HELENA — Friday and Saturday, April 14 and 15, mark the 105th anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic on its maiden voyage from Britain to New York City.
Twenty of the passengers had strong Montana ties, said Montana Historical Society Reference Historian Zoe Ann Stoltz.
At that time the Titanic was hailed as one the most luxurious ocean liners ever built. It left Southampton, England, on April 10, 1912, carrying approximately 2,200 passengers and crew. It's estimated that only 713 survived.
Researching the Titanic's tragedy has become a passion for Stoltz as she tries to learn their stories.
They were millionaires, miners and homesteaders, she said, in other words, "a microcosm of Montana."
"Survival depended on what class they traveled," she said. Sixty-two percent of first-class passengers, 41 percent of second class and only 25 percent of third class survived.
Some of the stories are of amazing bravery and grace when facing death.
"There's something so gripping about the tragedy," said Stoltz. "I have just been enthralled with these stories."
The Titanic was operating at full speed as it headed across the North Atlantic, despite ice warnings from other ships in the area, according to historic accounts. Apparently, crews of large ships often assumed their vessels were impervious to ice damage.
At 11:40 p.m. April 14, a lookout spotted an iceberg straight ahead and immediately notified the bridge, which tried to steer around the object, but it was too late.
When the ship struck the iceberg, it began taking in water through its punctured hull, and the bow began to sink. The ship was about 400 miles south of Newfoundland, Canada.
It sank at 2:20 a.m. April 15.
News of the disaster spread quickly over the wireless from the Carpathia, the ship that sped to the Titanic's aid when the captain heard of its distress calls.
Reports about the fate of first-class passengers came quickly, said Stoltz. But it would be weeks before there was news about what happened to those in second class and third class or steerage.
"Walter Clark, son of the nephew of Copper King William A. Clark, goes down with the Titanic," said Stoltz. Walter Miller Clark and his wife Virginia Estelle Clark were both formerly of Butte, so there was avid interest here in their stories.
Virginia recounted in the April 26, 1912, Anaconda Standard that she had retired to her stateroom Sunday night, when the ship hit the iceberg.
"I knew something had occurred out of the ordinary," she said, even though there was no major impact or shock. She got dressed and went to the promenade deck and found her husband in the smoking room playing cards with friends.
Officers assured them that all was well, that they had struck some ice, but that water-tight compartments below deck had been sealed and "that there was no danger of any kind."
She went on deck for 15 to 20 minutes. On the way to her stateroom, she met a man carrying a life preserver. That's when she was told that all passengers were to go to the top deck with life preservers.
Disaster strikes
Virginia and her husband prepared for they knew not what.
Clark donned heavy underwear, an ordinary suit, and a heavy overcoat "and I my furs," said Virginia. They also grabbed life preservers and took any of their valuables they could quickly grab. "My husband also saw that I was provided with money in case we should become separated."
On the main deck, they saw Isidor and Ida Straus and John Jacob and Madeleine Astor. Clark, Astor and Straus were all prominent businessmen.
An officer approached them to say women and children would be put aboard the lifeboats, recalled Virginia. "Even then, there was no rush for the lifeboats."
She and her husband stayed on deck to help load women and children into the boats, which included women and children from second class and steerage, she said.
An officer returned and told them it was "imperative that all the women leave the ship, that the men could not leave until the women had been provided for," she recalled.
Virginia wound up in a lifeboat with Madeleine Astor.
"At the time of our leaving ... the men of our party seemed unconcerned," said Virginia. "Mrs. Straus absolutely refused to leave her husband." Others report hearing her say to her husband, "Where you go, I go."
Virginia said she was convinced that her husband "felt no apprehension and fully expected to join me later."
As they rowed away, Madeleine Astor saw the ship was sinking very fast and insisted they turn the lifeboat around.
"We rowed about the scene of the disaster all night and picked up eight men out of the water," two of whom would die from exposure and one who lost his mind, Virginia said.
