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Teri, I'd take the stories of locked gates with a grain of salt the size of Mount Everest if I were you. There are only two places with the bostwick gates made notorious in the movies to be found on any actual plans of the ship, and one of them is back in a crew area. Further, the closed gates referred to in actual testimony are the waist high gates at the top of a stairway leading from one of the well decks to B Deck on the superstructure.

If you have Powerpoint, you may want to go to home.comcast.net/~bwormst7/Symposium/gates.html then click on "Cathy's Powerpoint presentation" to see the research that Cathy Akers-Jordan did on this. Mr. Finoli got off the ship in Lifeboat 15 which...if by Bill Wormstedt, Tad Fitch & George Behe is correct...was launched around 1:30. (See home.comcast.net/%7Ebwormst/titanic/revised.html and also home.comcast.net/%7Ebwormst/titanic/lifeboats/lifeboats.htm for their reasons and source material.)

As you pointed out, he may well have been locked up behind a gate or perhaps even a door but if he was, he managed to find his way out.
 
Michael

I looked everything over and I am going to conclude that all gates (including the one on E deck) prior to the collision were locked. I based my decision on the Immigration Law (slide 7), "Stephenson par. 7; Wade 22 "Immigration Laws required LOCKED barriers on immigrant ships to prevent the spread of disease." The key word here is LOCKED, as in LOCKED barriers, not unlocked ones. The crew had a job to do and part of that meant gates were to be kept locked at all times. White Star was no run-of-the-mill shipping firm so I trust they followed regulation firmly. Also, it is mentioned in various places that crew had to UNLOCK the gates to let 3rd Class passengers out. This indicates the gates were initially locked. (Pellegrino mentions locked gates as well, on page 71 of "Ghosts of the Titanic," "What they did not know, could not have known, was that historians of the future were launching robots deep into the Titanic's bow and finding those murderous gates still locked -- just as Anna Sjoblom and Emily Badman and Rosa Abbott said they had last seen them, on that cold, dark morning." I do not know which dive Pellegrino was referring to, had to have been an early one as his book was written in 2000, but I hope to have this data soon.)

Why there is a gate placed on E deck I will never know. From slide 9 I could not make out that the classes were segregated horizontally or vertically by this gate, so what was its purpose?

As far as the gate on E deck and whether IT was locked or not at the time of the sinking -- again I am going to have to say that it WAS locked due to the regulation, but whether men died from being locked in or if they were killed nearly instantaneously from the onrush of water as a result of the iceberg I do not know. I am aware though that flooding came quickly since this part of the ship was closest to the damage.

My personal opinion on the great loss of 3rd Class life was that the crew loaded 1st Class first, and by the time they were ready to load 3rd Class the ship was 3/4 well into the sinking and time ran out. They managed to save about 100 (3rd Class) women, but there were still approximately 130 (3rd Class) women left who did NOT get saved. And honestly, if the crew wanted to load women first they would have if they could have. My first thought was that these 130 women who lost their lives were in the forward part of the ship on E deck and got killed almost instantly by the force of the iceberg damage, but then I remembered that it has been said that single men were placed in that part of the ship and what would women be doing there. Because that part of the ship belonged to single men, I was forced to conclude that loading time for the remainder of the women ran out. I am not sure if there is any relevance or importance to this but I noticed the 3rd Class did not start getting substantially loaded until Boat #16, and may I comment that it was quite remarkable that the crew were able to detain all those 3rd Class people while loading the 1st Class. They detained somewhere in the vicinity of 800-900 people (I estimated the figure), because that is how many 3rd Class Passengers there was. That's a lot of people to contain in just one hour.

P.S. I could see now, why Mr. Luigi Finoli was angered. Locked or not, how would you feel if you were detained and prevented from boarding a lifeboat on a sinking ship, that you had to sit idly by while hundreds of 1st Class people strolled by climbing into a lifeboat? (and I do not think every single 3rd Class person was down below, I am sure there were plenty who escaped their quarters to watch the 1st Class load)

--Teri
 
>>so what was its purpose?<<

Actually, there were only two of the Bostwick gates even mentioned on the NARA plans. The one up forward in the 3rd class area is was underwater fairly early on so it's simply irrelevant. The one back aft was actually at the base of a *crew* stairway in the area of the potato washer and potato storage.

