For Oscar,
my sunshine-faced little boy—
and my last baby
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1: What Was Titanic?
Chapter 2: The Grandest Ship
Chapter 3: Building a Monstrous Vessel
Chapter 4: A Pleasant Life On Board
Chapter 5: All in the Ship Together
Chapter 6: Iceberg!
Chapter 7: Horror at Sea
Chapter 8: Desperate to Survive
Chapter 9: After the Disaster
Epilogue
Glossary
Source Notes
Map
Timeline
About the Author
Sneak Peek: Read Chapter 1 of Real Stories From My Time: The Underground Railroad
Copyright
America’s past is filled with all kinds of stories. Stories of courage, adventure, tragedy, and hope. The Real Stories From My Time series pairs American Girl’s beloved historical characters with true stories of pivotal events in American history. As you travel back in time to discover America’s amazing past, these characters go with you to share their own incredible tales.
Titanic was a British cruise ship that set sail on April 10, 1912, from Southampton, England, to New York City. At that time, Titanic was the largest—and widely believed to be the safest—ship in the world.
Thousands of passengers boarded the luxury ship to begin a journey. Some were returning home to America after traveling in Europe. Others were starting a new life in a country that held the promise of opportunity. Fifteen-year-old Edith Brown was one of those passengers, and she was excited to travel with her parents on Titanic. The Browns were a well-to-do family from South Africa. Edith’s father wanted to open a hotel in America. As Edith walked up the gangway with her mother and father, she could see the rows and rows of glittering portholes above her. The enormous ocean liner was brand new and beautiful. Until they reached New York, it would be their home.
As the rest of the passengers boarded the ship, each one carried his or her own story. They knew they were making history by sailing on Titanic’s very first voyage across the sea. It was the biggest, grandest, most modern ship ever built. Passengers were told that Titanic was unsinkable, and they believed it. But the ship’s owners were eager to prove that Titanic was faster and better than any other vessel. That ambition put every person on board in terrible danger.
In 1904, Samantha Parkington was a nine-year-old orphan growing up in New York. Her parents had died in a tragic boating accident when she was five, so she was being raised to be a proper young lady by her wealthy and old-fashioned grandmother, Grandmary. When she was ten, Samantha moved in with her uncle Gard and aunt Cornelia. She loved her aunt and uncle, but she always longed for a larger family with sisters and brothers.
As Samantha’s family was changing, America—and the world—was changing, too. People were inventing new and improved machines to do things faster and better. Samantha rode through the city streets in Uncle Gard’s brand-new automobile. She sailed across the Atlantic Ocean with Grandmary on the luxury ship Queen Caroline. She lived in a home with modern devices, such as a telephone and electric lights.
But not everyone lived a life of luxury. Samantha learned this from her best friend, Nellie O’Malley. Nellie and her two younger sisters, Bridget and Jenny, had come from Ireland with their parents for a better life in America. After their parents died of influenza, Nellie and her sisters lived in an orphanage. Samantha was overjoyed when Uncle Gard and Aunt Cornelia decided to adopt Nellie, Bridget, and Jenny. Now the girls could all live together as sisters to Samantha! When Gard and Cornelia’s son, William, was born, Samantha finally had the large family she’d always wanted.
In 1912, when Samantha was a teenager, the world watched as the world’s largest ship, Titanic, set out to make a trip across the Atlantic Ocean. In the middle of the ocean crossing, tragedy struck. For Samantha, the tragedy was personal, because she had family members on board! For days, Samantha waited for news of their fate, praying that another accident wouldn’t tear apart her family.
Although Samantha is a fictional character, her story will help you imagine what it was like to live through the Titanic disaster.
This morning when I come down to breakfast, I see the front page of the New York News. Suddenly, I can’t breathe. The headline screams “TITANIC SINKS!” My heart freezes. My best friend Nellie, Aunt Cornelia, and little William are on Titanic! They’re sailing home from Ireland. I try to read the words in the newspaper, but they are a blur. All I can think about is Nellie, William, and Cornelia—are they safe? I know I won’t stop worrying until I hear from them.
There’s a knock on the door. It’s Bridget and Jenny. They’re here with me at the New York Academy for Young Ladies, and they’ve just learned about Titanic. We fall into one another’s arms and cling together.
We decide to go home to be with Uncle Gard. He needs us—and we need him. Bridget and Jenny hurry back to their rooms to pack a bag. I put a clean dress and a petticoat into my suitcase. Every time the doorbell rings downstairs, I jump and listen, hoping I’ll hear the maid’s footsteps on the stairs and her soft knock telling me there’s a telegram from Cornelia. But there’s no word yet.
Nellie was so excited for this journey. She hadn’t seen Ireland since she left there so many years ago with her parents and sisters. She couldn’t wait to go back and show Cornelia and William the country where she was born. They’d been having a lovely time. Her letters were full of descriptions of the beautiful green hills and giant cliffs with the ocean crashing below. Now they’re somewhere in the middle of the ocean. I swallow the lump in my throat when I think about how scared they must have been when the ship went down.
