- 7 hours ago
Titanic Sinks Tonight - Season 1 Episode 3 -
The Moment of Mutiny
The Moment of Mutiny
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00:00Things I saw made impressions I can never forget I can't describe it I can't say how it was
00:25It was just terrible
00:30A dream of being trapped on the ship with no means of escape
00:40But I always wake up before the boat sinks
00:55He told me that apparently we'd struck something
01:06Iceberg, get ahead
01:09I didn't become alarmed
01:17There was no danger
01:19They said
01:20I told her to come at once, we were sinking
01:27You can imagine the chaos and the fear and the terror of finding water in your cabin
01:35And you're in the bowels of the ship
01:37It makes me panic just thinking about it
01:39The story of the Titanic is the human condition spread out
01:44Pinned on a board for us to examine
01:47Then came the terrible cry
01:51Women and children, women and children
01:54Two men lifted me up and put me in a boat
01:58It's these small decisions, these little butterfly effect moments
02:02That change the outcome
02:04It really was every man for himself
02:20My heart stood still
02:24If we're going to die
02:38Best to die gripping something
02:41It's a split second decision
02:45What would you do?
02:46What would I do?
02:47It was a terrible sight
02:55Men swimming and sinking
02:59I'd been brought up to believe in a hell
03:10After death
03:12For now I think I went through a hell that night
03:21I'd been brought up to believe in a movie
03:23Oh there is a place
03:24For now I go to believe in a building
03:25I'd been brought up to believe in a distant history
03:27Oh yeah
03:28Ooh
03:29Oh yeah
03:31Oh yeah
03:33Wow
03:34Oh yeah
03:40Oh yeah
03:40Oh yeah
03:41Oh yeah
03:42Oh yeah
03:44Oh yeah
03:46Oh yeah
03:47Oh yeah
03:48Oh yeah
03:51I nipped along to have a look down the emergency staircase, to gauge the speed the water was
04:14rising, that cold green water crawling its ghostly way, the electric lights shone under
04:28the surface with a weird effect.
04:36Sir Lightoller knows now things are getting more serious, he thought this thing could not
04:41go down and now he knows it could sink. This is a terrible shock for him.
04:53Captain Smith is at fault here, he has not informed his senior officers of what he has known for some
05:00time. It's very hard to know why Captain Smith did not give out the information to his most trusted
05:05command. Maybe it's important to keep this away to stop them panicking and to keep control.
05:26There are just 10 standard lifeboats left on the ship, along with four collapsibles.
05:33There's 2000 souls and more on board, and only around 700 places. There's no rescue ship coming
05:40anytime soon, so if you don't get in, you're gonna die.
05:44Lytolo is going to continue doing exactly what he's done before, but with even more fervor and rigidity,
06:06enforcing the plan. It's the only thing he can do.
06:09Charlotte Collier is just about holding herself together in her family unit, her husband Harvey
06:21and her little daughter Marjorie.
06:23Mr. Low rushed among the passengers and ordered the women into the boats. Many of them followed him in a
06:37dazed kind of way, and others stayed with their men. A sailor caught Marjorie in his arms,
06:50tore her away from me, and threw her into the boat.
06:55I was crying for my doll. Then, two men lifted me up and put me in a boat.
07:04Marjorie! Marjorie!
07:08Marjorie!
07:09She was not even given a chance to tell her father goodbye.
07:16You, too, a man, yelled, you're a woman.
07:22Take a seat in that boat, or it will be too late.
