The Titanic and the Californian

Description

Publisher’s Description

The TITANIC disaster and the truth about Captain Lord of the CALIFORNIAN who was blamed by two formal investigations for not going to the rescue

On April 14th, 1912, the “unsinkable” luxury liner Titanic, travelling at night in a haze at full speed through the ice fields of the North Atlantic, struck an iceberg and went down with a loss of more than fifteen hundred lives. Immediately a United States Senatorial investigation was held, followed by a British formal investigation, in attempts to determine what might have been done to prevent the disaster and who, if anyone, was to blame for it.

This book sets straight the most pernicious of many myths to grow out of the disaster-that on that night to remember and at the exact time the Titanic went down, the officer of the watch aboard the liner Californian saw distress rockets coming from a ship to the southward. That he called the master once twice, three times, but Captain Stanley Lord took no notice and slept on in his bunk while his ship lay stopped in the ice in plain sight of the sinking liner and ignored all her calls for help. But for this dereliction of duty, much, if not all, of the loss of life could have been prevented.

Peter Padfield, a noted author of books about sailing and the sea, attacks this myth and disproves the popular theory, upheld by two formal investigations, that the Californian was within sight of the Titanic when she sank. He suggests that the British Board of Trade, to cover up its own inadequacies in the enforcement of maritime safety regulations, deliberately made a scapegoat of Captain Lord and that the President of the British Court, Lord Mersey, had prejudged the case from the beginning.

The first part of the book is a reconstruction of the loss of the Titanic, seen mainly through the eyes of her officers and crew. Parts two and three, dealing with the United States and British inquiries, illuminate vividly the world’s hysterical reactions to one of the most shocking accidents in history.

Contents

Foreword by Mr Stanley Tutton Lord
Introduction

• Part 1: THE VOYAGE OF THE TITANIC
• Part 2: THE UNITED STATES SENATORIAL INVESTIGATION
• Part 3: THE BRITISH FORMAL INVESTIGATION

Postscript
Appendices

• Affidavit of Captain Stanley Lord
• Original statement of Mr H. Stone, Second Officer
• Original statement of James Gibson, apprentice
• Letter to the Editor M.M.S.A. Reporter by Captain Lord
• Evidence to show that the first rocket and first boat lowered were practically contemporaneous
• Captain Knapp’s explanation of his Chart number 2
• Summary of Californian’s Log positions
• Some points from Mersey’s judgement on the loss of the Titanic
• Glossary of nautical terms
• Titanic files released by the Ministry of Transport, July 1964

Praise for The Titanic and the Californian:

‘Fresh and valuable… Mr Padfield knows what he is writing about… with a knowledge and devotion displayed by no previous writer’ — Times Literary Supplement

‘It is a pity that Captain Lord did not live to read this splendid vindication… Padfield’s magnificent analysis’ — New Zealand Herald

‘A dramatic and excellently told story’ — The Book Society

Peter Padfield is a historian, journalist and author who has written extensively on naval and other military history. He lives in Suffolk.