Complete Titanic Chronicles by Walter Lord

Author:Walter Lord [Lord, Walter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4804-1058-9
Publisher: Open Road
Published: 2012-12-11T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER IV

Had Ships Gotten Too Big for Captain Smith?

AS I RECALL, ON the day it sailed, all England was merry in the celebration of a holiday for the occasion. Flags flying in the breeze in every city and hamlet. There was the inevitable speech-making. That gloriously martial air, “Britannia Rules the Waves,” was the mighty theme-song of the day….

So the Reverend Wilfred G. Hurley described the Titanic’s maiden sailing, April 10, 1912, in a little pamphlet published 37 years later by the Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle. It is a familiar picture, handed down by countless writers through the years.

Actually, the White Star Line made very little of the Titanic’s departure. There were no bands, no speeches, no flag-waving. The only touch out of the ordinary was an immense crowd. Southampton was a seafaring town, and it seemed that the whole city wanted to watch the greatest ship in the world start off on her maiden voyage. But it was a knowledgeable crowd, almost professionally observant, and not at all given to singing or cheering.

Yet, the departure did have its excitement. While the Titanic was casting off, promptly at 12 noon, seven members of the “black gang,” as the stokers and firemen were called, came racing down the dock hoping to scramble aboard. They had gone ashore for a last pint and somehow lingered too long. Now they stood by an open ship’s gangway, arguing with the officer on duty there. He clearly wanted no part of them—they were too late, and that was that. Frustrated, the little group melted into the crowd, cursing this rotten turn in their luck.

Imperceptibly, the gulf widened between the Titanic and the dock; she was under way at last. Assisted by six tugs, she slowly crept out of the slip and into the channel of the River Test. Here her enormous bulk was maneuvered to the left, toward open water and ultimately the sea.

As she moved down the channel, now under her own power, the Titanic came abreast of two smaller liners moored to the quay on the left. These were the White Star’s Oceanic and the American Line’s New York, idled by a coal strike that had paralyzed most of British shipping for weeks. Warped side by side, with the New York on the outside, they made the narrow channel even more narrow.

The Titanic glided on, steaming at about six knots. As she drew opposite the New York, there was a sudden series of sharp cracks, like pistol shots. One after another, all six of the lines tying the New York to the Oceanic snapped. Drawn by some inexorable force, the American Liner began drifting toward the huge Titanic. For a moment a collision seemed certain, as the stern of the New York swung to within three or four feet of the port quarter of the Titanic.

Quick thinking saved the day. The tug Vulcan, one of the small fleet escorting the Titanic, darted to the danger spot. Her skipper, Captain Gale,

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