Ship that missed the Titanic's distress signals
SS
Californian
SS
Californian
on the morning after
Titanic
sank.
|
History
|
United Kingdom
|
Name
| SS
Californian
|
Namesake
| State of California
|
Owner
| Leyland Line
|
Port of registry
| Liverpool, UK
|
Route
| Atlantic Ocean
crossings
|
Builder
| Caledon Shipbuilding & Engineering Company
,
Dundee
, Scotland
|
Cost
| £105,000
(equivalent to about £14,400,000 in 2023)
[1]
|
Yard number
| 159
[1]
|
Launched
| 26 November 1901
|
Acquired
| 30 January 1902
|
Maiden voyage
| 31 January 1902
|
In service
| 1902?1915
|
Out of service
| 9 November 1915
|
Identification
| - Official number: 115243
- Code letters: TFLN
- Radio call sign: MWL
|
Fate
| Sunk by German U-boats, 9 November 1915, 61 miles (98 km) southwest of
Cape Matapan
,
Greece
.
|
General characteristics
|
Type
| Cargo liner
|
Tonnage
| 6,223
gross
, 4,038
net
|
Length
| 447 ft (136 m) LOA
|
Beam
| 53 ft (16 m)
|
Draught
| 30.5 ft
|
Decks
| 6 (3 on superstructure [flying bridge, promenade deck and shelter deck] and 3 below deck)
|
Propulsion
| |
Speed
| - 13 knots (service speed.)
- 12 knots (speed estimated in sea trials.)
|
Boats & landing
craft carried
| 6 (4 lifeboats, 1 gig and 1 pinnace) with total capacity for 218 people.
|
Capacity
| 47 passengers
|
Crew
| 55 officers and crew
|
SS
Californian
was a British
Leyland Line
steamship
. She is thought to have been the only ship to see the
Titanic
, or at least her rockets, during the
sinking
,
[2]
[3]
but despite being the closest ship in the area, the crew took no action to assist. The
United States Senate inquiry
and
British Wreck Commissioner's inquiry
into the sinking both concluded that the
Californian
could have saved many or all of the lives that were lost, had a prompt response been mounted to the
Titanic
's
distress rockets.
[4]
The U.S. Senate inquiry was particularly critical of the vessel's captain,
Stanley Lord
, calling his inaction during the disaster "reprehensible".
[5]
Despite this criticism, no formal charges were ever brought against Lord and his crew for their inaction. Lord disputed the findings and would spend the rest of his life trying to clear his name. In 1992, the UK Government's
Marine Accident Investigation Branch
re-examined the case and while condemning the inaction of the
Californian
and Captain Lord, also concluded that due to the limited time available, "the effect of
Californian
taking proper action would have been no more than to place on her the task actually carried out by
RMS
Carpathia
, that is the rescue of those who escaped
... [no] reasonably probable action by Captain Lord could have led to a different outcome of the tragedy".
[6]
[7]
Californian
was later sunk on 9 November 1915, by the German submarines
SM
U-34
and
U-35
, in the Eastern Mediterranean during
World War I
while serving as a transport ship.
History
[
edit
]
Californian
was a steamship owned by the
Leyland Line
, part of
J.P. Morgan
's
International Mercantile Marine Co.
She was constructed by the
Caledon Shipbuilding & Engineering Company
in
Dundee, Scotland
,
[8]
and was the largest ship built in Dundee up to that time.
[9]
[10]
The ship was built to the maximum dimensions that were allowed to moor and outfit her in the Dundee Docks. The ship's size and importance to the local shipbuilding industry meant that there was a lot of local interest in her construction as it progressed. There were also some problems ? when both of the ship's boilers were being transported through the streets from a foundry to the shipyard the weight of them (carried on a wheeled
bogie
) caused considerable damage to the city's roads, as well as breaking a number of underground water pipes. Later when a crane was being used to rig a spar on one of the
Californian
's
four masts, the spar became tangled in nearby telephone wires and severed them.
[11]
She was designed primarily to transport
cotton
, but also had the capacity to carry 47 passengers and 55 crew members.
[
citation needed
]
The primary clientele was those passengers with too limited the means to travel on board large liners. By offering them comfortable cabins at an affordable prices (£10 per crossing in the direction Liverpool ? Boston, £50 in the opposite direction), Leyland Line was able to secure some profits this way.