That's it.

There are no other Bostwick gates shown in any passageway on any extant plans of the ship. They might have been in a couple more places but they just aren't shown.

Having said that, there may have been locked doors in various places. Plenty possibilities there which you can identify even on the incomplete plans that ET has. Detaining the passengers below wouldn't have been all that incredibly difficult. The below decks area was a rat warren of dead ends and confusing turns which made getting out very difficult for anyone to whom it wouldn't occur to go up. This was also an age when people had a profound respect for authority and "Knowing One's Place" that's scarcely understood in our "Question authority" mindset.
 
"The one up forward in the 3rd class area is was underwater fairly early on so it's simply irrelevant."

To me this forward gate IS relevant when you look at the total loss of the 3rd Class. It should not be dismissed because "it filled up early." Just because this gate went under early does not mean it went under empty. I stated in my post above that it is entirely possible that a number of single men were locked behind this gate and lost their lives. I also stated it is possible they were not locked behind this gate and that they were killed nearly instantaneously from the onrush of water. But again, just because this gate went under water early does not mean it went under EMPTY.

"Detaining the passengers below wouldn't have been all that incredibly difficult. The below decks area was a rat warren of dead ends and confusing turns which made getting out very difficult for anyone to whom it wouldn't occur to go up."

Getting around the ship was difficult I will agree to that, and was probably why the huge rush of people came much later in the game. They weren't called to the decks until 3/4 into the sinking anyway. They were probably working their way up to the decks while the 1st Class were being loaded.

It is a good thing that many passengers were guided by crew to the decks where the boats were being loaded. They may not have ever found their way otherwise. Exactly how many were guided remains unknown, as well as exactly how many found their way up, is unknown as well. All we know is that many were guided and many found their own way.

"This was also an age when people had a profound respect for authority and "Knowing One's Place" that's scarcely understood in our "Question authority" mindset."

If I interpreted your post correctly, yes 3rd Class knew their position with regards to remaining in their designated areas, but the mindset of these (3rd Class) people quickly changed once they realized they were on a sinking ship. Motherly instincts took over to save their children and they attempted to get rid of whatever barrier lay in front of them. Men too, attempted to get rid of any barrier that stood in their path, as their fatherly instincts took over. Parents wanted to save their families in whatever way they could.
 
Pellegrino may have been talking about "Titanic: Secrets Revealed," a documentary released 10 April 1999, 87 minutes long. I will see if I can get a copy today at my local library and view it myself to see if they captured a locked Bostwick gate.
 
>>To me this forward gate IS relevant when you look at the total loss of the 3rd Class. It should not be dismissed because "it filled up early." <<

It can be if it was abandoned early on and that's what the extant source material pointed to. Even if it wasn't, you won't be detaining people in an area that's already flooded solid. ( The dead don't care and the living have long sought out a drier climate. ) You can detain people in areas that are not.
 
You make a good point, Michael. If I'm below decks in Steerage, and my ship is about to founder, I'm certainly not going to swim into water over my head to find a way out - whether the gate is locked or not! Another point I'd like to hear commented on is - and I'm not sure of the source of this - whether many of the "locked gates" were no more than three foot high. If this were the case, a three foot gate would not be that difficult to traverse or even trample down. And also please address the theory that the "locked gate" referred to by Pellegrino (whom we all know to be 100% accurate - :) ) was actually a gate to a cargo area that was locked to keep Steerage from stealing food.

Kyrila
 
>>And also please address the theory that the "locked gate" referred to by Pellegrino (whom we all know to be 100% accurate - :) ) was actually a gate to a cargo area that was locked to keep Steerage from stealing food.<<

I think I know what "gate" you're referring to and it was observed around the hatches going down into the cargo hold. I doubt very much that it was there to keep anyone from stealing food since this particular barricade was observedup forward. The victuals were stored back aft. This barrier was there for safety reasons. (Can't have people falling down into the hold and killing themselves. It's embarrassing.)

