Page 193 - British Inquiry into Loss of RMS Titanic Day 1 - 5

3774. (Mr. Raymond Asquith.) Yes, my Lord. (To the Witness.) Can you see this plan? 3775. (The Commissioner.) You can see the plan, cannot you? - Yes, my Lord. 3776. (Mr. Raymond Asquith.) That is the engine room? - Yes. 3777. You went through a watertight compartment there into that place which is called boiler room No. 1 - is that right? - Yes. 3778. And there were no fires lit there? - No. 3779. Then you went through another watertight door into another boiler room? - Yes. 3780. Were the fires lit there? - Yes. 3781. Did you go on from that into the third boiler room? - Yes. 3782. Were fires lit there? - Yes. 3783. Through another watertight door? - Yes. 3784. Did you go on from that to the fourth boiler room? - Yes. 3785. Through another watertight door? - Yes. 3786. And then through another watertight door into boiler room No. 5? - No. 3787. You did not? - No. 3788. You stopped short at that point? - Yes. 3789. (The Commissioner.) Then you opened three watertight doors in the watertight bulkheads. The Attorney-General: Four, that is the evidence; from the engine room first. 3790. (The Commissioner.) Oh, from the engine room first. Then you opened four, did you? - Yes, my Lord. 3791. And when you came to the afterside of the fifth section, you stopped? - Yes, my Lord. 3792. (Mr. Raymond Asquith.) Did you leave the doors open or not as you went through? - Left them open. 3793. (The Commissioner.) They were not closed again? - No, my Lord. 3794. (Mr. Raymond Asquith.) Having gone into No. 4 boiler room, did you go back through the open watertight doors, or what did you do then? - I did nothing then; I just knocked about. 3795. You afterwards went on deck? - Yes. 3796. How did you go up? Did you go back through the way you had come? - Yes, through the engine room. 3797. And when you went back those watertight doors were still open, were they? - Yes. 3798. (The Commissioner.) Were you ordered to open those doors? - Yes. 3799. By whom? - By the chief engineer. 3800. And what did you open them for? - To allow the engineers to get forward to their duties, the valves and the pumps. 3801. Then am I to understand that the order had come from the bridge to close all the watertight doors, and that they were closed, and that afterwards the chief engineer ordered you to open the doors? - Yes, my Lord. The Attorney-General: What he said was that they were closed automatically from the bridge. The Commissioner: Yes, he said they were ordered to be closed from the bridge; they were in fact closed from the bridge. The Attorney-General: Yes, my Lord. The Commissioner: And although they were closed from the bridge you, under the orders of the chief engineer, opened them? - Yes, my Lord. 3803. Sufficiently to allow you to get under the door? - Yes, my Lord. Mr. Laing: They have to be released from the bridge; they have to telephone to the bridge and get the catch or clutch on the bridge released so as to allow them to be opened. 3804. (The Commissioner.) That is so, is it? You could only open them with the concurrence of the people on the bridge? - We opened them by hand.