[12]
[13]
Nonetheless, the ship was still primarily a freighter, as evidenced by her massive bunkers. She was named
Californian
according to a tradition specific to the company which gave its ships the name of one of the 46 states of the
United States
at the time.
[14]
She measured 6,223 tons, was 447 feet (136 m) long, 53 feet (16 m) at her beam,
[10]
and had a
triple expansion steam engine
powered by two double-ended boilers. Her average full speed was 12 knots (22 km/h).
[15]
The accommodation of most of the fifty or so crew members was located below the foredeck. They stayed there in cabins designed for four to eight people that were quite uncomfortable, poorly ventilated and lighted.
[16]
In all, the crew included the captain, four officers, a radio operator, and 49 crew members (sailors, drivers, trimmers, etc.).
[17]
The cabins were located in the superstructure. The officers of the crew resided on the starboard side and the passengers on the port side. The facilities for passengers corresponded to the second class of most ships of the time. Although the cabins were not of high quality, they remained comfortable and had electric lighting, which was not the case on all contemporary ships. The passengers of the
Californian
also had at their disposal a smoking room on the upper starboard deck, decorated with oak panels and linoleum, a novelty at the turn of the century. The dining room was also decorated and comfortable.
[13]
Californian
was launched on 26 November 1901 and completed her sea trials on 23 January 1902. From 31 January 1902 to 3 March 1902, she made her maiden voyage from Dundee to
New Orleans, Louisiana
,
United States
. Subsequently, she made transatlantic crossings, generally carrying around thirty passengers in addition to her cargo. In 1902, she was chartered by the
Dominion Line
for five crossings to
Portland, Maine
.
[18]
She then returned to the Leyland Line service to serve the southern United States.
[17]
From 1901 to 1911, she was commanded successively by four captains before being finally put under the command of
Stanley Lord
. By his young age (he obtained his captain's certificate at 24, a very early age compared to many of his colleagues) and by his spirit of initiative and his skills, Lord indeed promised to become a major captain in the British merchant fleet.
[19]
Between late 1911 and early 1912,
Californian
had a
Marconi
wireless apparatus installed in a refitted cabin. Her first radio operator was Cyril Furmstone Evans.
Sinking of
Titanic
[
edit
]
On March 30, 1912, the
Californian
made a stopover in London on a trip to New Orleans during which she had to face a storm which damaged part of her cotton cargo.
Stanley Lord
, who had commanded
Californian
since 27 March 1911, was her captain when she left the
Royal Albert Dock
,
Liverpool
,
England
on 5 April 1912 on her way to
Boston, Massachusetts
.
[20]
She was not carrying any passengers on this voyage.
[12]
On the navigation bridge, Lord was accompanied by three officers and an apprentice: George Stewart (second in command or chief officer), Herbert Stone (second officer), Charles Groves (third officer) and apprentice James Gibson.
[21]
The first week of the crossing was uneventful.
[22]
On Sunday 14 April at 18:30
ship's time
,
Californian
's
only
wireless
operator, Cyril Furmstone Evans (born 1892 in
Croydon
,
Surrey
,
United Kingdom
), signalled to the
Antillian
that three large icebergs were five miles to the south.
[23]
Titanic
's
wireless operator
Harold Bride
also received the warning and delivered it to the ship's
bridge
a few minutes later.
[24]
Californian
encountered a large
ice field
at 22:20 ship's time,
[4]
and Captain Lord decided to stop the ship and wait until morning before proceeding further.
[25]
Before leaving the bridge, he thought he saw a ship's light away to the eastward but could not be sure it was not just a rising star.
[26]
Lord continued to the engineers' cabins and met with the chief, whom he told about his plans for stopping. As they were talking, they saw a ship's lights approaching. Lord asked Evans if he knew of any ships in the area, and Evans responded: "only the
Titanic
." Lord asked Evans to inform her that
Californian
was stopped and surrounded by ice.
[27]
Lord ordered Evans to warn all other ships in the area, which he did.
