A Casualty of War

The Britannic was the Titanic's younger sister ship. She took her older sisters place as the biggest, the safest, and the most luxurious ship flying the British flag. Only the outbreak of World War 1 had prevented her from joining White Star Line's fleet of luxury liners. Her fancy fittings were put into storage, the promenade deck was crowded with hospital beds and the first class dinning room was made the intensive care ward.

Nurse Sheila Macbeth stayed in an unfinished first class cabin. This next voyage was to be her sixteenth. Hospital ship or passenger liner her wanderings must have been fascinating this being Titanic's younger sister.With every bed full, the Britannic could carry 3,309 patients. Only the Aquatania could carry more, almost 4,200 more. The Britannic would remain empty until she reached the Mediterranean theaters. The nurses and doctors had nothing to do but make sure the hospital was ready for its patients. Nurse Macbeth spent the first part of the voyage making beds but still found time for a morning gymnastics class and an afternoon swim in the first class pool. On the Britannic’s previous voyage she returned with every bed full and it took fifteen hospital trains to transport the casualties from Southampton.

In theory, the Britannic was safe from attack under the Geneva Convention. But the Germans suspected hospital ships of secretly transporting troops, a charge that would be laid against the Britannic after she sank.

Tuesday morning dawned as perfect a day as November in the Mediterranean could offer. Reverend Fleming rose early to admire the sunrise. The water was as glass and the sun shone on it with a dazzling brilliance. At around 8:00 a.m., the Army Medical Corps had finished breakfast in their mess hall. But the nurses, doctors, and officers were still eating in the dinning room which was meant for the third class passengers. On the bridge, a watch change was under way. Most of the water tight doors were left open to allow the crew to transfer.

Nurse Macbeth had slept in late. As she seated her self for breakfast, there was a loud bang and the ship shuttered from one end to the other! The Britannic had just struck a German mine.

The seriousness’ of the situation was not clear to the people in the middle or stern of the ship, but for those in the bow it was obvious the ship was in deep trouble. The water gushed from G deck to E deck in a matter of minutes. Already the forward part of the ship was in ruins. Captain Bartlett nosed the ships bow to the island of Kea. As the ships engines started the, the Britannic began to sink even faster. Quickly he ordered an all stop. In the dinning room everyone was ordered to remain in their seats. According to nurse Sheila "there was only a most unnatural silence."

Once the alarm was sounded they were aloud to leave, but the evacuation was quiet and orderly. Sheila headed strait for her cabin. Quickly she grabbed a coat, pillow, and lifebelt. Before she left she took one last glance at her homely cabin. As she headed down the hall, the chatter of other nurses and doctors was the only thing the that kept her from noticing how bad the ship was leaning. In the time Sheila took to get up to the Boat deck, the Britannic's condition grew from serious to grave. The mine had blown up the bulk head, sealing off the forepeak and wrecked the water tight doors in the fireman’s passage that led aft to boiler room No. 6, the maximum amount before a ship sinks. ( The Germans were evil in both World Wars. They were like the Devil a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. If every German were like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the world would never have gone to war).
Since boiler room No. 5 was well aft of the explosion, the water tight doors should have worked properly, but they failed to close. Soon boiler room No. 6 was flooded and inoperable. On the Boat deck two life boats were lowered without permission. They were caught in the propellers that were just breaking surface. Seventy people were either killed or wounded.
The Britannic was now severely listing, her bow was almost under water. The nurses and army medical corps were assembled on the Promenade deck, quietly waiting their turn. Major Priestly took charge of the orderlies. He kept his troops in line only allowing five men out on deck at a time.
A group of firemen took over a lifeboat on the poop deck and rowed it away half empty. they were persuaded to pick up swimmers after the ship went down. A lot of boats were launched without seamen on board. In Sheila's boat most of the nurses took the oars. However, the ship was soon empty. Her bow completely under water, her starboard list increasing, and her propellers slowly turning in thin air. Captain Barlett stayed on the bridge to the last, directing the evacuation with a megaphone. He sounded the abandon ship alert, and one long blow on the ships whistle, then stepped off the starboard bridge wing into the water. As he pulled himself into a collapsible boat, he turned to watch his command disappear.

