Women and children first

[Harland Duzen]

I don't know how to phase the answer, but when the ship was sinking, the Boat Deck and the lowering of boats was divided into two sides with 1st Officer Murdoch taking charge of boats on the Starboard Side while 2nd Officer Lightoller took charge of the boats on the Port side.

Murdoch followed "Women and Children First" which meant once all women and children nearby had got on board, he would allow any men nearby to step in.

Lightoller meanwhile mostly followed "Women and Children Only" which meant that once all women and children nearby had got on board he would lower the boat despite men being nearby.

Hope the above makes sense, and their were exceptions made to these rules.

 

[Aaron_2016]

The order could be interpreted to mean the same thing, assuming both orders were in relation to the gangway doors below. Lightoller gave orders to open the gangway doors and he thought it was safer to 'partially fill' the lifeboats from the top decks and then fill each one to their full capacity after they had safely reached the water far below them by dropping rope ladders out of the gangway doors. Murdoch may have thought the same thing because he told 3rd officer Pitman - "You go away in this boat, old man, and hang around the after gangway."

Lightoller's order - "Women and children only" could simply mean he only wanted the women and children to enter the lifeboats from the top decks and the men would be instructed later on to go below decks and climb out of the gangway doors via rope ladders after the lifeboats had all safely reached the water. This would be physically challenging for the women and children to do, so it certainly makes sense that he specifically only wanted the women and children to enter the lifeboats from the top decks - hence - "Women and children only (from this deck)".

Murdoch's order - "Woman and children first" could mean the same as the above, as Murdoch wanted the women and children to be the first to enter the lifeboats from the top decks. He would not want to distress them by asking them to climb down the rope ladders and putting the children inside mail sacks (similar to how the children were hoisted aboard the Carpathia). Once all of the women and children were out of sight on the top decks Murdoch would allow the men to enter the lifeboats as he was willing to take the risk of adding the extra weight.


I believe the gangway doors were supposed to be their primary source for filling the lifeboats. The crew would lower the boats from the boat deck without any interference from the passengers, and the crew would put the women and children into the boats from the promenade deck below, and the men would climb down the gangway doors and fill the lifeboats to their full capacity.

Unfortunately the evacuation did not go to plan.


.

 

[Ezekiel]

Why not? It's a part of history as it happened. There's really nothing any of us can do about it and it's way too late to pass some highly subjective moral judgements.

It's never too late to pass judgments.

He dealt with the crisis as best he could and carried out his orders as best he understood them.

Highly questionable.

That understanding may well not have been perfect but miscommunications and misunderstanding was as rampant then as it is in any other disaster.

"Not perfect" is a very tame way of putting it...

While the boats were indeed tested to full capacity in Belfast, whether or not all the officers knew about it is questionable at best. While I have a difficult time believeing that they didn't know...this purported ignorance and the notorious Masaba message *may* have been misdirection,...that hardly means that all of them did know about it.

They could have consulted Andrews, for one. Or in Lightoller and Wilde's case, they could have just taken a look at Murdoch's aft boats, which were launched successfully "despite" being loaded to capacity.

Titanic's officers found themselves between a rock and a hard place when they realized that they were;
a) On a sinking ship with
b) A surplus of bodies,
c) A shortage of boats to put them in and
d) No help in sight that could be obtained until *after* the ship sank in freezing cold water.

They also had quite a few advantages the officers involved in most of that era's maritime disasters could only dream of:

a) a ship sinking slowly,
b) on an even keel,
c) on a glass calm sea,
c) with passengers and crew that remained calm and orderly until the end,
d) the knowledge ships would be on the scene within a few hours to pick up the lifeboats,
e) and Andrews and his guarantee group at hand to provide advice.

They had the best possible conditions to make use every single seat in those lifeboats... and to get them all launched before the final plunge, even the collapsibles... and they botched the job spectacularly.

Could any of us have done any better in their position and having only the knowladge and understanding they had at the time?