[28]
Titanic
's
on-duty wireless operator,
Jack Phillips
, was busy clearing a backlog of passengers' messages with the wireless station at
Cape Race, Newfoundland
, 800 miles (1,300 km) away, at the time. Evans's message that SS
Californian
was stopped and surrounded by ice was heard very strongly on
Titanic
due to the relative proximity of the two ships and drowned out a separate message Phillips had been in the process of receiving from Cape Race, bringing Phillips to rebuke Evans: "Shut up, shut up! Keep out, I am busy; I am working Cape Race!".
[29]
[30]
Philips never passed this message to the bridge, but in his defence, Evans had not prefixed the message with the letters, "MSG", which stood for Master Service Gram, as was customary for all messages intended for the bridge. A little bit later Evans, feeling that he had done his duty despite Philips's rude rejection of the message, switched off his wireless equipment and went to bed.
[31]
[32]
One hour and 10 minutes later, at 23:40,
Titanic
hit an iceberg
.
[33]
Shortly after midnight, she transmitted her first distress call.
Third Officer Charles Groves of the
Californian
testified to the British inquiry that at 23:10 ship's time, he had seen the lights of another ship come into view 10 or 12 miles away, 3.5 points above
Californian
's
starboard beam. At about 23:30, Groves went below to inform Lord.
[34]
The latter suggested that the ship be contacted by
Morse lamp
, which was tried, but no reply was seen.
[35]
To Groves, she was clearly a large liner, as she had multiple decks brightly lit. The ship finally seemed to stop and extinguish her deck lights at 23:40, the same time
Titanic
stopped her engines. At the British inquiry, Groves agreed that if the ship he saw had turned two points to port, it would have concealed her deck lights.
[34]
Slightly after midnight, Second Officer Herbert Stone took watch from Groves. He testified that he, too, observed the ship, judging it to be about five miles away. He tried signalling her with the Morse lamp, also without success.
[36]
Apprentice officer James Gibson, who had been doing the Morse signalling, testified that at 00:55, Stone told him he had observed five rockets in the sky above the nearby ship.
[37]
Stone testified that he had informed Captain Lord, although the British inquiry did not ask whether or not he communicated the number. Lord asked if the rockets had been a company signal, but Stone did not know. Lord and Stone both testified that Stone reported they were not distress signals.
[26]
[36]
Lord ordered Stone to tell him if anything about the ship changed, to keep signalling it with the Morse lamp, but did not order that it be contacted by wireless.
[38]
[39]
Gibson testified that Stone had expressed unease to him about the situation: "A ship is not going to fire rockets at sea for nothing", Stone said. "She looks very queer out of the water?her lights look queer."
[37]
Gibson observed, "She looks rather to have a big side out of the water", and he agreed that "everything was not all right with her"; that it was "a case of some kind of distress".
[40]
Stone, however, under questioning by the British inquiry which became more and more incredulous, testified repeatedly that he did not think at the time that the rockets could have been distress signals,
[41]
and that the possibility did not occur to him until he learned the
Titanic
had sunk.
By 02:00, the ship appeared to be leaving the area. A few minutes later, Gibson informed Captain Lord as such and that eight white rockets had been seen. Lord asked whether he was sure of the colour. Gibson said yes and left.
[26]
[37]
At 02:20,
Titanic
sank. At 03:40, Stone and Gibson, still sharing the middle watch, spotted rockets to the south.
[37]
They did not see the ship that was firing them, but at about this same time
RMS
Carpathia
was coming quickly from the southeast, firing rockets to let
Titanic
know that help was on the way.
[42]
At 04:16, Chief Officer George F. Stewart relieved Stone, and almost immediately noticed, coming into view from the south, a brilliantly-lit, four-masted steamship with one funnel;
[43]
Carpathia
arrived on the scene shortly after 04:00.
[44]
Captain Lord woke up at 04:30 and went out on deck to decide how to proceed past the ice to the west. He sent Stewart to wake Evans and find out what happened to the ship they had seen to the south. They subsequently learned from the
Frankfurt
that the
Titanic
had sunk overnight.
[45]
[46]
Lord ordered the ship underway.
Californian
's
course took her west, slowly passing through the ice field, after which she turned south.
Californian
was sighted at 06:00 by
SS
Mount Temple
steaming from the north.
