The maiden voyage

Description

The Titanic epic, from the embarkation to the disaster and the dramatic courtroom aftermath

Behold the Titanic! Majestic in conception, awesome in size, luxurious in its accommodations. The pride of the British merchant service, freighted with the rich and sailing to disaster.

For half a century the event that took place in the North Atlantic on April 14, 1912, has captured the imagination of people the world over. Considering the scale of the wars, genocidal murders, assassinations, and holocausts that have wracked the globe in the years since, it is extraordinary what a grip the tragedy of the Titanic still exerts on us. For some, the sinking of the great ship, with the death of 1500 passengers and crew, is a symbol of the unforgiving sea: for others, it is a grandiosely eloquent symbol of a complacent Edwardian world sailing straight to its doom: for others still, it is a testament to man’s hubris, folly, and naked ineptitude.

Over the years many writers have described this greatest of marine disasters, and their well-told accounts have made readers of all ages familiar with the last hours of the Titanic. In The Maiden Voyage, Geoffrey Marcus reveals the complete story —before, during, and after—as it has never been told before. Drawing upon previously untapped sources, he relates the saga of the fateful voyage, from embarkation to the final inquiries on both sides of the ocean. Mr. Marcus presents fresh material on the management and navigation of the giant liners in the heyday of the great Atlantic ferry and on the remarkably effective functioning of the infant Marconi wireless. He examines anew the long-standing controversy about the various ice warnings received by the ship’s officers and the row over the inaction of the Californian, which lay dead in the water within sight of the dying liner’s rockets.

Dispassionately, he analyzes the reasons why the White Star Line lost in Britain’s High Court on a charge of negligence, though it had been cleared at the official inquiry.

Whether the reader is already a certified Titanic buff or comes anew to the subject, he will find here a wealth of material that has never been published before. And for every reader there is the eternal spell of the doomed rendezvous between the iceberg and the unsinkable ship. Here is a book to match the tragic epic itself.

Contents

PREFACE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

1. The Boat Train
2. Sailing Day
3. Vanity Fair Afloat
4. Last Sight of Land
5. On Her Course
6. Mid- Atlantic
7. Revelry by Night
8. The Collision
9. The Eight Rockets
10. ‘Every Man for Himself’
11. Adrift
12. The Middle Watch
13. ‘North 52 West’
14. The Rescue
15. Senator Smith
16. The British Inquiry (1)
17. The British Inquiry (2)
18. Negligent Navigation
19. The Row about the Californian
20. ‘The Sea Hath Spoken’

REFERENCES AND NOTES