The Titanic as a Microcosm of the Edwardian World

When the Titanic sank on April 14, 1912, only approximately 700 of her more than 2,200 passengers were rescued. Out of those only 26 percent were in the third class, even though Titanic carried more third class passengers than first and second combined (Geller 197-216). Subsequent survivor accounts would reveal that first and second class passengers were given more opportunities for rescue in several ways. Eloise Smith was a first class passenger who escaped in a lifeboat. Her account hints at the underlying view that largely determined who survived the sinking of Titanic: "The cries [of passengers in the sea] we heard I thought were seamen, or possibly steerage who had overslept, it not occurring to me for a moment that my husband and my friends were not saved" (Quinn 112).

On 10 April 1912, the American-owned British-operated White Star liner Titanic departed from the Irish port of Queenstown on her maiden voyage. She carried approximately 2,228 passengers and crew, including 1,697 men (12 years of age and older) and 528 women and children (Geller 8). Four days later, on April 14, 1912, the Titanic sank two hours and 40 minutes after striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic (Geller 8). Titanic was built in a period of history called the Edwardian Era in Britain, La Belle Epoque in France and the Gilded Age in America (Geller 13). The period was characterized by the Industrial Revolution, which helped fuel a change in the traditional society.

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wbray). Furthermore, crew officials did not know the lifeboats had been tested just before the voyage and they reduced the maximum number of people in each boat to ensure they did not exceed the boat's capacity (Quinn 13). Consequently, two hours and twenty minutes after Titanic hit the iceberg only 600 people had evacuated the ship (Quinn 20). Archibald Gracie was a first class passenger who went down with Titanic but saved himself by climbing onto an overturned lifeboat. Gracie's account of the final hours of Titanic demonstrates the disturbing lack of a sense of urgency as the ship sank: Two young men of the crew, nice looking dressed in white, one tall and the other smaller, were coolly debating as to whether the compartments would hold the ship afloat. They were standing with their backs to the rail looking on at the rest of the crew, and I recall asking one of them why he did not assist (Quinn 58). But this lack of urgency was not limited to the crew or the first class passengers. Frankie Goldsmith was a third class boy traveling with his parents: My little boy's eyes recall looking into windows and open spaces of the two decks we were being lowered past. I saw early teenage boys who were employed aboard the ship in

Category: History - T