Californian
actually passed the
Carpathia
to the west, then turned, and headed northeast back towards the rescue ship, arriving at 08:30.
[47]
Carpathia
was just finishing picking up the last of
Titanic
's
survivors. After communicating with
Californian
,
Carpathia
left the area, leaving
Californian
to search for any other survivors. However,
Californian
only found scattered wreckage, empty
lifeboats
, and corpses,
[48]
[47]
and continued on its route to America. Upon arrival, several key crew members, including Lord and Evans, were summoned to give evidence at the American inquiry. Evans also gave evidence at the British inquiry into the tragedy. Like others involved in the disaster, he was offered large sums of money from newspapers for his story, but he refused it.
[49]
Aftermath
[
edit
]
As public knowledge grew of the
Titanic
disaster, questions soon arose about how the disaster occurred, as well as if and how it could have been prevented.
A
United States Senate inquiry into the sinking of the RMS
Titanic
started on 19 April 1912, the day
Californian
arrived unnoticed in Boston. Initially, the world was unaware of her and her part in the
Titanic
disaster. On 22 April, the inquiry discovered that a ship near
Titanic
had failed to respond to the distress signals. The identity of the ship was unknown.
[50]
The next day, a small newspaper in New England,
The Clinton Daily Item
, printed a shocking story claiming that
Californian
had refused aid to
Titanic
.
[51]
The source for the story was
Californian
's
carpenter, James McGregor, who stated that he had been close enough to see
Titanic
's
lights and distress rockets. On the same day, the
Boston American
printed a story sourced by
Californian
'
s assistant engineer, Ernest Gill, which essentially told the same story as the
Daily Item
.
Captain Lord also spoke with several Boston area newspapers but gave conflicting accounts. In a
Boston Traveller
article dated 19 April, Lord claimed that his ship was 30 miles from
Titanic
,
[52]
but in a
Boston Post
article dated 24 April, he claimed 20 miles.
[53]
Lord told the
Boston Globe
that his ship had spent three hours steaming around the wreck site trying to render assistance,
[52]
but Third Officer Grove later stated that the search ended after two hours, at 10:40.
[54]
When reporters asked Lord about his exact position the night of the disaster, he refused to respond, calling such information "state secrets".
[55]
After the newspaper revelations on 23 April, the U.S. Senate inquiry issued
subpoenas
for multiple members of the crew, including Gill and Lord. During his testimony, Gill repeated his claims.
[56]
Lord's testimony was conflicting and changing. For example, he detailed three totally different ice conditions. He admitted knowing about the rockets (after telling Boston newspapers that his ship had not seen any rockets) but insisted that they were not distress rockets,
[57]
and they were not fired from
Titanic
but a small steamship, the so-called "third ship" of the night.
[58]
Yet the testimony of Captain J. Knapp,
U.S. Navy
, and a part of the
Navy Hydrographer's Office
, made clear that
Titanic
and
Californian
were in sight of each other, and no third vessel had been in the area.
[59]
The so-called "scrap log" of
Californian
also came under question. This is a log wherein all daily pertinent information is entered before being approved by the captain and entered into the official log. Company policy of
International Mercantile Marine Co.
, the parent of both Leyland Line and the White Star Line, required scrap logs to be destroyed daily.
[60]
The official log mentioned neither a nearby ship nor rockets. At the British inquiry, Stone was not asked to recall the notations he had actually written in the scrap log, during his bridge-watch between midnight and 4:00 on 15 April.
[61]
On 2 May, the British Court of Formal Investigation began. Again, Lord gave conflicting, changing, and evasive testimony. By contrast, Captain Arthur Rostron of
Carpathia
, at each inquiry, gave consistent and forthright testimony. During the British Inquiry, Rostron was asked to confirm an affidavit he had made to the United States Inquiry. Among the other things in his affidavit, he confirmed that "It was daylight at about 4.20 a.m. At 5 o'clock it was light enough to see all around the horizon. We then saw two steamships to the northwards, perhaps 7 or 8 miles distant. Neither of them was
Californian
."
[62]
During the inquiry, the crew of
Californian
, like Captain Lord, gave conflicting testimonies. Most notably, Lord said he was not told that the nearby ship had disappeared, contradicting testimony from James Gibson who said he reported it, and Lord had acknowledged him.
