It is, on the 15th of April’16, the 104th Anniversary of the sinking of R M S Titanic. This was marked in Farlam, Cumbria the birthplace of the Titanic Chief Engineer Joseph Bell with the laying of a wreath to his memory. The image here is of his Memorial Gravestone with the placing of the wreath by Ann Freer, on behalf of the Joseph Bell Memorial Appeal donors and supporters.
SS Californian was a Leyland Line steamship that is best known for its inaction, despite being the closest ship to the last location of the RMS Titanic, during the sinking of the latter ship on 15 April 1912.
With the approaching anniversary of the sinking of RMS Titanic, a new book is published titled ‘The Midnight Watch’ by David Dyer, published by Atlantic. “It is a work of fiction based on true events”.
On the 15th of April 1912, a young navy officer of the merchant marine is on watch at midnight aboard SS Californian. He sees the lights of a ship in the darkness of the night with others on the bridge observing it. Quite suddenly the mysterious ship ejects distress rockets into the night sky.
The young officer, Herbert Stone, rouses the captain, Stanley Lord. Captain Lord does nothing at all and does not communicate any orders whilst the Titanic is slowly sinking.
The subsequent British & American inquiries found that the Californian’s blunder in not responding to Titanic’s rockets contributed to the death of 1514 passengers and crew. Of the recorded facts, there still remains a mystery as to why didn’t Captain Lord respond?
The author, David Dyer spent many years as a lawyer at the London legal practise whose parent firm represented the Titanic’s owners in 1912. He has also worked as a cadet and ship’s officer on a wide range of merchant vessels, having graduated with distinction from the Australian Maritime College. He now teaches English literature in Sydney. For those who may like to know more about the Californian incident visit the following website: daviddyer.com.au
The novel radiates a little light on the mysterious behaviour of Lord and Stone which makes an intriguing account of the event on that fateful night of 104 years ago, on the 15th of April 1912. R.I.P. Joseph Bell
It was in 2012 that the Australian billionaire Clive Palmer, Chairman of the Blue Star Line, announced that he was to build a replica of RMS Titanic and that the ship would be called Titanic 2. She had been expected to set sail in 2016, although a series of delays put the project in jeopardy, and many assumed that the project had been cancelled. We were told a few months ago that the ship was to be completed, although no new launch date was shared at that time.
The latest Titanic 2 ship news is a positive one, Mr Palmer has announced the project is still ongoing, and the new Titanic 2 launch date will now be in 2018, which makes it two years behind schedule but is certainly great news for the continuation of the project.
There will now be renewed demand for Titanic 2 tickets, for which prices are yet to be confirmed. We do know that there will be first, second and third class fares like the original RMS Titanic, and some people have been offering up to £640,000 so they can be the first to experience life aboard the Titanic 2.
This is not the only Titanic related news, as a theme park in Sichuan Province, China, is set to open a life-sized Titanic themed hotel and casino in 2017.
During the course of the year the site had 1956 visitors who viewed 4364 items.
Visitors were from 75 countries of which the top ten viewing countries were from:
UK, USA,Canada, Germany, Italy, Australia, New Zealand,
Sweden, France & Switzerland.
Thank you to all visitors to the site for your continued interest during 2015.
This first class April Fools’ Day Menu, is supposed to have been offered to passengers in the 1st class saloon of RMS Oceanic, which year is unknown. I must say that ‘Camel’s Humps’ sounds an interesting course! Joseph Bell served in the Engineering department but it is unknown whether he was offered the Menu. The fares on the route to New York were: Saloon £16 16s Od [Return £28 7s Od], Steerage £6 6s 0d.
RMS Oceanic
Hors d’oeuvres
Spider’s Kidneys Flea’s Eyes
Humming Bird’s Tongues
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Puree of Blubber Cod Liver Oil Broth
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Shark’s Fins a la Maitre d’Hotel
Broiled Octopus
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Vol-au-Vent of Worms Curried Cockroaches
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Devilled Albatross Fricassee of Buzzard
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Camel’s Humps Hyaena a la Foret
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Angel’s Eyes Mermaid’s Mers
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Mammas’ Black Looks Pretty Girl’s Kisses Glad Eyes
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Caviare en Confiture
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Candied Anchovies Peppermints in Paraffin
Vaseline in Grape Fruit
Toad’s Necks in Syrup
The Spillers & Bakers Pilot cracker from a survival kit in one of the Titanic lifeboats, was sold at auction for £15,000 or $22,971 this week and must be one of the most expensive crackers ever bought. The biscuit was saved by James Fenwick, a passenger on the Carpathia that picked up Titanic survivors. The cracker had been kept in an envelope with the genuine script of “Pilot biscuit from Titanic lifeboat April 1912”. The cracker was bought by a collector from Greece.