The three foor high gates you're referring to were at the top of the stairs going up from the welldecks to B Deck in the superstructure of the ship. The photos of these gates are shown in Cathy's Powerpoint Presentation. The location of the gatr described by Buckley is shown in slide 15 with a photo in slide 16.

The location of the gates described by Gilnaugh, Mullins and Murphey are shown in slide 19.
 
Good Afternoon Michael,

I hadn't interpreted the material to say the gate was abandoned, so thank you for clarifying that.

You know what, at first I thought no passengers died being locked behind this gate because from studying the E deck plans posted here on ET (https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/plans.php?angle=E+Deck), I learned that this gate lead down to F deck and in order to be saved these people needed to travel UPWARDS not downward. Now, if F deck lead to some other area where they could go up then the gate would be important for them. I am not an expert on deck plans so I do not know if F deck contained some other means of going up or not.

I was told that other gates in this area existed and if the one leading to F deck didn't do anything for the people maybe another one did.

With just a little more work hopefully I can come up with at least one solid truth about the 3rd Class loss of life.

--Teri
P.S. I agree that you won't be detaining people in an area that was abandoned.

P.S.S. I know you don't give a hoot but I found the reference to dead people don't care a little harsh. These passengers afterall, are living people's relatives, in the event it has been forgotten.
 
>>P.S.S. I know you don't give a hoot but I found the reference to dead people don't care a little harsh.<<

Not harsh...just reality. Since I make no apology for not being a sentimentalist, there's little real point in trying to call me on the carpet for that.

In regards to where the ladders went, it would appear from the evidence that people had little trouble making their way up from below. If there were any barriers...and I think in a larger sense there were...they were rarely of the physical kind suggested in the mythos surrounding the Titanic. Certainly the blokes who made it to the well decks didn't have any problem at all. Getting past those gates leading up to B Deck was a bit of a trick but no more difficult then leapfrogging the lot as they were only about waist high. Especially for the guy who went after the seaman who pitched him back down.

(I wonder if he ever caught up with that crewman.)

As a little aside, do you have any deck plans of the ship. If you don't, or have to rely on the Eaton and Haas plans, you may want to invest in a copy of the deck plans put together by Bruce Beveridge. You can go to http://titanic-model.com/ga-plans/ for more information.

I'll offer you a little tip from my own training in shipboard damage control under combat conditions: Learn to think in three dimensions. Look at what's below and above as well as forward, aft, and side to side. I think you'll find that it helps to explain a lot!
 
Thank you for the link to Beveridge's site. Took a brief look at the forum and they certainly get detailed don't they, talking about brass strips at the top of the stairs, how more detailed can you get. It is nice to know I have a place to go should I ever need detailed information such as that. The entertaining bits was seeing the below job titles on the small deck plan (E). White Star certainly left no hands overlooked, ha ha.

Sauce Cook, Roasting Cook
Vegetable Cook, Fish Cook
Pastry Man, Poultry Man
Pageboy (a boy who is employed to run errands)

Beveridge's site has a small gif of the Bostwick gate leading upwards, but it was the one aft. I just might invest in the plans, who knows.

Fair enough on not claiming to be sentimental. At least you're honest about it. I have a better sense of your makeup, and thoroughly understand your signature better too.

I think I got your combat experience. You were saying it is important to always look all around you to maintain what is going on. Right?

I might have a deck plan or two in the books I have, but no I do not have any purchased plans, well, the only purchase deck plan I have is of the Majestic II. I wanted the plans of Majestic One but the guy who mailed it to me sent me the wrong one, or he didn't have the one I wanted.

I am still working on the passenger list.

--Teri
 
>>I think I got your combat experience. You were saying it is important to always look all around you to maintain what is going on. Right?<<

Bingo!

I was one of the lucky ones to have never seen combat, but I've had a few close calls with non combat crisis. It's very difficult to make a career at sea without facing something that'll get your heart racing.

In any event, if you have a fire burning in a main propulsion machinary room, (Been there done that!) and the adjoining spaces were things like storerooms filled with dangerous chemicals, flammables such as clothing, or an ammunition magazine, wouldn't you as a damage control officer want to know that? As a member of the fire team, wouldn't you want to know where to set the fire boundries as well as possible escape routes if things get ahead of you?

I think you might!
Wink
 
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