[37]
Also during the inquiries,
Titanic
survivors recalled seeing the lights of another ship after
Titanic
had hit the iceberg. To
Titanic
'
s Fourth Officer Boxhall, the other ship appeared to be off
Titanic
'
s bow, five miles (8 km) away and heading in her direction. Just like
Californian
's
officers, Boxhall attempted signaling the ship with a Morse lamp, but received no response.
[63]
However,
Titanic
lookout
Frederick Fleet
, who was in the crow's nest when the iceberg was sighted and remained there for another forty minutes, testified at the US inquiry that he did not see the lights of another ship while in the crow's nest. He only saw a light later after leaving the ship on a lifeboat.
[64]
Titanic
'
s Captain Edward Smith had felt the ship was close enough that he ordered the first lifeboats launched on the port side to row over to the ship, drop off the passengers, and come back to
Titanic
for more. Moreover, lifeboat occupants reported the other ship's lights were seen from the lifeboats throughout the night; one lifeboat rowed towards them but never seemed to get any closer.
[65]
[
page needed
]
Both the American and British inquires found that
Californian
must have been closer than the 19.5 miles (31.4 km) claimed by Captain Lord, and that each ship was visible from the other. Indeed, when
Carpathia
arrived at the wreck site, a vessel was clearly seen to the north; this was later identified as
Californian
.
[66]
Both inquiries concluded that Captain Lord had failed to provide proper assistance to
Titanic
, the British Inquiry concluding further
Californian
'
s responding to
Titanic
'
s rockets and going to assist "… might have saved many if not all of the lives that were lost".
[4]
In the months and years following the disaster, numerous preventive safety measures were enacted. The United States passed the
Radio Act of 1912
, which required 24-hour radio watch on all ships in case of an emergency. The first
International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea
formed a treaty that also required 24-hour radio monitoring and standardized the use of distress rockets.
Despite the criticisms of Lord's conduct, no formal charges were ever brought against him. As a result, he had no right of appeal against the inquiry's findings.
[67]
The issue was not considered again until the publication of
Walter Lord
's (unrelated to Captain Lord) book
A Night to Remember
in 1955 and the release of the 1958 film
of the same name
prompted Lord to seek a re-hearing of the inquiry relating to his ship, to counter the allegations made in the book and his portrayal in the film. Petitions presented to the UK Government in 1965 and 1968 by the
Mercantile Marine Service Association
(MMSA), a union to which Captain Lord belonged, failed to get the matter re-examined.
[68]
However, when the wreck of the
Titanic
was discovered by Ballard's expedition in 1985, it was found to be 13 miles from its reported position (the location accepted by both inquiries), so the Board of Trade ordered a re-examination.
[69]
The British Government's
Marine Accident Investigation Branch
(MAIB) concluded its reappraisal of evidence in 1992. The conclusions were those of Deputy Chief Inspector, James de Coverly, stating: "What is significant, however, is that no ship was seen by the
Titanic
until well after the collision
… watch was maintained with officers on the bridge and seamen in the crow's nest, and with their ship in grave danger the lookout for another vessel which could come to their help must have been most anxious and keen. It is in my view inconceivable that the
Californian
or any other ship was within the visible horizon of the
Titanic
during that period; it equally follows that the
Titanic
can't have been within the
Californian's
horizon." The report went on: "More probably, in my view, the ship seen by
Californian
was another, unidentified, vessel."
[70]
The original investigator of the 1992 reappraisal was a Captain Barnett, who unlike de Coverly, concluded "that the
Titanic
was
seen by the
Californian
and indeed kept under observation from 23:00 or soon after on 14 April until she sank
... [based on] the evidence from Captain Lord and the two watch officers, Mr. Grove and Mr. Stone".
[70]
It was after Barnett's original report was submitted that Captain de Coverly was given the task of further examination. Both Barnett and de Coverly had concluded that
Titanic
's
rockets had been seen and that Stone and Lord had not responded appropriately to signals of distress.
The 1992 MAIB report concluded that Captain Lord and his crew's actions "fell far short of what was needed".
[71]
The report did concede that even if "proper action had been taken",
Californian
could not have arrived on the scene until "well after the sinking".
