MEN RUDELY SILENCED.
“These men were rudely silenced and forbidden to speak, as was the president of the company, by junior officers, a few of whom, I regret to say, availed themselves of the first opportunity to leave the ship. Some of the men to whom had been intrusted the care of passengers never reported to their official stations, and quickly deserted the ship with a recklessness and indifference to the responsibilities of their positions as culpable and amazing as it is impossible to believe.
“And some of these men say that they ‘laid by’ in their partially filled lifeboats and listened to the cries of distress ‘until the noise quieted down’ and surveyed from a safe distance the unselfish men and women and faithful fellow-officers and seamen, whose heroism lightens up this tragedy and recalls the noblest traditions of the sea.
“Some things are dearer than life itself, and the refusal of Phillips and Bride, wireless operators, to desert their posts of duty, even after the water had mounted to the upper deck, because the captain had not given them permission to leave, is an example of faithfulness worthy of the highest praise, while the final exit of the Phillips boy from the ship and from the world was not so swift as to prevent him from pausing long enough to pass a cup of water to a fainting woman, who fell from her husband’s arm into the operator’s chair, as he was tardily fleeing from his wireless apparatus, where he had ticked off the last message from his ship and from his brain.
“It is no excuse that the apparatus on the Carpathia was antiquated; it easily caught the signal of distress and spoke with other ships nearly 200 miles away, both before and after the accident, while the operator says it was good for 250 miles. The steamship Californian was within easy reach of this ship for nearly four hours after all the facts were known to Operator Cottam.
“The captain of the Carpathia says he gave explicit directions that all official messages should be immediately sent through other ships, and messages of passengers should be given preference. According to Binns, the inspector, the apparatus on the Californian was practically new and easily tuned to carry every detail of that calamity to the coast stations at Cape Sable and Cape Race, and should have done so.”
CRITICISM FOR CAPTAIN LORD.
Regarding the part played after the disaster by Captain Lord, of the steamship Californian, Senator Smith declares that, while it is not a pleasant duty to criticize the conduct of others, the plain truth should be told. Referring to the testimony of repeated signals given from the Californian with Morse lights, he declared:
“Most of the witnesses of the ill-fated vessel before the committee saw plainly the light, which Captain Lord says was displayed for nearly two hours after the accident, while the captain and some of the officers of the Titanic directed the lifeboats to pull for that light and return with the empty boats to the side of the ship.
“Why did the Californian display its Morse signal lamp from the moment of the collision continuously for nearly two hours if they saw nothing? And the signals which were visible to Mr. Gill at 12.30 o’clock and afterward, and which were also seen by the captain and officer of the watch, should have excited more solicitude than was displayed by the officers of that vessel, and the failure of Captain Lord to arouse the wireless operator on his ship, who could have easily ascertained the name of the vessel in distress, and reached her in time to avert loss of life, places a tremendous responsibility upon this officer from which it will be very difficult for him to escape.