Test your knowledge of the Top Ten Titanic myths.
Can you separate fact from fiction?
True or False
1. The Ship’s orchestra switched from dance music to the hymn “Nearer
My God To Thee” as the Ship broke apart and sank.
2. White Star Lines manager Bruce Ismay pressured Captain Smith to
maintain full speed because he wanted to break the record for a
transatlantic crossing.
3. There were ships close enough to rescue Titanic’s passengers if they’d
known how bad the situation was.
4. Many of Titanic’s lifeboats left half-empty.
5. Some men disguised themselves as women to sneak onto the
lifeboats.
6. If watchmen in the crow’s nest had binoculars, they would have seen
the iceberg in time to avoid the collision.
7. Crewman locked third class passengers below deck so they wouldn’t
come to the upper decks and interfere with evacuating first class
passengers.
8. Bruce Ismay, managing director of White Star Lines, felt so guilty
after escaping in a lifeboat that he later committed suicide.
9. Titanic Captain Edward J. Smith was making his final voyage with
White Star Lines.
10. First Officer William Murdoch shot a Titanic passenger and then,
overcome by stress, turned the gun on himself.
ANSWERS
1. FALSE. The band did play on deck to provide comfort as the ship sank, but
there’s no evidence that “Nearer My God To Thee” was among their final tunes.
Harold Bride, one of Titanic’s two radio operators, was one of the last crew
members to leave the Ship. He told reporters that he distinctly remembered the
band playing a sad waltz called “Autumn” just before conditions forced them to
stop.
2. FALSE. Titanic couldn’t beat the cruising speeds or crossing times of the
Mauritania or the Lusitania, flagships of the competing Cunard Line. Ismay may
have challenged the crew to beat the crossing time of Titanic’s sister ship, the
Olympic, but there’s no evidence he interfered with decisions on the bridge.
3. TRUE. The Californian had stopped dead in the water to avoid steering through
an ice field at night. It is estimated that the Californian was only 15-18 miles
away from Titanic, close enough to have reached the ship before it sank.
4. TRUE. Many passengers were reluctant to leave the ship and row off to an
unknown fate in the darkness. One of the first lifeboats launched held 12
passengers and a dog. Titanic’s lifeboats could carry 65 people, but on average
held only 38. Almost 400 more lives could have been saved if the lifeboats had
been filled to capacity.
5. FALSE. During the initial evacuation when no women or children remained at a
lifeboat station, some seats were offered to men. In one documented case, a
female passenger offered a shawl to a nearby crewman wearing only an
undershirt. Another passenger in that boat, upset by the loss of her husband,
later complained bitterly to reporters about the presence of men in any Titanic
lifeboat. Subsequent reporting caused the “men-in-disguise” stories to take on a
life of their own.
6. FALSE. While it is true there were no binoculars in the crow’s nest the night of
the accident, watchmen didn’t normally use them to scan the horizon. They’d use
binoculars only to check on something that appeared unusual to the naked eye.
Icebergs are normally detected at night by observing the white spray of waves
crashing against the base, but there was no such wave action the evening of April
14th.
7. FALSE. Many of the Ship’s internal doors and gates were routinely locked to
keep the different classes of passengers from mixing. During the evacuation,
stewards unlocked these passageways so second and third class passengers could
move to the upper decks. In the confusion, it is possible some gates may have
been missed.
8. FALSE. Ismay suffered a lot of bad publicity after the disaster because he
accepted a lifeboat seat when one was offered. He was criticized in the media,
questioned harshly at official hearings, and pressured by White Star to retire
shortly after the sinking. His professional reputation never recovered and he
lived quietly in Ireland until dying of natural causes in 1937.
9. TRUE. Smith, White Star’s highest paid officer, was a celebrity among wealthy
passengers who made frequent ocean voyages. Known as the “Millionaires’
Captain”, Smith was selected for the maiden voyage in part as an honour because
he planned to retire after Titanic returned to Southampton. Smith honoured
maritime custom by going down with his ship.
10. FALSE. Lifeboat supervisors were issued guns and, on several occasions, did fire
Shots into the air to control panic but most historians agree no passengers were
Shot. Murdoch didn’t survive the sinking and some eyewitnesses suggest he may
Have taken his own life privately before the ship broke apart. Officially, his fate
remains a mystery.