Maybe, but I'd bet long odds against it.

I'd bet the opposite. It would have required considerable effort to do worse than what Smith, Wilde and Lightoller did.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

I'd bet the opposite. It would have required considerable effort to do worse than what Smith, Wilde and Lightoller did.

That is an excruciatingly arrogant statement.

Everything of what you said, whether true or not, has the dead fish stink of hindsight. They had to work it out as they went along from the bottom of the learning curve, and the mistakes which happened were pretty much inevitable. Anybody can be wise after the event. You have the benefit of 111 years of all the evidence being gathered and being able to slice and dice it from the comfort of an armchair.

They didn't.

Start being mindful of that.

 

[Ezekiel]

Oh, I am mindful of that, Mr. Standart. Unfortunately for Lightoller et al - and fortunately for at least a hundred male passengers and crewmen -, as it happens, Murdoch was able to do much better than the disaster trio on the port side without needing 111 years to gather evidence and analyze decisions. No armchairs, no hindsight for him (not that I've ever found those to be solid defence arguments - they are usually brought up when no other option is available). He wasn't flawless - no one is - but he made right choices, and his colleagues made wrong choices, terribly wrong choices, that can and deserve to be harshly criticized, as they caused the preventable loss of hundreds of lives, for which Lightoller, the only one who survived, was never held accountable (nor were Smith and Wilde, posthumously promoted to heroes, when they were the polar opposite). Murdoch is all proof one needs. He too was at the bottom of the learning curve, he too had to work it out as he went along, yet he made different decisions, which resulted in at least a hundred more lives saved than on the other side of the ship. It was possible to do better, those "mistakes" weren't inevitable at all. And if I sound arrogant in saying this, so be it.

Good night.

 

[Ezekiel]

I don't think it was too rigidly enforced at all. It was absolutely necessary to load only women and children.

Complete and utter nonsense, as showed by Murdoch.

I have always believed it was just good manners and politeness. Economics also plays a big part though. Economies depended on a growing population and a woman's role was vital for the survival of the economy. Even children went to work. The world was rampant with disease and poor living conditions and I understand families had upwards of 10 children just to make ends meet and also because so many kids did not reach adulthood. There are 7 billion people in the world today but back then there were only around 1 billion people in the world. Each nation was still progressing and creating new settlements and claiming new territories. Men were sadly expendable, women were not. Millions of men were tragically killed in the world war and in many wars before and after, yet their nations still continued and their populations grew which supported their economies. If millions of women were killed instead of men then those nations would have come to a halt and possibly the enemy nations would have advanced and gained the upper hand. Providing safety and security for women was an essential part in securing a nations future.

That is also nonsense. Polygamy didn't suddenly become legal because of the world wars. The men who survived married and had children, the 'excess' women simply did not have children.

That besides the fact that the fate of a few hundred women on a ship is completely irrelevant to overall demographics.

Greetings,
New guy here so please forgive any breaches of protocol I may commit...

In reading about the RMS Atlantic disaster on 1 April 1873, the ship capsized and foundered in such adverse conditions that all the women and children drowned, save one. This was the first loss of a ship that White Star suffered.

Is it possible that J. Bruce Ismay ordered Capt. Smith to put the women and children first into the lifeboats because of this disaster of the Atlantic? Perhaps the Titanic's list caused him to think it could happen here, too. Even though he was only eleven when the Atlantic sank, Ismay would've certainly known all the details when he came to be employed by his father, and when he took over White Star in 1899.