07:25i heard my husband say
07:32go lottie for god's sake be brave and go
07:42and saw my husband's back as he walked steadily down the deck and disappeared among the men
07:48if they'd not wrenched marjorie away from me
07:58i wish i had gone with him
08:06the kirch's deferential veneer is not there anymore the officers will pull apart women from their men
08:15and make them go into the boats whether they want to or not this is new in the course of the night
08:21and it's frightening
08:31there's a really stark disadvantage facing third-class passengers from the beginning
08:38they are stuck in the bowels of the ship trying to get to where the lifeboats are
08:45i've been seasick the whole trip
08:59all i wanted was to be left alone so i could lie down
09:07anna huerblom is a teenager from finland she's a swedish speaker
09:11a third of steerage passengers on the titanic were from nordic countries there were so many
09:17people who did not speak english they spoke spanish arabic swedish swedish is the second most spoken
09:23language when the boat struck the 14th of april which was my birthday i was 18
09:32i didn't become alarmed i just couldn't believe that this wonderful ship could possibly be in trouble
09:44there are 14 stewardesses in first class to help those passengers leave the ship
09:53in third class there's only one
09:59there was no tunneling system or announcement of what was going on of what to do they had to work it
10:06out themselves
10:18that crash woke me up
10:27nearly jolted me from my bed
10:29i put on my trousers and shoes and got up
10:41eugene daly is a 29 year old textile worker from county westmeath in ireland
10:45after years of saving he's immigrating to america along with his cousin maggie her friend bertha and his
10:53beloved irish pipes
10:57the stewards came through and told the passengers that they shouldn't be frightened
11:02there was no danger they said everything was all right and that i might go back
11:19the third class passengers don't know what's going on because they're not being told and there's
11:24nothing worse than having an idea that something's really wrong but not knowing exactly what it is
11:30is above deck the first and second class passengers and the crew they can all see there aren't enough
11:37boats left and there are hundreds of them on deck
11:45i stood at the bulkhead with the other stewardesses a ship's officer ordered us into the boat
11:53some lifeboats are only at half capacity
11:56now there's fear everywhere so they're filling them up as quickly as they can
12:04looking along the length of the ship
12:08i noticed the forward part of her was lower now
12:15much lower
12:21my heart stood still
12:25you know in the military this is what we talk about triaging this is a case of thinking how many
12:39people can we save at this point there's only room for 800 people in the lifeboats that remain
12:45so that's best case scenario but in crisis situations you're not getting the best case scenario
12:51within the panic the confusion
12:55the boat was full now
13:01as the boat was being lowered the ship's officer called here miss jessop look after this baby
13:10someone had dumped it on the deck beside his feet
13:24at this stage violet is handed a baby that has been sort of separated from their family or
13:30whoever was caring for them at that point it's hard to fathom that
13:34that panic beginning to spread it's making their circumstances worse it's making everybody's
13:42chance of survival worse but it's such a natural reaction
13:55i could hear the commotion overhead increasing i decided to go up even though i still felt very ill
14:16i was fully closed and i had a life belt
14:20my railroad ticket to tacoma and a small amount of money were sold in a little bag and hung around
14:27my neck so that i couldn't lose it
14:32i went down into the room where maggie daly and bertha mulville hill were
14:38the men and women in third class are separated so for eugene to find maggie and bertha he has to cross
14:45from one end of the ship to another no one is guiding them no one is saying this is the best
14:50way to get around the flooding they have to work it out themselves
14:59come with me the ship is sinking
15:06there's hundreds of third-class passengers trying to navigate the warren
15:10of corridors hallways staircases and they're trying to get to a part of the ship the boat deck that
15:16they've never been allowed onto before it's difficult to convey the size of a ship like the titanic it
15:25took me 14 days before i could find my way from one part of that ship to another by the shortest route
15:31eugene maggie and bertha must navigate up several decks to the boat deck
15:39it's now a very challenging situation and the feeling of a loss of control on the part of the
15:44crew is getting stronger and stronger it was about this time that the chief officer came over from the
15:50starboard side and asked did i know where the firearms were i told the chief officer yes come along and i'll
15:57get them for you drawing weapons is very unusual
16:07the officers clearly were aware of how panic was setting in and order and discipline amongst people
16:14were falling apart there are guns on board the titanic like the lifeboats nobody expected to ever
16:23have to use them into the first officer's cabin we went the chief murdoch the captain and myself
16:37i hauled them out still in all their pristine newness and grease
16:42i was going out when the chief officer shoved one of the revolvers into my hands with a handful of
16:55ammunition and said here you are you may need it the fact of the matter is there are far more passengers
17:05than crew british and american society at this time is hierarchical and it's rules-based people will do