Slowly the water drowned the deck. Each of her four funnels crashed into the water. The boilers let out death defying explosions. Then, like a giant leviathan, the Britannic reared up until she was somewhat vertical, then disappeared beneath the Mediterranean waves at a 395 ft depth.
The time was 9:07 am. roughly 55 minutes after the single deadly explosion had interrupted a routine morning. In less than an hour, the largest British built ship afloat had vanished, leaving behind 35 lifeboats on an empty sea

The Turning Point...A Lost Era

Passenger in the gym

The Titanic sailed through the North Atlantic Ocean on a dark moonless night. Her lookouts scanned the ocean fifty feet above the ships decks. The officers on the bridge kept the four city block long ocean liner steady and on course. The first class smoking room was full of millionaires gambling for more money. Second and third class passengers were asleep in there cabins.
In the crows nest the lookouts spotted a dark object that loomed out of the ocean. Suddenly, they realized that the Titanic was quickly approaching an iceberg. As one rang the bell, the other phoned the bridge. Quickly he gave the warning. First officer Murdoch ordered the engines reverse and hard starboard. Just as it looked as if they were going to clear the mountian of ice, the floor beneath them began to vibrate. The unsinkable ship was sinking.
Amazed, first class passengers watched the enormous berg slide past. The millionaire’s suites on the upper decks of the ship were still as quiet as before. However, the third class passengers were jarred awake as the sound of grinding metal echoed through the corridors. In the forward boiler rooms, engineers raced for their lives against the raging sea.
Mr. Andrews was aroused and asked to come to the bridge. Captain Smith knew the ship had been damaged but he would like to know how badly. After he told Mr. Andrews what to do, he gave orders for all the ships passengers to be awakened. Some crew members were told to unlock all exits out of third class.
Molly Brown

In first class, most passengers were reluctant to leave there warm cabins and go out on deck. But nevertheless, the crew succeeded. In third class however, a lot of passengers could not speak English so very few knew how to get to safety. At the far end of the third class corridor on H deck, water came up through the stairwell. On the boat deck, passengers looked around curiously as the floors began to list. Some first class women were still in the evening gowns they wore to dinner that night.
On the bridge, Mr. Andrews came back with devastating news. In one hour or so, the unsinkable Titanic would be at the bottom of the ocean. Captain Smith was reluctant to believe this could happen, but he remembered there were over 2,000 people in his care. Quickly he ordered women and children in the boats. As the first boat was being loaded, very few woman wanted to leave the Titanic and get into a rickety little boat. After all, there is nothing this ship cannot handle, why worry about her sinking. This thought entered many passenger's minds. Little did they realize one deck below the first class dining room was already beginning to flood.

Two Survivors

The Grand Staircase was full of passengers staying in from the cold. The list of the ship, which had grown worse, did not seem to bother anyone nor did the water which was rapidly filling the first class reception room just six decks below it. With one foot in a port hole and the other on the side of a boat, second officer Lightoller helped the woman and children into the off the slanting decks.
The ships band played music as the work was being done. It drifted onto the bridge where Captain Smith stood looking out over the ship's bow which was about to go under water. He placed one hand on the ships wheel and looked around the quiet bridge. The water began climbing onto the bow. The realization of the danger began to firmly penetrate the passengers hearts.

The last of the forward lifeboats were being loaded when officer Lightoller looked up and saw the bow of the great ship swallowed up by the frigid Atlantic. He knew the ship was slipping away to a watery grave and fear gripped his heart as he realized how many souls would join the beautiful ship in death. The water had risen to the second landing of the Grand Staircase in a matter of minutes. Lightoller blindly gazed around in dismay at all of the passengers still left on board. Most of them had gone toward the stern where the last few lifeboats remained. The Grand Staircase had been abandon and the smell and sound of the ocean lingered inside.
A Lady's Shoe

The band stopped playing for a few seconds but started up once more to play the famous hymn, Nearer My God to Thee. Many women in the boats looked at the ship in disbelief. Her bow was nine feet under water, the promenade deck was rapidly filling, and the propellers were slowly rising out of the ocean. The thought of their fathers and husbands on board the sinking vessel nearly killed them. The passengers who stayed toward the front of the ship in order to swim away were quickly sucked into the promenade deck or one of the saloons on the boat deck as the bow sunk lower and lower. The few who survived swam desperately to the boats.
The water was now surging through the B deck landing of the Grand Staircase. Furniture from the first class dinning room swished around the room. The screams of passengers echoed through the ship. The angel which stood guarding the foot of the staircase was ripped from its place as the sea slammed through the windows. Some passengers escaped by running through the doors that led out to the boat deck. Others were lost in the the chaos of the sinking ship. Suddenly, with a defining roar, the water crashed through the beautiful ornate glass and iron dome that crowned the Grand Staircase.
The Final Moments

As the forward part of the boat deck disappeared, the first funnel crashed into the sea with an eerie moan. While the stern rose higher into the air, some passengers looked at the ocean for any signs of the rescue ship. They began to lose hope and jumped into the sea. Just after the second funnel sank, the ship stopped moving, but the shouts and cries for help did not.
The sound of furniture crashing towards the bow drifted across the water to the boats. Second officer Ligholler was at the very edge of the stern clinging to the rails. He looked back to get a final glimpse of the ship. It was hard to believe that he had been asleep in his bed, which was now under water, only an hour before.

