a set for much of the filming. Prior to the war, the Cap Arcona had been the most luxurious ship to ply the route to South America, sailing from Hamburg to Buenos Aires, but like many vessels she had been removed from commercial service upon the outbreak of hostilities.
Goebbels wanted Titanic to depict Teutonic heroism, to which end a fictional German officer was inserted into the ship’s roster and shown in the final scenes dashing bravely through flooding corridors to rescue trapped children, but the movie was also intended to highlight the corruption of Germany’s enemies. In one particularly memorable scene, showing a dinner during the Titanic’s voyage, the shipping line’s owner, J. Bruce Ismay, gives a speech to the Dining Saloon boasting of the liner’s record-breaking speed. At his announcement, several American financiers scuttle away from their tables to send telegrams ordering their brokers to buy shares in the White Star Line while, back in the Saloon, the Titanic’s privileged passengers stand as the ship’s orchestra plays ‘God Save the King’. As a depiction of German perceptions of British arrogance and American greed, the scene had all the subtlety of a sledgehammer – although that, of course, was not the reason Goebbels vetoed his own creation.
Filming had been plagued with difficulties from the start. The director, Herbert Selpin, privately complained about the military extras’ sexual harassment of the actresses, comments that may have widened into criticism of the armed forces. The scriptwriter reported Selpin’s comments to the Gestapo, who had him arrested and imprisoned, at which point Goebbels almost certainly gave the order that Selpin was to be found hanged in his cell, as if from suicide. Certainly, almost nobody believed Selpin had died by his own hand.[11] Back on set, the production costs were spiralling beyond the generous allowance and several Allied bombing raids on nearby towns intermittently disrupted filming. By the time Goebbels saw the movie at a private screening, those bombing raids had helped turn the tide of the war against Nazi Germany and Goebbels was concerned that the scenes of passengers screaming in panic during the evacuation would remind too many moviegoers of their own experiences during the air raids. He also allegedly worried that German civilians might sympathise with the plight of the British and American passengers as they struggled to escape the Titanic, no matter how repugnant their on-screen leaders.[12] Titanic was the last of the anti-British Nazi historical dramas, after which productions shrank as the Reich stuttered towards oblivion.[13]
During the regime’s depraved unravelling, the Cap Arcona was once again pressed into service, this time to move 9,000 people from Nazi Poland, most of them prisoners from local camps. Whether the SS knew that the Cap Arcona had been identified as a target by the Royal Air Force before they herded the prisoners on board and if that was the reason they herded all the prisoners below deck to make sure the British pilots did not cease fire is unclear. According to the fullest modern account of the Cap Arcona’s career, the surviving evidence suggests that if the British aeroplanes had not turned up as expected to attack the ship the SS would have bombed it themselves and placed the blame on the Allies, the main reason for moving the prisoners on to known targets being the guards’ hopes of destroying living evidence of the existence of the neighbouring concentration camps.[14] As the RAF attacked the ship, small German boats near by evacuated only fleeing camp guards and SS personnel, who were also the only passengers to have been provided with lifebelts. The Cap Arcona burned, capsized and sank with the lost of about 5,000 lives, meaning that the Titanic’s one-time cinematic stand-in became the first ship to break her record for the greatest loss of life at sea.
Goebbels’ Titanic is one of the least-known if most repellently intriguing interpretations of the Titanic as both a symbol of Anglo-American cooperation and a damning indictment of its elites. Although no subsequent dramatisations of the disaster have mined the depths of national stereotypes seen in the 1943 version, the story of the Titanic’s owners pushing her to break the record for the fastest crossing of the Atlantic has been replicated ad nauseam. Where Goebbels sought to excoriate, others have sympathised or simply remained fascinated. As a child growing up in Belfast, I heard stories from my great-grandfather, who had seen the Titanic’s construction and departure from the city and remembered men and women weeping in the streets when the news broke of the sinking. For him, something had shattered, some certainty had vanished, in that moment. He had never seen his father cry before that morning and he did not remember seeing him do so again. Admittedly, many are unimpressed by the allure of the Titanic to its own or subsequent generations. When he edited the memoirs of one of the Titanic’s surviving crew members, Stewardess Violet Jessop, the late historian John Maxtone-Graham was unmoved by the liner’s appeal, positing, ‘Ostensibly sinkable in life, she has proved positively unsinkable posthumously … My sense is that we should view the vessel as neither symbol nor metaphor but merely an imprudently captained vessel lost at sea. Leave Titanic as she was, one of hundreds of wrecks littering the Atlantic depths.’[15]