17:13what they are told but not when their lives are at stake this is what the officers fear but you know
17:21check off said you can't put a gun in the room and not use it
17:39third-class passengers naturally gravitated towards the aftwell deck which is the outdoor space they've
17:45had use of but it is still three decks below the boat deck where the lifeboats are
18:02there was a lot of confusion with people running around crying swearing and and praying
18:13since i couldn't speak english i hardly knew what was happening
18:19i had to push people apart to find the place to walk
18:29she doesn't speak english there's no one experienced to advise her so she's working
18:34this all out with so much against her there's a sea of passengers already gathered there so eugene
18:41and anna are joining this throng of people i went up on deck people were running around
18:51the titanic being an immigrant ship must conform to american and british immigration laws and one of
18:58those laws is around quarantine maintaining steerage class passengers in areas separate from the first
19:05and second class passengers to stop the spread of disease before the third class passengers have
19:11even boarded titanic they've had to be subjected to medical examinations they're hemmed in by locked
19:18gates and these same gates that were meant to prevent ill health are now blocking their access to the
19:23lifeboats eugene's cousin maggie tries to go back to her cabin but that corridor is under five foot of
19:30water there's no chance she can make it and she turns back all this time we knew that the water was coming
19:38up and up rapidly
19:40to know that safety is on the other side of that locked gate it must make them despair
19:54the boat was practically full and there were no other women anywhere near it when
20:12fifth officer low jumped in and ordered it lowered
20:16a young lad hardly more than a schoolboy was standing close to the rail now realizing he was to be
20:29left behind he leapt down into the boat and crawled under a seat
20:39but the officer dragged him to his feet and ordered him back onto the ship
20:46the officer drew his revolver and thrust it into his face
21:02i gave you 10 seconds to get back onto that ship before i blow your brains out
21:09the lad only begged harder
21:17my mother said i called out don't shoot
21:27the officer suddenly changed his tone
21:31he lowered his revolver and looked the boy squarely in the eyes
21:42for god's sake be a man we have got women and children
21:47we have women and children the little lad turned around and climbed back without a word
21:54he was not saved
21:59he was not saved
22:03allow the boats
22:07to avoid another recurrence of that sort i fired my revolver as i was going down each deck
22:15because the boat wouldn't stand a sudden jerk
22:17she was loaded already with people and would not stand anymore
22:26actually drawing the gun shows that the ship's officers realized that things were very very
22:32desperate indeed and of course we did not have enough lifeboats for everybody on board
22:37there are 10 lifeboats left on deck now and 1960 people still to save titanic now was so low in the water
22:48that iconic areas like the grand staircase and some of the luxury state rooms were flooding
22:55there's no doubt at all that this was unstoppable it was merely a question of time
23:07it's not a question of time
23:13phillips told me the wireless was growing weaker
23:20jack phillips has spent the last few hours trying to communicate with other wireless operators
23:27carpathia is sailing at full speed towards titanic but she's still two hours away
23:33on the nearest ship the californian nobody recognized or responded to the distress
23:41flares but phillips still believes that as long as he can get signals out he may be of some use
23:49but now the electricity is starting to fail
23:52then he does get a message from his sister ship olympic
24:05but she seems not to understand at all what is happening to titanic and thinks titanic must be
24:12limping along sailing towards them the frustration here is now clear because the messages are not getting
24:19through for this young man in his mid-twenties i think this is the place of utmost distress
24:28right now it's clear on board ship that no rescue vessel is going to reach titanic before she sings
24:35the third class passengers are at most risk at this moment there's the language difficulties there's
24:50probably a bit of aggression i think that's setting in annoyance frustration we had quite
24:57a number of hot-headed italians and other people who got crazy and made for the stairs
25:05these men tried to rush the stairway pushing and crowding and pulling the women down
25:13at this moment we would expect the adrenaline to kick in the body wants to survive and it gives us some
25:21sort of innate choices you might fight your way to the front physically people might freeze where
25:26they're just stuck they're in terror they don't know what to do we also see people who are turning
25:32inward and that would be turning to god as well making the sign of the cross and so on
25:38the first class deck was higher up than the steerage deck and there were some steps leading up to
25:43it and a gate at the top of the steps they tried to keep us down at first on our steerage deck at the back of
25:49the ship they're trying to keep order but by doing so in such a chaotic way they probably contribute to
25:59a greater loss of life than they realized i can't say who they were i think they were sailors
26:11they didn't want us going up to the first class place at all
26:13even though there's no direct policy preventing third class passengers from accessing lifeboats
26:23it's clear from their testimony after the sinking that there was not a level playing field the
26:28third class were left marginalized and endangered by cruise actions
