Here is an incident from a memorable tragedy which tells how one
Played a Hymn on the Deck of a Sinking Boat
“Wallace H. Hartley
Died April 15, 1912
‘Nearer, my God, to Thee’”
Such was the simple inscription on the rosewood coffin of one of the heroic figures of the musical realm, whose name was carried all over the world when the Titanic was sunk. As the boats were hurrying away from the wreck the marine band continued to play until their instruments were choked by the swirling water that closed about the musicians and sent them to heroes’ graves. Of the eight bandsmen six were Englishmen, one a German and one a Frenchman.
Their leader was Mr. Wallace H. Hartley. One who had been with him on twenty-two voyages on the Mauretania states that he once casually asked him what he would do if he were on a boat which was wrecked. He promptly replied that he would play “Nearer, my God, to Thee.” And this was the hymn he led the bandsmen in playing after they had long been rendering popular tunes, when he had to make a last selection before the great ship made her final plunge.
Among the 815 passengers and 688 crew who were drowned was W. T. Stead, editor of The Review of Reviews. A few years previous he had published “Hymns That Have Helped.” In this list of the best hundred hymns, “Nearer, my God, to Thee” stands seventh. The Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII, sent a letter to the editor in which he expressed a preference for this hymn and said, “There is none more touching nor one that goes more truly to the heart than No. 7 on your list.” Mr. Stead made the terse comment, “The hymn is as dear to the peasant as it is to the prince.”
Mr. E. J. Elliott, president of the local musicians’ union at Louisville, at the time of the disaster said there is a standing rule in the national organization requiring bands attending funerals of dead members to conclude the rites with this tune. “That is the last thing we play at the grave of a musician—‘Nearer, my God, to Thee.’ I believe that, knowing they were doomed as the result of their own heroism, the members of the ship’s orchestra thus commended their own souls to their God, giving expression to their petition in the notes of their instruments.”
What a fitting expression for souls about to wing their way into eternity!
Equally impressive is this incident when