The weekly Republican. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1911-1922, 1912-05-02

about thirty degrees. As she start
ed to sink we left the davits and
went back and stood by the rail
about even with the second funnel.
Long and myself said goodbye to
each other and jumped up on the
rail. He put his legs over and held
on a minute and asked me if / was
coming. ! told him I would be
with him in a minute. He did not
jump clear, but slid down the side
of the ship. never saw him
again. About five seconds after he
jumped 1 jumped out, feet first. I
was clear. of the ship, went down,
and as l came up was pushed away
from the ship by some force. I
came up facing the ship and one of
the tunnels seemed to ne lifted off
and fell towards me about fifteen
yards away with a mass of sparks
and steam coming out of it. / saw
the ship in a sort of red glare,
and it seemed to me that she broke
in two just in front of the third
funnel. At this time / was sucked
down, and as 1 came up / was push
ed out again and twisted around by
a large wave, coming up in the
midst of great deal of small
wreckage. As pushed it from
around my head my hand touched
the cork fender of an overturned
life boat. looked up and saw
some men on the top and asked
them to give me a hand. One of
them, who was a stoker, helped me
up. In short time the bottom was
covered with about % or 80 men.
When | got on this | was facing the
ship. The stern then seemed to
rise in the air and stopped at about
an angle of 60 degrees. 1t seemed to
hold there for a time and then with
Kissing sound it shot right down
out of sight with people jumping
from the stern. The stern either
pivoted around towards our boat, or
we were sucked toward it, and as
we only had one oar we could not
keep away. There did not seem to
be very much suction and most of
us managed to stay on the bottom of
our boat.
"We were then right in the midst
of fairly large wreckage. with peo-
pie swimming all around us. The
sea was very calm and we kept the
boat pretty steady, but every now
and then a wave would wash over it.
"The assistant wireless operator
was right next to me, holding on TO
me and kneeling in the water. We
all sang hymn and said the Lord =
prayer, and then waited for dawn
to come. As often as we saw the
other boats in the distance we would
yell "Ship Ahoy!" but they could
not distinguish our cries from anv
of the others so we all gave it up
thinking it useless. 1t was very
cold and none of us were able to
move around to keep warm, the
water washing over her almost all
the time.
Towards dawn the wind sprano
up. roughening up the water and
making it difficult to keep the boat
balanced. The wireless man raised
our hopes great deal by telling us
that the Carpathia would be up in
about three hours. About three
thirty or four o'clock some men on
our boat on the bow. sighted her
mast lights. [ could not see them
as / was sitting down with a man
kneeling on my leg. He finally got
up and [ stood up.
"We had the second officer. Mr.
Lighttoller on board. He had ar
officers whistle and whistled for the
boats in the distance to come up ani
take MS off. 1t took about an houl
and a half for the boats to draw
near. Two boats came up. The
first took half and the other tool
the balance fincluding myself. W.
had great difficulty about this tim,
In balancing the boat as the mer
would lean too far. but we were al
taken aboard the already crowded
boats and in about half or thre,
quarters of an hour later we wer,
picked up by the Carpathia.
81 have noticed second Office
Lightoller's statement that J. B
Thayer was on our overturned boat
which would give the impression tina
it was father, when he really mean
it was |, as he only learned my mann
in subsequent conversation On tn
Carpathia- and did net know l wa
Junior. "