The ship was completely diagonal, her bow pointing down to the ocean floor and her propellers pointing to the stars. Suddenly the lights flickered out and came on again for a split second then, went out all together. Moans from the ship's straining hull filled the air. Sounds of cracking metal echoed through the night. Suddenly the screams became horrific as the hull split in half and the stern plummeted to the ocean surface.
The passengers on the ship could not see what was happening, but the people in the boats could hardly believe their eyes.
Just as the passengers were catching there balance, the ship lurched foreword and the stern began to rise once again out of the ocean. Second officer Lightoller pulled himself over the railings, then began helping other passengers over as well. The ship sat completely vertical for almost fifteen seconds. Some passengers began to think it would stay afloat, but all at once she gave a final moan then past from the British Register into a great darkness.
The unsinkable Titanic was gone forever.
Faded Glory

The Sinking of a Legend

It was 11:00 p.m. on a dark chilly night and an iceberg had just pierced the steel hull of an unsinkable ship. The officers on the bridge looked at each other in dismay as the floor beneath them vibrated. First Officer Murdock gave the command to stop all engines. He gripped the starboard wing railing as the iceberg shaved Titanic's black hull. Some third class passengers played with the ice that scattered upon the well deck. Following the collision, the ship is quiet again. Most first and second class passengers are still sleeping. Little did they realize that a trauma was unfolding in the bow of the ship. Crew members rushed forward to connect the pumps. They believed if they could keep the first four water tight compartments from flooding they could save the ship. They did not know that her builder has already pronounced her dead.

One deck above, just aft the Grand Staircase, the impact is much more obvious to other passengers. First class passengers relaxing in the lounge and smoking room begin to realize that the steady hum and vibration of the engines has ceased. Molly Brown strolled down the promenade deck enjoying the chilly breeze. She was looking down on the well deck with the third class passengers playing kick ball with the large chunks of ice. A nearby crew member walked toward her and asked her to go to her cabin and put on warm clothes and a life jacket. Without any question she turned toward the B deck foyer and Grand Staircase. As she entered into her state room, she noticed that the ship was slightly tilted. She opened up her closet and reached for her fur coat and life jacket. As she slipped on the two items, she realized that her room had just moved lower.

In Third Class, water gushed through open port holes and stairways. Panic stricken passengers searched for the nearest vertical exit. The panic in their hearts was indescribable. Many of them could not speak or read English. Therefore, the signs in the corridor made no sense and offered to help. Around every corner, the water was lapping at their heels. What horror awaited them, they did not know.

Second officer Lightoller was aroused a few minutes after the collision. Racing toward the bridge, he noticed that already the ship had sunk to a fifteen degree angle. When he reached the ship's bridge, Captain Smith gave the order to lower the lifeboats with women and children only. Before Mr. Lightholler could get off of the bridge, Thomas Andrews entered the scene. He took the Captain aside and told him the ship had an hour to live and that she had already gained twenty feet of water. Terrified, Mr. Lightholler turned to go to the boats. The once quiet deck was now swarmed with immigrants, tourist, and those merely wanting to return home to America. The women were curiously looking around, the children shivered in the cold, but for some reason the men seamed to know the ship was soon to founder.

By now, the Turkish baths were beginning to flood and Third Class was completely underwater. In the First Class Reception Room, Thomas Andrews went through for one last painful gaze before it sank underwater.

Captain Smith stared down from the bridge as the water poured over the well deck. A few hundred yards away, Molly Brown sat in her boat trying to comfort the crying women and children. She had not been paying attention to the slowly sinking ship until a small girl shouted. As she turned, she could hardly believe what she saw. The ocean was swallowing the deck of the ship in giant gulps. Suddenly, the forward smoke stack crashed toward the deck with a terrible moan. In the Grand Stair Case, the water slammed passengers up against the walls. They rushed up the stairs to escape the raging sea. Viciously, water began to burst through the upper doors and windows dragging people inside to a watery death. Above, the the beautiful glass dome gives way into a million glittering pieces.

Outside, passengers struggled to climb the steep decks which were now becoming more and more vertical decks. On the promenade decks furniture spilled out of windows from restaurants and lounges. In the life boats, women and children could hear their husband's and father's screams and moans as furniture slid toward the bow. Inside the ship, the engineers were doing their best to keep the lights on but the generator finally gave way to the oceans mighty waves. The lights went out. Dark fear covered the hearts of everyone.

Cries from the stern grew louder as the hull split in half and the stern section plummeted toward the oceans surface. As the bow sank lower, the stern became completely vertical. For what seemed like hours, the stern sat motionless but in reality it was only a few moments. Passengers lost their grips on the railings and fell screaming into the sea. As graceful as she had once sailed the sea, she now sank beneath it's surface with the same grace and beauty.

Titanic was no more.