26:33there was no help of any kind to reach safety
26:49so time is ticking down the water's rising they're sandwiched in between the sea and the locked gate
26:56they're having to make life or death decisions in moments with very little information
27:07i got talking to a young swedish girl returning to the united states
27:15she knew about an emergency stairway to where the lifeboats were
27:21anna's interesting because she's come from a different environment she's come from finland
27:29where the social strata isn't quite as defined as it is in england at the time
27:35perhaps she has a little bit more leeway to not rely on following the authority figures orders
27:41we climbed the ladder up to the first class deck and then an officer saw me and dragged me up to the next deck
27:59we passed a window and we looked into a beautiful room where the tables were so beautifully set
28:09the silver and all the furniture
28:16the other girl she wanted to kick the window out and walk in and help ourselves
28:27i told her that they might make us pay for the broken window so we didn't
28:32there's some evidence that growing up in adverse situations actually gives you a kind of cognitive
28:40toolkit to be able to get through those situations all kinds of skills where you've needed to survive
28:47and depend on yourself and that translates really quite well to an emergency scenario the third-class
28:53passengers have survived so many different challenges already
29:02they must have felt their confidence and trust in the crew and officers had gone
29:09i think these are people who are not taking no for an answer
29:12they couldn't keep them down
29:22gate was broken
29:25all the storage passengers went up onto the first class deck
29:29they're going to take fate into their own hands and they will get to those boats
29:33in the same way that i think when officer low fired his gun he changed the terms by breaking the gate
29:39they changed the terms
29:45i rushed to the lifeboats
29:50there seemed hundreds of people around me
29:55half the lifeboats have already gone they're in the water
29:58there's only four lifeboats at this end of the ship and the others are hundreds of yards ahead
30:05seeing only four lifeboats available and nearly 2 000 people trying to get into them there is such
30:12panic in that crowd
30:17everywhere everybody was confused
30:21i saw a lot of people
30:22catholics make the sign of the cross
30:29i had to step
30:33on many of these people to reach the side of the deck
30:41the crying of children and the screaming of a woman you know these are terrifying sounds that we are
30:47programmed to have a sort of visceral reaction to i remember from living through my trauma my wounding
30:54in afghanistan it sounds stay with you far more than sights that is a powerful thing for the senses to
31:00take on board and for ultimately you to then have to live with i tried to get into a lifeboat
31:11and i was pushed back
31:18it seemed as though i would go down with the ship
31:31it seemed as though i would go down with the ship
31:40ideas about self-control and stoicism and self-sacrifice are celebrated as forms of gentlemanliness
31:49as well as manliness these are the values that they've been told to hold to
31:55and it means putting yourself second that is the ideal as far as edwardian society is concerned
32:07bruce ismay who is the managing director of the white star line his father had founded the white
32:11star line and the titanic is basically his idea this is the crowning achievement of his career the
32:18creation of this amazing opulent ship and now he can see that it is all going to the bottom of the sea
32:38did you think it was in a very serious condition
32:41as time got on i did and that the ship was sinking i did
32:51i helped for nearly two hours as far as i can judge at the starboard boats helping women and
32:57children into the boats and blurring them over the side
32:59i think the sense of responsibility for bruce ismay must have been huge we see this in the fact that
33:09he spends time patrolling the boat deck putting people into boats instructing crew how to behave
33:18but he knows that there aren't enough lifeboats on board he knows by this point that there's no
33:24rescue ship coming anytime soon these lives are on his conscience
33:41the ship was listing heavily in the bow somebody gave me a push towards the boat
33:54and i got in that girl and i went together
34:02the lifeboat was so crowded
34:16when i got to the deck a lifeboat was hanging from the davits number 13 boat
34:26it was pretty well filled when i got there
34:32the boatswainer knew me as i'd sailed with them and other ships before said to me you get on this
34:38boat and pull an oar fred is in the lifeboat and because you know he's one of those strong enough to
34:47be able to row it and at this stage the crew is now starting to really fill the lifeboats
34:54so i took his orders and i got on as she swung from the davits
34:58he had women men and two little babies one two months old and the other ten months old
35:11there is no real order people are sitting on top of one another and you know you're sort of being
35:16crushed underneath this mass of people it's suspended by davits off the side of the ship at this point
35:23it's about 18 meters above the water but every person that gets in adds that weight adds that
35:30movement adds that risk and so there has to be a point at which you say that's enough
35:36about three more people get in after i did and then the orders were given let no more on that boat
35:43or the falls will break
35:44that means looking into the whites of people's eyes and saying there's no more space
36:05the board was being filled with women
36:07maggie and bertha got in and i got in