[67]
It also noted that when he did know of
Titanic
's
distress, Lord twice took his ship across an ice field to help search for survivors.
[72]
Captain Lord's chief defender, union attorney Leslie Harrison, who had led the fight to have the
Californian
incident re-examined by the British government, called the dual conclusions of the report "an admission of failure to achieve the purpose of the reappraisal".
[73]
The 1992 report by the MAIB was published just months after their publication of another controversial report, on the subject of the
Marchioness
disaster
of 1989.
[74]
This report had led to questions over the evidence-gathering, conduct and judgements of the MAIB.
[74]
Author Paul Lee accused Captain Lord of an "inability or unwillingness to adjust to an entirely new situation".
[51]
Although Lord had stopped his ship upon encountering ice, the British inquiry concluded that if
Californian
had acted upon the rockets and pushed through the ice, the
Californian
"might have saved many, if not all, of the lives that were lost".
[4]
The U.S Senate inquiry was also critical of Lord's inaction, the final report stating that "such conduct, whether arising from indifference or gross carelessness, is most reprehensible, and places upon the commander the
Californian
a grave responsibility".
[5]
Senator
William Alden Smith
, in a speech to the U.S. Senate inquiry, said: "the failure of Capt. Lord to arouse the wireless operator on his ship, who could have easily ascertained the name of the vessel in distress and reached her in time to avert loss of life, places a tremendous responsibility upon this officer from which it will be very difficult for him to escape".
[75]
Author Daniel Allen Butler wrote: "The crime of Stanley Lord was not that he may have ignored the
Titanic's
rockets, but that he unquestionably ignored
someone's
cry for help."
[76]
Others have suggested that, considering all the circumstances, there was actually little if anything the
Californian
could have done to prevent or reduce the loss of life. Allegations have been made that trade unions defending Captain Lord succeeded in influencing the reports from the official investigations before they were available to the public.
[77]
Williams and Kamps wrote in
Titanic and the Californian
: "Bearing [the] distance in mind, and recalling that a mere fifty-five minutes had elapsed from the time Captain Lord was first informed about the rockets to the moment the
Titanic
slipped beneath the waves, it would have been nothing short of a miracle for Lord to bring his ship to the
Titanic
and effect a rescue in such a short space of time."
[78]
Titanic
historian Tim Maltin theorized
[
clarification needed
]
that the
Californian
's inaction was the result of a cold water mirage, or
superior mirage
, arising from differences in air temperature over the warmer waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the colder waters of the Labrador Current. Maltin suggested that this would cause a superior refraction, superimposing and stretching and distorting the edge of the sea and lifting images of objects, distorting their appearance. This would explain why the
Titanic
's
Morse lamp was believed to be a flickering oil lamp on the mast of a much smaller ship, and why Capt. Lord thought the
Titanic
was a different vessel. If correct, Maltin's theory may further explain why the
Titanic
's
lookouts did not spot the iceberg earlier.
[79]
Cyril Evans continued his service with the
Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company
and its successor companies (Eastern Telegraph Company and Cable & Wireless: the later part of his career was spent as manager for Cable and Wireless on the West Indian island of
St Lucia
) for the rest of his life. He also served at sea in
World War I
and
World War II
, running mobile telecommunications for the
British Army
in North Africa and then Italy. He married and raised a family. In the film
A Night to Remember
, Evans was portrayed by
Geoffrey Bayldon
.
[80]
Later career and sinking
[
edit
]
Site of sinking (diamond), off Cape Matapan (red dot)
On 2 July 1913,
Californian
was docked in
Veracruz
when a fire erupted in her
nos.
3 and 4 holds, sustaining serious damage to herself and her cargo.
[81]
[82]
[
unreliable source?
]
Californian
continued in normal commercial service until
World War I
, when the British government took control of her. She was responsible for transporting equipments and troops for the Allies mired in the
Battle of Gallipoli
.
