Just after boat No. 1 got away, the water was up to C Deck just under where the ship’s name is. Witness got about 200 yards away and ordered the crew to lay on their oars. The ship’s stern was well up in the air. The foremost lights had disappeared and the only light left was the mast light. The stern was up out of the water at an angle of forty-five degrees; the propeller could just be seen. The boat was pulled away a little further to escape suction; then he stopped and watched.
After the Titanic went down he heard the people shrieking for help, but was afraid to go back for fear of their swarming upon him, though there was plenty of room in the boat for eight or a dozen more. He determined on this course himself as “master of the situation.”[30] About a day before landing in New York a present of five pounds came as a surprise to the witness from Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon.
[30] Italics are mine.—Author.
The President: You state that you were surprised that no one in the boat suggested that you should go back to the assistance of the drowning people?
Witness: Yes.
The President: Why were you surprised?
Witness: I fully expected someone to do so.
The President: It seemed reasonable that such a suggestion should be made?
Witness: Yes; I should say it would have been reasonable.
The President: You said in America to Senator Perkins that you had fourteen to twenty passengers in the boat?