36:23the officer called me to go back but i got in life was sweet to me and
36:32i wanted to save myself
36:34it's the early hours of the morning the lifeboats are being filled to the broom now
36:39overfilled naturally some male passengers want to get in they want to be with their loved ones
36:44and they just want to save their lives as any of us would they told me to get out but i didn't stir
36:56then they got a hold of me and pulled me out
36:58eugene's testimony makes me like him i think he's honest he's frank he's not trying to put a spin
37:08on his own behavior or anyone else's i get the feeling of a real historical account in its watson
37:14all attitude what's sad about this story is that most of those officers knew the people that they were
37:21turning away in the sense that they were from the same class the same kind well if i didn't save myself
37:30at least i saved the two girls
37:42so
37:58captain smith had severe doubts about whether a fully laden lifeboat could be lowered properly
38:04he knew there are a lot of people waiting down at the gangway doors to get into boats and therefore he
38:10thought how can i manage to get these boats full how can i save as many of the people whose lives i
38:16am responsible for as is possible the captain came and said mr boxall you go away in that boat pointing
38:26to boat number two i tumbled into this lifeboat and started to lower up and the captain looked over and
38:36told me and told me go around to the starboard side which was practically on the opposite side to where i was lowered
38:47so boxall's lifeboat was only about 45 percent full was meant to go around to the starboard side of the ship
38:54to take on more passengers
38:58i had great difficulty in getting that boat around there
39:03there was suction
39:09i was using the stroke or standing up and there was this lady helping
39:15she was steering around the ship's stern
39:17when i passed around the boat to get to the gangway door on the starboard side
39:25her propellers were out of water
39:30but when i did eventually reach there
39:34i found that there was such a mob standing at the gangway doors
39:45and i found that there was such a lot of people who were able to get to the ship's
39:55if they jumped they'd swamped the boat
40:01i don't go alongside she was only a small boat
40:05boxall should have made sure that he filled the lifeboat up and take necessary action to make
40:16sure he wasn't swamped he was in a position to do that and he didn't
40:23and it's a really tricky one because yes crews should follow orders and the structure of discipline
40:28is how you can try and create some form of order in moments of chaos there is a good reason why
40:36you know in circumstances we are not question orders having said that it's all well and good one
40:42of your superiors giving you an order but they're not seeing the circumstances that you are witnessing
40:48i pulled off and laid off until i pulled away about a quarter of a mile i suppose
41:09so the instinct to row away is very normal very human everybody wants to get away from the scene
41:33of an accident or a disaster and this ship is huge people have never seen anything this big
41:45captain smith is out there with his megaphone barking orders
41:49it's almost instinctive and it's driven into you from the day you join the royal navy or the merchant
42:10navy that you obey your captain and do as he says he is god in a sense and therefore not to do as you're
42:16told is a heinous crime quartermaster hitchens who is in command of one of the lifeboats said it's our
42:28lives now not theirs i find that quite extraordinary the bottom line should be i want to save as many as i
42:35can it's our lives now not theirs this is the moment of mutiny this is when all order has broken down
42:46we are not going to stand by anymore and drown because you tell us to fair enough
42:59we had gone perhaps half a mile when the officer ordered the men to cease rowing
43:06no other boat was in sight we didn't even have a lantern to signal with
43:19we lay there in the silence and darkness of that calm sea
43:25no sound reached us
43:35except the music from the band which i was aware of for the first time
43:41those brave musicians
43:51they were playing lively tunes ragtime
44:00i will never forget the terrible beauty of the titanic at that moment
44:11i started to count the rows of lights
44:22one
44:24two
44:27three
44:29four
44:31five
44:31i stopped
44:39surely i i had miscounted
44:46i went over them again more carefully and i'd made no mistake
44:54there are only five decks now
44:55as if all could read my mind the women in the boat started to weep
45:04some silently some unrestrainedly
45:15just before launching the last lifeboats
45:18i'd made my final hurried visit to the emergency stairway
45:22to gauge how quickly she was going down
45:31it was then conclusively evident that
45:35not only was she going but she was going very soon
45:43even in pants and sweater over pajamas alone i was in a bath of perspiration
45:47if we were to avoid the disgrace of going down with lifeboats still hanging to the davits
45:54there wasn't one moment to lose
45:56the forward well deck was under water
46:11i saw phillips still sending away
46:14i suspect many people on the ship by now are in an altered state
46:19which we know is what happens when people are facing death jack phillips won't leave his post
46:27it is a clear single focus on what you believe to be right
46:32and he believes the right thing to do is to stay there until it's all over again phillips called cqd
46:38and sos for nearly five minutes and got no reply
46:51we now realized the awful state of affairs the ship listing heavily to port and forward
46:56i thought it was about time to look about and see if there was anything that would float