[83]
At 07:45 on 9 November 1915, while en route from
Salonica
to
Marseilles
at a speed of 12 knots, with a French torpedo boat escort,
[84]
she was torpedoed by the German U-boat
SM
U-34
. The escort tried to take her under tow, but the tow rope broke at 13:20. During a second attempt at 14:15, she was torpedoed again by sister
SM
U-35
and began to sink quickly. The crew evacuated onto the patrol boat, and finally
Californian
[85]
sank in 10?13,000 feet of water, approximately 60 miles (50 nmi; 100 km) south-southwest of
Cape Matapan
,
Greece
. Fireman Richard John Harding
[86]
was killed during the first torpedo attack, and two other firemen were scalded.
[81]
To date,
Californian
'
s wreck remains undiscovered.
[87]
Californian
sunk less than 200 miles (170 nmi; 320 km) from where
HMHS
Britannic
, a sister ship to Titanic, would sink only a little over a year later by striking a
mine
laid by German
SM U-73
.
[88]
In popular culture
[
edit
]
The involvement of the
Californian
in the sinking of the
Titanic
is examined in the 2012 BBC TV drama
SOS
–
The Titanic Inquiry
. The drama tells the story of the original British Inquiry into the sinking of
Titanic
, which decided, using the facts that were available at the time, whether the
Californian
was in near enough proximity to the vessel to rescue some, if not all, of the 1,500 lives lost.
[89]
The 2016 novel
The Midnight Watch
by David Dyer explores the
Titanic
tragedy from the perspective of the crew of the
Californian.
The narrative centres around a fictional American reporter who tries to uncover what really happened on board the
Californian
that fateful night.
[90]
References
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a
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[the ice warning] is dated 6.30 p. m. "A.T.S." which means apparent time ship … The sent date was 5.35 p.m., New York time.
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(The Attorney General.): Could you tell us how long it was after you got the message that you delivered it on the bridge? Bride: About two minutes.
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When I came off the bridge, at half-past 10, I pointed out to the officer that I thought I saw a light coming along, and it was a most peculiar light, and we had been making mistakes all along with the stars, thinking they were signals … He said he thought it was a star, and I did not say anything more.
- ^
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. Titanic Inquiry Project
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.
I said, "Let the 'Titanic' know that we are stopped, surrounded by ice."
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Phillips was tired and on edge and Cyril Evans' call burst in on him like a thunderclap; so loud, we are assured, it hurt his ears.
- ^
Piouffre 2009
, p. 23
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.
At 11.25 I still had the phones on my ears and heard him still working Cape Race, about two or three minutes before the half-hour ship's time, that was, and at 11.35 I put the phones down and took off my clothes and turned in.
- ^
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.
We signaled her, at half-past 11, with the Morse lamp. She did not take the slightest notice of it.
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Senator SMITH: Captain, did you see any distress signals on Sunday night, either rockets or the Morse signals? Mr. LORD: No sir; I did not. The officer on watch saw some signals, but he said they were not distress signals.
- ^
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. Titanic Inquiry Project
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I said, 'This is not the Titanic; there is no doubt about it.'
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.
[
page needed
]
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Bibliography
[
edit
]
- "Caledon Built ? Dundee Ships"
(PDF)
.
Friends of Dundee City Archives
. Friends of Dundee
. Retrieved
28 April
2015
.
- Butler, Daniel Allen (2009).
The Other Side of the Night: The Carpathia, the Californian and the Night the Titanic Was Lost
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Titanic
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.
Further reading
[
edit
]
- Eaton, John P. and Haas, Charles A.
Titanic: Triumph and Tragedy
(2nd ed.). New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1995.
- Halpern, Samuel.
Strangers on the Horizon: Titanic and Californian ? A Forensic Approach
, 2019.
- Lord, Walter.
The Night Lives On
. Morrow and Company, 1986.
- Lynch, Donald and
Marschall, Ken
.
Titanic: An Illustrated History
. Hyperion, 1995.
- Molony, Senan.
Titanic and the Mystery Ship
. Tempus Publishing, 2006.
- Padfield, Peter
.
The Titanic and the Californian
. The John Day Company, 1965.
- Reade, Leslie.
The Ship That Stood Still: The Californian and Her Mysterious Role in the Titanic Disaster
. W. W. Norton & Co Inc, 1993.
- Dyer, David (2016),
The Midnight Watch
, Atlantic Books, 2016
External links
[
edit
]
35°32′30″N
22°06′06″E
/
35.54167°N 22.10167°E
/
35.54167; 22.10167
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