Officer's Duty at Dinner Time

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Dennis Smith

Member
Hi All,

After reading the posts about the Officer's Mess, I was wondering if any of the officers, except the Old Man, would have any duties with regard to entertaining the passengers, ie. Did they have a table in the dining room where the passengers joined them (on invitation) for dinner. I know this happened on the QE1,QM1 and QE2, I sailed with an OM who was Senior 2nd mate on QE1 & QM1, and the guy I was in college with was 2R/O on QE2.
They reckoned that the "Entertaining" was sometimes the hardest part of any voyage and quite often left them out of pocket, financially, although they received a suppliment to their salaries to cover this it rarely covered the cost of drinks etc.

Thanks for any comeback

Best Wishes and Rgds

Dennis
 
I seem to recall something about the pursers having some obligations in this regard. Can't say as it's something I gave a lot of thought to. I am aware that this particular "duty" wasn't entirely welcome among deck officers, and some avoided this sort of thing like the plague if they could get away with it. Considering the often brutal and exhausting watch schedules they had to keep, it's not hard to understand why.
 
Yes, the Chief Purser hosted a table in the 1st Class dining room and the 2nd Purser did the same in 2nd Class, where Lawrence Beesley was among those seated at 'the purser's table'. The Chief Surgeon also was expected to dine with the 1st Class passengers, though he was seen mainly at a small table with Ismay. Somebody here mentioned a while back a passenger account that another deck officer (Chief or 1st, if I remember right) had a table in the 1st Class dining room, but I don't think that was substantiated by other evidence.
 
A curiosity in events leading up to the accident is that Murdoch relieved Lightoller for dinner that evening. This is contrary to the IMM/White Star Rulebook (pg 11 "Sea Watches").

Under Senior Officers' Watches it shows the second officer worked 6 to 10 a.m. and that the first officer relieved him for breakfast.

The first officer served from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and is relieved by the second officer for lunch.

At dinner, the book states, "No Dinner relief needed." This is apparently because the 6 p.m. change of watch would allow the second officer to get dinner before going on duty; while the chief officer who had the 2 to 6 p.m. watch could do so after coming off duty.

Yet, we have testimony that Murdoch relieved Lightollar at 7 p.m. that Sunday night contrary to the company policy.

-- David G. Brown
 
I don't know if I'd read too much into that, David. It's not as if it's unknown for ships to bend the rules a little to deal with some day to day operational necessities not covered by the book. It was probably one of those "winked at" practices that the line knew about, but didn't see fit to raise a fuss about.

Since I could be mistaken, I would have to wonder what any alternative reasoning would be behind this.
 
Can we imply, from the context of that phrase and from the custom and practice of the workplace at the time, that something which need not be done is also something which must not be done? If not, then this particular private arrangement would be within the 'letter of the law'.

In any case, it's clear from Lightoller's memoirs that he at least was a man who was not averse to creative interpretation of the rule book, and he certainly was in favour of seamen prepared to 'use their brains' and do what clearly needed to be done rather than seek official approval for their every action. During his Royal Navy service he wasn't impressed when he first encountered ratings who had been trained to do nothing unless specifically ordered, and everything by the book.
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Anyone know when breaktfast time was for the senior officers on the Titanic? We have from Lightoller that luncheon was at 12:30 PM and dinner was at 6:30 PM. At 12:30 PM he would go to relieve Murdoch for lunch and take his at about 1:00. I presume Murdoch had lunch with Wilde at that time. At 7:00 PM Lightoller would be relieved for 1/2 hour by Murdoch so he could take dinner, and Murdoch had his dinner before at 6:30 PM along with Wilde I presume.

Dave, to me the rulebook recommendations makes a lot of sense unless dinner was unavailable at 5:30 PM before Lightoller was to assume his watch. If, however, breakfast was available at 5:30 AM and after, then there would be no need for relief at breakfast, and it all works out well between Lightoller and Murdoch.

By the way, if anyone reads Lightoller's testimony at the BOT regarding the watch keeping for the junior officers, he says:

"They are divided into watches - 3 to 5 and 4 to 6, 4 hours on and 4 hours off, with a dog watch, that is, the watch from 4 to 8 p.m., is divided into what we call the dog watches, 4 to 6 and 6 to 8."

The reference to "3 to 5 and 4 to 6" can be a bit confusing to those not initiated. What he should have said more clearly was that the junior officers are teamed into pairs to work together in the two separate watch sections, with the 3rd officer teamed with 5th officer in one watch section, and the 4th officer teamed with the 6th officer in the other watch section.
 
It is a bit to "pat" an answer to say that they simply ignored the rulebook when it was convenient. That would have been a very modern way of conducting business, not the sort of thing you would expect out of the late Edwardian age. Titanic sailed in a time when order and "by the book" was highly esteemed.

There are other possibilities. For one, it was Sunday evening. That may have meant a different schedule for the stewards in order to reflect the lighter duty usually performed on Sundays. Perhaps, as Sam suggests, the time of breakfast was changed so that it became necessary to move the relief to dinner.

Whatever the reason, the reason that Lightoller was relieved by Murdoch contrary to company rules should have been established by both inquiries. Yet both chose to ignore this breach of policy. I think this shows the true depth (or lack of depth) of the two governmental probes.

-- David G. Brown
 
>>Whatever the reason, the reason that Lightoller was relieved by Murdoch contrary to company rules should have been established by both inquiries. Yet both chose to ignore this breach of policy. I think this shows the true depth (or lack of depth) of the two governmental probes.<<

I'm inclined to agree with that. In fairness, I don't know if Senator Smith & Company had any way of knowing about this. If they did, they probably didn't care as they had their own agenda to persue. ( J. P. Morgan was the one in Senator Smith's gunsights when you get down to it.) I don't think the same can be said of the Mersey Court, but then they might not have believed this to be germane to the causes of the accident itself.
 
There may be more to this than meets the eye...

When Wilde came on board Murdoch was "bumped" to first officer and Lightoller to second. Due to the fact that the ship was operational at the time, this may have caused problems with the normal rotation of watches.

What if...

It had been convenient to allow Lightoller to retain the watch schedule of the first officer, whlle Murdoch took that of the second. This would not change their duties and responsibilities, just the hours of their watches.

If so, then Murdoch would have been on duty from 6 to 10 p.m. This would be why he was on the bridge to tell Hemming to close the scuttle at dusk. Lightoller may have done the 7:30 p.m. sights as "extra duty" so that this work did not interfere with Murdoch's primary watchkeeping responsibilites.

To continue the "what if"... Lightoller would then have come back on duty at 10 p.m. This means that he, and not Murdoch, would have been the watch officer at the time of the accident.

In the aftermath, Murdoch was dead. And, dead men do not testify. It would have been most convenenient to claim that he was on watch in accordance with company policy during the accident. Doing so would have avoided a lot of pointed questions at Lightoller which could only have resulted in testimony damaging to White Star.

Preposterous? Perhaps. However, such a switch of officers is certainly not without the bounds of possibility. And, that's why investigators have to examine every scrap of evidence and trace down every lead. The fact that the alleged dinner relief of Lightoller was never adequately explained leaves open questions of large import.

-- David G. Brown
 
I noticed that Lightoller and Murdoch had the same arrangement at lunch time. I don't see any sinister secret, just a friendly deal that was not by the book.

Quite a bit was done off the record, including the captain dining with passengers. It wasn't officially his job, but it was expected of him.
 

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