I keep hearing Grandmary’s voice in my head. She hadn’t approved of the fuss over the great ship Titanic. I remember her telling Cornelia, “Faster doesn’t always mean better, my dear.” I can see her clearly, sitting very straight before the fire with her teacup in her hand, shaking her head. Cornelia sat there, listening respectfully, but giving Nellie and me the tiniest of smiles on the side. We all thought sailing on Titanic sounded like a wonderful adventure.
In 1909, the year that construction began on Titanic, America was in love with machines. Technology was speeding forward. Mills were churning out yard after yard of cloth. Steel plants were producing sheets of shining hot metal. Metal was used for constructing many things, including railroads, cars, and buildings. Factories were canning fruit so that people could eat peaches in the wintertime. Six years earlier, the Wright brothers had tested their new flying machine in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. More and more automobiles were replacing horses and carriages on the streets of New York and other cities. It seemed that there was nothing machines could not do.
J. Bruce Ismay, the head of the White Star Line ship company in Great Britain, wanted to make headlines. So he decided to build three magnificent ocean liners. They would be called Olympic, Titanic, and Britannic, and they would be faster, bigger, and more luxurious than any ships the world had ever seen.
J. Bruce Ismay
The ships were constructed in Belfast, Ireland. The city was known for its shipbuilding, but no one had seen a vessel as enormous as Titanic. She rose piece by piece in the dry docks alongside her sister ship, Olympic, which was just as big and was being constructed at the same time. The two massive ships, weighing 45,000 tons each, were the largest moving objects ever made up to that point. They towered over Belfast, and every day, people stopped to admire them and wonder at them.
Olympic and Titanic in the shipyard
In the early twentieth century—and for centuries before—if you wanted to travel long-distance between
the continents, you had to do it by boat. And for hundreds of years, ocean travel was long, dirty, and miserable. The journey from Europe to North America took a month or more. Passengers, whether rich or poor, spent weeks in cold, cramped conditions, and many got sick.
In the 1860s, shipbuilders began designing better boats for long-distance travel. Shipping companies started competing with one another for passengers. One way to do this was to make their ships safer and more comfortable to sail on. Cabins had windows. There was clean water and cleaner bathroom facilities.
Passengers bought tickets based on the level of service they could pay for. First-class tickets were the most expensive and provided the nicest rooms and food. First-class passengers had access to lounges, libraries, and dining rooms. Second-class tickets offered smaller rooms and fewer comforts. Third-class passengers were usually immigrants or laborers. They sailed in cramped quarters on the lowest level of the ship, which was often called steerage because it was near the ship’s steering machinery.
Above: A first-class passenger ticket for Titanic Right: A White Star third-class ticket
Robert Douglas Spedden was only six years old when he sailed on Titanic in first class. His wealthy family had been traveling in Africa, and now Robert, his parents, and his nurse were headed back to their home in New York. His family’s luxury suite in first class had all the comforts the little boy was accustomed to. Robert carried his teddy bear with him onto Titanic. He was very excited about the trip, which was the final leg of his family’s long journey home.
Although nine-year-old Maria Touma wasn’t in first class, she was just as excited to board Titanic, clutching a third-class ticket, along with her mother, Hanna, and her younger brother. Her father was working in Michigan, and they were traveling to America to join him there. The Touma family were emigrants from Lebanon. They had already been traveling for weeks by camel, freighter ship, and train. To Maria, even the small room in steerage that she would share with her family during their voyage on Titanic felt comfortable by comparison. And it was a relief to know that in just a week they would be in America.
Improvements to steam engines and propellers made the ships faster. By 1900, it took only about a week to cross from Europe to North America. Shipping companies in Great Britain were major players in the race to build better, faster, and bigger ships. And with Titanic and her two sister ships, J. Bruce Ismay was sure he would win this race.
Jenny, Bridget, and I are sitting in the library at Gard and Cornelia’s house. Uncle Gard is pacing back and forth. No one is talking. The tick of the mantel clock is the only sound in the room. We’re all praying for news. The newspaper said most of Titanic’s passengers are safe, but I have a terrible feeling in my chest.
I remember when Nellie, Grandmary, her husband Admiral Beemis, and I sailed across the Atlantic on Queen Caroline six years ago. She was quite an elegant ship—ships are often referred to as “she” or “her.” Although Queen Caroline was not as luxurious as Titanic, my cozy bed in our first-class cabin had thick curtains around it. When I pulled them closed each night, I stayed toasty warm, despite the cold ocean air.
I had my own little room in our cabin, and my own writing desk. I sat there each day writing in my journal—for fun, I called it my “log.” The admiral had told me that ship captains always keep a log, which is a detailed record of the daily happenings of the ship.
I loved to explore the ship. I’ll never forget finding my way down to third class. The ship looked different down there. The passengers were crowded and had few of the comforts of the upper decks. Nellie had told me all about traveling in steerage. She and her sisters and parents had traveled that way when they first came to America.
Now, I bow my head and tears drip from my cheeks as Nellie’s face swims up in my mind. Will I ever see her again?
It took approximately three years and fifteen thousand workers to construct Titanic and Olympic. The ships were so utterly massive, the shipbuilders had to make new equipment before they could even start to build. The largest gantry in the world was put up—228 feet high—to support Titanic and Olympic while they were being built.