47:03i remembered that every member of the crew had a life belt
47:07and then i thought how cold the water was
47:09i remembered i had some boots and i put those on and an extra jacket
47:13we picked up the olympic and told that we were sinking by the head and we're about all down
47:19phillips is leading from the front he's a hero it's easier to understand
47:28fear and self-interest than it is to understand sacrifice and heroism especially now in our world
47:38we think that everything is about greed and me first that generation did not as phillips was
47:45sending the message i strapped the life belt to his back i'd already put on his overcoat wondered if
47:51i could get him into his boots just at that moment the captain came into the cabin
47:58and said men you have done your full duty you can do no more
48:01the man in your cabin that was every man for himself i release you
48:10every man for himself now in the conflicts i trained for and it's unimaginable that we would
48:15ever find ourselves in a circumstance where it was every man for themselves all of the order has been
48:20lost and actually trying to maintain that order whether it's you know pointing a gun at a crowd or
48:27you know screaming at the top of your voice all you're doing in that circumstance is wasting energy
48:47the last of the hard hulled lifeboats have been dispatched but there is still
48:52two collapsible lifeboats left on the boat deck they're a little bit more flimsy but they still
48:58are a lifeline there was some disturbance loading the last two forward boats
49:07a large crowd of men were pressing to get into them though there were many crew and men lined up with
49:14apparently not a thought at attempting to board the boats without orders
49:23i saw bruce ismay who had been assisting in loading the last boat push his way into it
49:39really was every man for himself
49:43bruce ismay decides to save himself he is about the only man on board who can't be ordered out of
49:53that spot by any of the remaining crew
50:01you were one of those as the managing director responsible for determining the number of lifeboats
50:07yes in conjunction with these shipbuilders when you got into the boat you thought that the titanic was
50:14sinking i did did you know that there were some hundreds of people on that ship yes
50:21who must go down with her yes i did
50:30has it occurred to you that you as the responsible managing director deciding the number of boats owed
50:37your life to every other person on that ship it has not
50:41i have searched my mind with the deepest care i'm sure i did nothing that i shouldn't have done
50:50my conscience is clear
50:53i took a chance of escape when it came to me i did not seek it
50:59it is true i'm president of the company but i didn't consider myself any different from the rest of
51:04the passengers i took no other man's place
51:16i took no man's place this is palpably untrue but i think he must believe it
51:24i think that bruce ismay comes from a class of society who believes that they have everything
51:32they have because of grit and character i mean it's like being a billionaire today in a world of hungry
51:40people the only way you can live with yourself is to imagine that you deserve it in some way
51:46and so i think that bruce ismay believes contrary to all rational fact that he hasn't taken someone
51:57else's place even though he really must know internally that he has
52:11there was a terrible crowd standing about
52:24the officer in charge pointed a revolver waved his hand and said that if any man tried to get in
52:32he'd shoot him in the spot if anyone tries to enter i will shoot two men tried to break through and he
52:39shot them both i saw him shoot them i saw them lying one seemed to be dead the other was trying to pull
52:59himself up at the side of the deck but he couldn't
53:02himself up at the end i tried to get to the boat myself but was afraid i would be shot and stayed back
53:16when we rode away from the titanic my face was towards the sinking steamer
53:37the things i saw i'll never forget
53:55i saw an officer
53:59shoot himself through the temple with a revolver
54:07the story of the officer shooting himself is contested even the name of the officer
54:19is in dispute you're meant to help others not shoot them and you're certainly not meant to shoot
54:24yourself when you make a mistake
54:29i saw the officer himself lying on the deck
54:32it's not a line of inquiry that is pursued and i think that is because in edwardian society there is
54:45such a taboo around death by suicide it looks like the easy way out though it can hardly have been so
54:53it suggests that the people who did it have failed that test of being an edwardian man which is to
55:03demonstrate heroism and courage and stoicism in the face of disaster
55:19death stares everyone in the face some will escape some won't
55:41death
55:45jack phillips he's young but he's responsible he's self-reliant he thinks he's going to die
55:53and so he decides to die doing his best for everyone else
56:02phillips clung on for about 10 minutes after the captain had released him
56:06i learned to love him that night
56:18i suddenly felt for him
56:21a great reverence to see him standing there sticking to his work
56:25well everybody else was raging about
56:35i will never forget the work of phillips for those last awful minutes
56:47he was a brave man
56:48people find themselves facing this life or death moment together
56:59titanic broke in two before my eyes
57:03striking water was like a thousand knives being driven into one's body
57:09to die slowly within a shot of people who might save your life there's a particular cruelty to that
57:18so
57:26so
57:31Transcription by CastingWords
58:01CastingWords
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