At the same auction, a photograph claiming to show the iceberg that sank Titanic sold for £21,000 or $32,159. The photograph was taken by a steward on another ship which passed the iceberg, the day after Titanic sank in the Atlantic.
BBC Story: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-34626108
The menu for the Titanic last luncheon was sold at auction in New York yesterday, the 30th of September’15, for the breathtaking sum of $88,000 or £58,114. pounds sterling. The seller it is said, was the son of a man who was given the items by a descendent of one of the survivors.
Another item sold at auction was a printed ticket from the Titanic’s Turkish baths,which recorded an individuals weight when seated in a upholstered lounge chair, it was sold for $11,000 or £7264 pounds sterling.
It has been publicised that an original menu for lunch on R M S Titanic served on the 14th of April 1912, is to be sold at auction at New York based Lion Heart Autographs. The Auctioneers estimate that it may fetch between $50,000 and $70,000 [£32 – 40,000].
The seller is said to be the son of a man who was given the item by a direct descendant of one of the survivors of Lifeboat One, called the “money boat” because of rumours that first-class passengers bribed the crew to row away before it was full.
As you can see below, the lunch consisted of many choices including corned beef, dumplings, lamb chops, veal & ham pie, eight varieties of cheese and Munich lager to help it all go down.
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Joseph Bell was employed in the engineering department of S S Britannic, this was his second appointment with White Star Line. It is good that this ship’s original wheel has survived, as illustrated, fitted out for Brtannic’s maiden voyage to New York on the 25th of June 1874.
Britannic was a steamship that was still equipped with sails when, on her maiden voyage, she broke both the eastbound and westbound records with passages of less than 7.5 days at an average speed of 15.7 knots. She continued on the Liverpool – New York route until August 1899 when she was requisitioned by the Royal Navy to be a troopship taking soldiers to the Boer War in South Africa. She then became known as HMT [Her Majesty’s Transport] Britannic. Until the war ended in 1902, she had transported around 37000 troops to and from the conflict.
Steering or Ships Wheel
RMS Britanic Maiden Voyage 25.06.1874
Jonathan Shepherd was born in Whitehaven Cumberland in 1880 and was lost in the sinking of R M S Titanic, aged 32, on the 15th of April 1912.
Shepherd began his seagoing career with W S Kennaugh & Sons, Liverpool, who traded with South America. On his return to Liverpool he succeeded in obtaining a second-class certificate joining the Lowther Castle trading between New York, China and Japan during the period of the Russo-Japanese War.
On obtaining his first class Marine Engineer’s certificate he joined the White Star line serving on the Adriatic, Teutonic, Olympic and Titanic, having been appointed Junior Assistant 2nd Engineer. His monthly wage for this Titanic appointment being £12.10s. It was said by Mr Shepherd senior, that Joseph Bell selected Jonathan for the Titanic engineering department and he was very honoured to have been chosen.
Jonathan Shepherd was on duty on the evening of the 14th of April, subsequent to the collision with the ice-berg, he helped his fellow engineers rig pumps in boiler room 5 but in the process of doing so he broke his leg, having slipped into a raised access plate. Shortly after the nearby bulkheads were breached and the helpless Jonathan Shepherd drowned as the icy waters overwhelmed him. RIP another heroic Cumbrian.
A commemorative wreath was laid yesterday at the Joseph Bell memorial gravestone, in remembrance of the 103rd anniversary of the sinking of R M S Titanic on the 15th April 1912. Joseph Bell the Chief Engineer, and all his heroic crew are remembered.
Barrie & Ann – 15th April 2015
Joseph Bell memorial wreath 15th April 2015
Joseph Bell, Chief Engineer on the R.M.S. Titanic 