| Author |
Message |
    
Jeremy Aufderheide
Member
Username: jerauf
Post Number: 250
Registered: 1-2007
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 14, 2009 - 5:44 pm: | 
|
http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/titnch18.htm
In this link, Lady Duff Gordon mentions seeing a school of whales. Did any other survivors mention this? Any guesses as to what kind of whales they might have been.
I wonder if they were just passing through, curious about the commotion, or snacking? |
Dave Gittins
Member
Username: gittins
Post Number: 3963
Registered: 4-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 14, 2009 - 8:06 pm: |
|
No other survivors mentioned whales and I suspect Lady Duff-Gordon didn't either.
The tale is from a heavily ghost written story attributed to her. It went round the world and I've got a version from the Australian press. It belongs with Rigel the dog and the other trash put out by the press.
Dave Gittins
Titanic: Monument and Warning.
http://users.senet.com.au/~gittins/Book.html
|
Mark Baber
Moderator
Username: mab
Post Number: 3221
Registered: 12-2000
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 14, 2009 - 8:18 pm: |
|
In this article, Elmer Taylor is quoted as saying that he saw whales while on Carpathia, but it's not clear (at least to me) exactly when.
MAB
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OceanicSteamNavigationCo/
http://www.greatships.net/
|
Dave Gittins
Member
Username: gittins
Post Number: 3968
Registered: 4-2001
| | Posted on Thursday, January 15, 2009 - 7:42 pm: |
|
An interesting article, but I think the polar bear reveals the hand of the ghost writer. That's so often a problem with these early accounts drawn from newspapers.
Dave Gittins
Titanic: Monument and Warning.
http://users.senet.com.au/~gittins/Book.html
|
Jeremy Aufderheide
Member
Username: jerauf
Post Number: 255
Registered: 1-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, January 15, 2009 - 7:46 pm: |
|
The thought of the outline of a whale swimming under the lifeboats in the morning light after the carnage a few hours earlier is a beautifully symbolic thought.
But, whatever...we can thank the hand for journalistic embellishment for his one. |
Mark Baber
Moderator
Username: mab
Post Number: 3226
Registered: 12-2000
| | Posted on Thursday, January 15, 2009 - 8:24 pm: |
|
I think the polar bear reveals the hand of the ghost writer.
Perhaps, Dave. But this isn't the only time "polar bear on ice" was reported:
2 August 1905: Oceanic II and Cunard's Caronia arrive in New York,
officers and passengers of both ships reporting having passed an "almost
frantic" polar bear on an iceberg about 900 miles west of Liverpool.
Caronia's Capt. Warr (sic; should perhaps be "Barr") describes the
bear's plight, which is almost certain to result in its death, as one of
the saddest things he has ever seen. (Source: The New York Times,
3 August 1905.)
MAB
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OceanicSteamNavigationCo/
http://www.greatships.net/
|
