Page 22 - National Geographic - How We Found Titanic

BY ERUCE OALE. ARIIFACIs COURTESY MERSEYSIDE MARITIME MUSEUM, LIVERPOOL; SOUTHAMPTON CITY MU5EUM; ULsIER FOLK AND IRANSPORT MUSEUM; ANO PEIER BOYD-5MlIH (BELOW) "because she had this premoni- tion, solely based on the fact that she said to declare a vessel unsinkable was flying in the face of God. " Of Titanic's final moments she says simply: "I saw that ship sink. I saw all the horror of its sinking. And I heard, even more dreadful, the cries of drowning people. " Like most other survivors, Eva Hart believes Titanic should be left intact as a memorial to those who went down with her. Another memento, a first- class deck chair (bel,ow lef) was salvaged from the floating wreckage by the Reverend Henry Ward Cunningham, who went out with a ship to recover bodies. He later donated the chair to the Maritime Museum PILOGUE to a tragedy sword, a silver spoon, a recov- of the Atlantic at Halifax, endures in the remaining ered victim's watch and keys, Nova Scotia. Here it stands survivors of. Titanic and and a lifeboat nameplate. Be- on the deckof. Acadia, berthed a few emblems of the golden cause she carried mail for the at the museum. age she represented. Two crown, Titanic also bore the In a memorable scene (right), survivors, Bertram Dean and honorary initials R.M.S., for one of Titanic's lifeboats comes Eva Hart (above) examine ship Royal Mail Steamer. alongside the rescue ship Carpa- mementos at Merseyside Mari- Miss Hart, who was seven thia several hours after the sink- time Museum in Liverpool, at the time of the sinking, lost ing. The relief of rescue was England. The items include her father but rode a lifeboat tempered by a grim statistic: a 20-foot-long builder's model to safety with her mother. She While all children in first and with a cork lifejacket by the recalls that her mother refused second class were saved, two- bow, Captain Smith's dress to go to bed aboard Titanic, thirds of the children in third class perished. Nor were the ship's owners disposed to gener- osity toward survivors. Against claims amounting to more than 16 million dollars, the White Star Line reportedly paid a total of $663,000. With luck we will return one day to explore further into the mysteries of Ti.tanic. Butit must be a gentle exploration, in a realm I tried to describe on our return last September to Woods Hole: "It is a quiet and peaceful place-a fitting place for the remains of this greatest ofsea tragedies to rest. Forever may it remain that way." n NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC PHOTOGRAPHER JOSEPH H. BAILEY. BY COURTESY OF MARITIME MUSEUM OF THE ATLANTIC, 7t8