I'm really enjoying this forum. One of the best. Thanks for any input.
Lyle

Ismay had no influence on Smith's decision. And the Atlantic was a situation where all lifeboats were swamped or capsized on launch and those who survived did so by swimming ashore in a rough sea or climbing ropes, no order of precedence would have changed the final outcome. If Smith was worried the Titanic might capsize (and there is really no reason he should have), which would have prevented the launching of lifeboats, he should have filled and launched them as soon as possible, instead of wasting time like he did.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

While I personally would not put it as crudely as certain other posts, I have always had issues with blindly following "women before men" policy - children being different, of course. The average man's life is not any more expendable than an average woman's and although it is difficult, where possible individual circumstances will have to be taken into account. In circumstances like the sinking Titanic, for example, the life of a 35 year old father of two, whether his wife and kids were with him or not, would have to be considered as more important than a 35 year old single woman. I do realize that it is all theory and it would be very difficult to even check, let alone enforce, in practice, but I was speaking as a matter of principle. If people argue that women should be accorded equal rights at all levels, then it should really be so under ALL circumstances except where the greater physical strength of the "average man" over the "average women" is an issue.

I know that it will probably never be accepted anywhere but if I had my way in such matters, I would give preference to unaccompanied children, older people, those physically challenged and indisposed people before proceeding to families or similar groups with children and keep able bodied men and women without immediate encumbrances to the last.

 

[Ezekiel]

Oh I mostly agree. Only caveat being 'older people' - it depends on the situation. If you have a "those left behind are still likely to be saved, but it will take more time/difficulty/it will be more risky" situation, then older people should be given precedence; if you have a "those left behind will die" situation like on Titanic, I'd say the older people should be left at the end of the line. Might sound callous, but people in their 20s have their entire life ahead of them, people in their 60s or older have lived most of it.

 

[Bob Read]

Gentlemen: You are trying to impose 21st century morals on an early 20th century Christian society. They were people of their time. If these posts are archived, I venture to say that people reading your posts in 100 years may think your notions of morality are just as outdated as you think those in 1912 were.

 

[Ezekiel]

Not quite, Mr. Read. I was talking in a broader sense in reply to people trying to come up with a 'rational', and thus still 'valid', justification for the 'women first' principle, other than "old post-Victorian morals", and I think the same is true for Arun. I wasn't contending its enforcement in 1912, per se.

That being said, I mantain that the "women and (small, if male) children only, to the point of launching half-empty lifeboats" policy enforced by certain Titanic officers, was incredibly stupid even by the standards of the time.

 

[Jason D. Tiller]

Robert is correct. You cannot apply today's modern standards to a disaster that occurred 111 years ago, which was a far different time; society was not developed yet.

 

[Steven Christian]

Robert is correct. You cannot apply today's modern standards to a disaster that occurred 111 years ago, which was a far different time; society was not developed yet.

Yes . Applying modern standards to historical times will give you a flawed and incorrect understanding of the actual history. Wether or not society was developed or not in 1912 would depend on ones views. My view is today's present society is entering a de-evolution stage. The down slope of the sine wave is kicking in. Just my opinion of course. Cheers.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

I venture to say that people reading your posts in 100 years may think your notions of morality are just as outdated as you think those in 1912 were.

He shoots!
He scoooooooooooooores!

 

[Jason D. Tiller]

Wether or not society was developed or not in 1912 would depend on ones views

Perhaps. But I'm looking at it from the angle that it was the technological age; things were just starting to come into existence, women hadn't been given the right to vote yet, certain safety regulations weren't in place (SOLAS for example) and the only way to get from one side of the old world to the new, was by ship. Not to mention, man believed he had conquered Mother Nature.

 

[Steven Christian]

Perhaps. But I'm looking at it from the angle that it was the technological age; things were just starting to come into existence, women hadn't been given the right to vote yet, certain safety regulations weren't in place (SOLAS for example) and the only way to get from one side of the old world to the new, was by ship. Not to mention, man believed he had conquered Mother Nature.

Yes. What you say is true with one exception I would take issue with. Some men believed that they had conquered mother nature. But not all. Even in those days some had the foresight to know what was coming if things weren't put into check. But yes a lot of the so called masters of the universe thought they were in charge. But like all through out history and the present day mother nature will always humble us. She's always gonna have the final say. Cheers.