Thirteen Amazing Facts About the Titanic

Many myths and rumours surround the night the Titanic went down after colliding with an iceberg off the coast of Newfoundland on April 14th, 1912.

Some of those tales have been discredited, others hold a grain of truth, but none are as incredible as the following proven facts about the Titanic.

*  In 1898, Morgan Robertson wrote a novel called 'Futility'.  Like the Titanic, the fictional ship was the biggest of its day and sank after hitting an iceberg in the Atlantic Ocean.  The imaginary disaster happened in April, the same month the Titanic went down.  Like the Titanic, the ship in Robertson’s novel was believed to be unsinkable, and for both ships the massive death count was blamed on a shortage of lifeboats.  Even more astonishing is the fact that Robertson called his ship the Titan.

*   In 1886, London’s Pall Mall Gazette published a story about the sinking of a large ship in which many people died due to a shortage of lifeboats.  The writer, William T. Stead, prophesied that a similar event could happen if shipping lines continued their widespread practice of sending ships to sea with too few lifeboats.  The article was entitled ‘How the Mail Steamer Went Down in the Mid Atlantic, By a Survivor’.

The author, a spiritualist, lived to see his prediction come true but failed to record the event.  Stead died on board the Titanic while travelling to a business meeting in New York.

* The Titanic was designed to carry more than twice the number of lifeboats present on the ship’s fateful maiden voyage.  It was subsequently discovered that all but twenty lifeboats had been removed from the ship to give passengers an unrestricted view of the sea around them.

*  Although the Titanic had four funnels, only three were functional, the fourth funnel was to make the ship look more imposing and longer than the three funnel ships of the day.

*   The massive pull of the Titanic as she set sail from Southampton caused the mooring ropes to snap on the S. S. New York berthed close by.  Tugboats were dispatched to the scene to prevent the two ships colliding.  Many people consider the near collision a premonition of the much greater tragedy about to unfold.

*  At least six ice warnings were sent to the Titanic’s wireless room on the day of the disaster.  All went unheeded because the Titanic’s wireless operator was busy processing messages on behalf of first class passengers.

*  In the mad panic following Captain Smith’s order to abandon ship, lifeboats were put to sea with many of their seats empty.  One of the first lifeboats to leave the Titanic carried less than half its potential passenger count.

*  There were many dogs on the Titanic, but no cats.  Most ships carried cats to control vermin and bring good luck.  The absence of cats was cited as a bad omen by newspaper journalists in the months following the tragedy.

*  It has always been considered lucky to break a bottle of champagne on the bow of a ship during the launching ceremony.  The Titanic did not receive this traditional blessing.

*  When the decision was made to evacuate the Titanic, the captain ordered women and children to board the lifeboats first.  The story goes that several men took seats in the lifeboats while women and children were standing close by.  Irishman, Daniel Buckley, is thought to have been disguised as a woman to claim his seat.

*   More than three hundred passengers and crew put on lifejackets and jumped overboard to avoid being sucked down into the ocean with the Titanic.  Charles Joughin was the only person to survive the icy waters.  A chef on the Titanic, Joughin had been drinking heavily as the disaster unfolded.  It is believed the alcohol in his bloodstream may have helped maintain his body temperature until rescue ships arrived.

*  Only one child travelling first class died on the Titanic compared to almost fifty children from steerage.

*  The band played ‘Songe d’Automne’ as the ship went down, not ‘Nearer My God To Thee’ as was widely reported at the time.  The band played until the last few minutes before the ship upturned and began its descent to the ocean floor.  None of the band members survived.

Those are just thirteen strange but true stories surrounding the Titanic disaster, equal to the number of newly married couples celebrating their honeymoons on board.