As construction continued, the ships began to soar above the Belfast skyline. The three giant bronze-and-steel propellers were attached. The massive anchors—three per ship—were brought in on specially constructed wagons, each pulled by a team of twenty powerful Shire draft horses. Three million rivets held in place the one-inch-thick steel plates of the hull.
Titanic and Olympic would move rapidly through the water using steam power to run their state-of-the-art engines. Steam power had been used to power trains and ships for a long time. It was made by shoveling coal into huge boilers. Titanic had twenty-nine of them! The boilers would give off the steam, which would pass through the engines. The engines would turn the propellers, moving the ship forward. Titanic had three large engines of the newest, fastest kind—they had recently been used in other new ocean liners with great success.
Titanic had three propellers—two wing, or outer propellers; each with three blades, and one center propeller with four blades
Olympic was finished first. During one of her early voyages, Olympic was hit by another ship. Water got into two of the watertight compartments but Olympic still made it back to port. So people were reassured. They believed that Titanic could not be sunk.
During the building process, Titanic was tested in the water. This was standard for all ships. Titanic was slid slowly off the slip on which she was built and into the water. Her engines and boilers were loaded in later at the fitting-out dock. Titanic was simply a huge floating shell, and she floated beautifully. It was time to outfit Titanic on the inside.
The interior of Titanic was very fancy so as to impress wealthy passengers. There was a sweeping grand staircase, topped by a beautiful glass dome. A gym had all the latest exercise equipment, like stationary bicycles and rowing machines. There was a swimming pool, something that was not usually found on ships, and an indoor court to play the game of squash.
First-class passengers’ rooms were located in the middle of the ship, where the rocking of the boat wouldn’t be felt as much as in other places. Some first-class passengers had larger rooms—suites—that had private bathrooms. Some suites even had a private deck. All first-class rooms had telephones, heaters, and special lamps that wouldn’t tip over if the ship sailed through choppy waters.
A cabin on the first-class deck on Titanic
A barbershop and smoking rooms full of comfortable leather chairs, provided places for the gentlemen. Elegant lounges and light-filled sitting rooms were available for the ladies. A Reading and Writing Room had tables, soft chairs, and sofas. The library was lined floor to ceiling with leather-bound books for people to borrow and read on board. There were several places to eat on Titanic. The first-class dining room was the largest room on the ship. In the Verandah Café or the Café Parisien, ladies could have tea and light snacks in between meals.
The dining room of Titanic
The third-class accommodations on Titanic were nicer than most second-class rooms on older ships. In the past, people in steerage—third class—would sleep and eat in one large crowded room, in the lowest part of the ship. There was no place for them to go for fresh air or exercise. They had to use buckets instead of toilets. Titanic’s third class was made up of small cabins that included bunk beds, pillows, and blankets. There was running water and electricity. Cabins even had sinks so that passengers could wash up in their own rooms. Third class had its own smoking room, dining room, and lounge. Passengers could walk and stroll on the lower decks and get fresh air.
A re-creation of a third-class cabin on Titanic
Although the ship was believed by many to be unsinkable, it was built with all the modern safety measures. She had sixteen watertight compartments to prevent her from ever sinking. If—if—water should enter one or two of the compartments—even four—the ship could still stay afloat. The water would be sealed in and would
not penetrate the rest of the ship. White Star made sure there were enough life jackets for every passenger. And there were lifeboats, too—the ship was required to have them. Titanic had sixteen wooden lifeboats and four collapsible boats. These boats could hold 1,178 people. But the ship was designed to carry 3,547 passengers and crew. Mr. Ismay, the head of White Star, saw no need for more lifeboats on board. He wasn’t breaking any laws—the ship wasn’t required to carry any more than they already had. Mr. Ismay didn’t want additional lifeboats blocking the view of the ocean from the first-class deck. Mr. Ismay didn’t worry about the number of lifeboats. He believed that Titanic was unsinkable. The lifeboats would never be needed—or so he thought.
April 10, 1912. The day of Titanic’s maiden voyage—her first trip—had arrived. Fresh paint gleamed inside and outside the ship. The beds were made. The forks were polished. In the boiler room, men heaved shovelfuls of coal into the boilers. The great engines were slowly revving up.
An inspector examining the lifebelts (lifejackets) on Titanic
The crew stood ready wearing dark blue uniforms, the gold buttons sparkling in the spring sunshine. Soon after ten o’clock in the morning, passengers began to stream onto the ship. One of the passengers was seven-year-old Eva Hart, who was traveling with her mother, Esther, and her father, Benjamin. The family was on their way to live in Canada, where her father was going to open a drugstore. Eva was excited. Sailing on Titanic seemed an excellent way to start their adventures in a foreign land.
Titanic departing on her maiden voyage, April 10, 1912
Eva Hart (center) with her parents
But Eva’s mother was not excited—she was scared! Eva remembered many years later, “We went down to the cabin and that’s when my mother said to my father that she had made up her mind quite firmly that she would not go to bed in that ship … and she didn’t!” Eva’s mother had a feeling that something would go terribly wrong on the ship.
Titanic Page 1