Propellers Glistening
As the tilt grew steeper, the forward funnel toppled over. It struck the water on the starboard side with a shower of sparks and a crash heard above the general uproar. Greaser Walter Hurst, struggling in the swirling sea, was half blinded by soot. He got off lucky — other swimmers were crushed under tons of steel.
The Titanic was now absolutely perpendicular. From the third funnel aft, she stuck straight up in the air, her three dripping propellers glistening even in the darkness. To Lady Duff Gordan she seemed a black finger pointing at the sky.Out on the boats, they could hardly believe their eyes. For over two hours they had watched, hoping against hope, as the Titanic sank lower and lower. When the water reached her red and green running lights, they knew the end was near…but nobody dreamed it would be like this — the unearthly din, the black hull hanging at 90 degrees, the Christmas card backdrop of brilliant stars.
Swallowed by the Sea
Some didn't watch. In Collapsible C, President Bruce Ismay bent low over his oar — he couldn't bear to see her go down. In Boat 1, C.E. Henry Stengel turned his back: “I cannot look any longer.” In No. 4, Elizabeth Eustis buried her face.
Two minutes passed, the noise finally stopped, and the Titanic settled back slightly at the stern. Then slowly she began sliding under, moving at a steep slant. As she glided down, she seemed to pick up speed. When the sea closed over the flagstaff on her stern, she was moving fast enough to cause a slight gulp.
“She's gone; that's the last of her,” someone sighed to Lookout Lee in Boat 13. “It's gone,” Mrs. Ada Clark vaguely heard somebody say in No. 4. But she was so cold she didn't pay much attention. Most of the other women were the same — they just sat dazed, dumbfounded, without showing any emotion. In No. 5, Third Officer Pitman looked at his watch and announced, “It is 2:20.”
(This article can also be found on National Review Online.)
Indestructible in Memory
The fingers of blame point in many directions. Bad design, defective rivets, weak steel, an arrogant owner, a neglectful captain, even the Wrath of God. The theories behind the sinking of the “unsinkable” Titanic are as plentiful as the books, movies, and television documentaries on the disaster. “Patently destructible in life,” wrote marine historian John Maxtone-Graham, “The Titanic has proved indestructible in memory.”
While it may seem strange to us now, no complete retelling of the Titanic disaster was published for over four decades after the sinking. In 1955, Walter Lord, a copywriter at an advertising agency, wrote A Night to Remember. An instant bestseller at the time, it remains the most popular and successful work on the subject. Lord takes us through the final moments of the Titanic.
