Hello John.
You wrote:
"I would think that if the Titanic was facing north when it sank, as is generally accepted,"
I'm afraid I am an exception to that popular concept.
Apart from the evidence that
Titanic's helm was put hard right (hard-a- port) as some indeterminate time after she hit the iceberg; the only other evidence pointing to
Titanic having swung north comes from Quarter Master Rowe.
He stated:
"17669. Was your vessel's head swinging at the time you saw this light of this other vessel?
- I put it down that her stern was swinging.
17670. Which way was her stern swinging?
- Practically dead south, I believe, then.[
17671. Do you mean her head was facing south?
- No, her head was facing north. She was coming round to starboard.
17672. The stern was swung to the south?
- Yes.
17673. And at that time you saw this white light?
17674. How was it bearing from you?
- When I first saw it it was half a point on the port bow, and roughly about two points when I left the bridge."
You may not be aware of it but Rowe was giving what is known as a 'relative bearing' of the light in question. That means he was giving it's position relative to
Titanic's bow.
There are two reasons why the direction of that light would have changed relative to the bow. The first would be the one many people have pounced on.. i.e..the ship's head swinging to the right. The second would be due to the movement of the ship carrying the light.
Unless Rowe had either taken a bearing of the light in question or had noted the ship's head by the steering compass, he would have had no idea whether the ship's head was swinging or the ship showing the light was moving. There are at least two separate witnesses who declared the other ship
was moving. The fact that the relative bearing of the light did not change more than 20 degrees between the time Rowe arrived on the bridge and the time he left it, does not sit easy with the idea of
Titanic's bow swinging right all the time. If it was, why would it stop doing so when Rowe left the ship 20 minutes before she sank?
There is of course the claim that the position of
Titanic's bow section as it lies on the sea-bed proves the point. That is pure conjecture in the absence of knowledge concerning the conditions prevailing on the sections of
Titanic as she sank through 2 miles of water. Sure, test tank work has been done on the subject but such tests could not replicate the unknown.
The people who hold to the theory of a pointing north scenario, also believe there was a south-setting current running that morning. Anyone who has a reasonable knowledge of the action of a stopped ship (Not Under Command)in a current will tell you that if such a current was running, Titanic could never have turned her bow to the northward against such a current.
This brings me to your question:
"then the boats we see (6, 14 and D), which were all launched from the port side, should be coming from the west, the direction that the icefield was to the Carpathia, so the bergs should be visible, no? Is there any explanation for this discrepancy? ."
As Adam observed "a good question".
It was reported that the wind was from the north after 4am. Wind blows at more or less right angles to the wave crests. If you look at the following photograph then you will see that these boats in this first picture are coming from a north, northeasterly direction.
As for the direction of the ice: Take a look at this image taken from Carpathia that morning:
However there is a problem with the wind direction in this second picture.
Captain Rostron of Carpathia said the ice was trending North-west..South east as far as the eye could see and was about 4 to 5 miles away. If the second picture was taken about 9am that morning, we can deduce from the sunlight on the face of the large iceberg together with Captain Rostron's remarks that the wind in that picture was blowing from about west-northwest.. not north.
If the wind in the first picture was blowing from the same direction in the second picture, the line of the pack ice with entrapped icebergs should have been seen in the back ground astern of 5th Officer Lowe's boat. We can only assume therefore that some time after daylight, the wind backed toward the westward.
If Lowe's boat came directly from the site of the wreckage then he was sailing southward. This would explain the absence of ice in the picture. On the other hand; if the original reported wind direction of north was incorrect and the wind was indeed WNW and blowing off the ice, then the ice would be trending away to the left and out of shot in the picture of Rowe's boat and his lifeboat would be pointing in the direction of about South East, parallel to the eastern edge of the pack ice. (I think!)
Jim C.