"When the Titanic went down and the lights from it had disappeared, we could hear all about us the most heartrending moans and cries," she said.
Virginia complimented the discipline maintained after the accident. "The world cannot help but be bettered by the example of these brave men who gave their lives that others might live."
Fascinating tale
One of the passengers who has particularly intrigued Stoltz was Imanita Shelley (Mrs. William Shelley), the wife of a Deer Lodge bookkeeper who was traveling in second class with her mother, Lucy Parrish. Her story is told in the May 6, 1912, Anaconda Standard.
Shelley, who was very sick on the voyage, wrote a meticulous account of their Titanic travails. Some of these began even before the iceberg — no heat in their room, a shortage of serving trays for the staff to serve meals, initially being put in the wrong room, and half-finished bathrooms.
"In the early evening of the accident, it had been getting colder and colder, so that all knew we must be getting close to the ice belt," she wrote.
Some of the survivors would later report they had asked the captain about slowing down in the ice field, and he had responded that he planned to "put on more speed and get through."
The collision woke Shelley and Parrish. After ringing repeatedly for a steward, they and other passengers were told there had been a "slight collision" and they should go back to bed.
Within 45 minutes, they were being rousted, ordered to the top deck and told to don life jackets.
As Shelley headed to the deck, the Strauses came looking to help her.
She described Ida Straus as an "angel." "So serene and quiet amid all that turmoil, not trying to get away and doing all to help the rest of us escape in comfort."
Many other women chose to stay on board as well, wrote Shelley.
"There they were going down to death, and yet there was no signs of any disorder and panic," she wrote.
Escape proved problematic. Lifeboat ropes were tangled and finally just cut. As they were departing, an Italian man from steerage jumped from the ship landing in the boat on her mother's foot.
A sailor pulled a revolver and threatened "to blow the man's brains out," but Shelley grabbed his hand and begged him not to shoot the man.
The final scene
On the Titanic, men wrapped their coats and life preservers around little boys and threw them out to sea "as a last chance."
Shelley recalled that the eight-man band on the Titanic "played steadily until the very end." "'Nearer My God to Thee' was the sweet strain that took them all down into the deep."
"Slowly she sank, deck by deck, the bright lights burning to the end," she recalled. "...Never can I forget that scene, those crowds lining the decks and the strained faces at the portholes in the lower decks as the good ship slowly sank."
The boats were ill-equipped and had none of the regulation items, such as water and crackers aboard.
They heard cries and screams in the dark. Shelley remembered some suggested singing to "drown out that awful cry, and we were unable to utter a sound."
As they paddled through the cold night, they came upon an overturned lifeboat with 32 men clinging to it. Shelley's boat somehow squeezed in 30 of them, and two of the men succumbed before they could be rescued.
Shelley's description of their rescue by the Carpathia is full of rich details. Apparently its captain, Arthur Rostron, had heard of the Titanic's distress calls and sped toward its location.
Shelley notes the crew's kindness. Once survivors were rescued, there were no bunks left for the crew to sleep.
These are just a couple of the stories Stoltz has discovered. And in these cases, there are happy endings.
But that was not the case for such passengers as four Butte Bulgarians who went down with the Titanic: Menko Angeloff, Hristo Danchoff, Stanio Georfieff, and Ivan Staneff, who all had steerage tickets.
Staneff had left Butte seven months earlier, planning to return to Butte and bring his friends.
He "was considered a leader among his countrymen," wrote the Anaconda Standard.
Four Croatian men in steerage were also headed to Montana. They were three married brothers or cousins — Bartol, Ivan, and Liudevit Clor, ages 35, 27, and 19 respectively, who were bound for Great Falls. Jovan Dimic, 42, was traveling to Red Lodge.
"We were such a new state," said Stoltz, "we were a destination. People came here from all over the world. Most of us came from third-class steerage."