Mrs Vera Dick
” Let me go back, I want to go back to my husband, I’ll jump from the boat if you don’t,” cried and agonized voice in one lifeboat.
” You can do no good by going back, other lives will be lost if you try to do it. Try to calm yourself for the sake of the living. It may be that your husband will be picked up somewhere by one of the fishing boats.”
The woman who pleaded to go back, according to Mrs. Vera Dick, of Calgary, Canada, later tried to throw herself from the lifeboat. Mrs Dick, describing the scenes in the lifeboats, said that there were half a dozen women in that one boat (lifeboat #3) who tried to commit suicide when they realized that the Titanic had gone down.
“Even in Canada, where we have such clear nights,” said Mrs Dick, ” I have never seen such a clear sky. The stars were very bright and we could see the Titanic plainly, like a great hotel on the water. Floor after floor of the lights went out as we watched. It was horrible, horrible. I can’t bear to think about it. From the distance, as we rowed away, we could hear the band playing ‘Nearer, My God To Thee.’ Among the lifeboats however there were scenes just as terrible, but to me nothing could compare with the tragic grandeur with which the Titanic went to its death. To realize it, you would have to see the Titanic as I saw it the day we set sail, with the flags flying and the bands playing. Everybody on board was laughing and talking about the Titanic being the biggest most luxurious ship on the ocean and unsinkable. To think of it then and to think of it standing out there in the night, wounded to death and grasping for life, is almost too big for the imagination.
Some of the women on our boat were in nightgowns and bare feet and the wealthiest women mingled with the poorest immigrants. One immigrant women kept shouting: ‘My God, my poor father! He put me in this boat and would not save himself. Oh, why didn’t I die, why didn’t I die? Why can’t I die now?’
- This account seems to be inaccurate as the list of people in her lifeboat includes NO second or third class women.
We had to restrain her or else she would have jumped overboard. It was simply awful. Some of the men apparently had said they could row just to get into the boats. We paid no attention to cowardice, however. We were to buy with our own troubles. My heart simply bleds for the women who were seperated from their husbands.
The night was frightfully cold, although clear. We had to huddle together to keep warm. Everybody drank sparingly of the water and ate sparingly of the bread. We did not know when or if we would be saved. Everybody tried to remain cool, except the poor creatures who could think of nothing but their own great loss. Those with the most brains seemed to control themselves best.”
Survivors of Lifeboat Number 3
1st Class Passengers
ANDERSON, Mr Harry
BURNS, Miss Elizabeth Margaret
CARDEZA, Mrs Charlotte Wardle
CARDEZA, Mr Thomas Drake Martinez
DANIEL, Mr Robert Williams
DAVIDSON, Mrs Orian
DICK, Mr Albert Adrian
DICK, Mrs Vera 17
GRAHAM, Mrs Edith
GRAHAM, Miss Margaret Edith
HARPER, Mr Henry Sleeper
HARPER, Mrs Myna
HASSAB, Mr Hammad & Sun Yat-Sen (Pekinese Dog)
HAWKSFORD, Mr Walter James
HAYS, Mrs Clara Jennings
LESUEUR, Mr Gustave J.
PERREAULT, Miss Mary Anne
SAALFELD, Mr Adolphe
SHUTES, Miss Elizabeth Weed
SIMONIUS-BLUMER, Mr Colonel (Oberst) Alfons
SPEDDEN, Mr Frederic Oakley
SPEDDEN, Mrs Margaretta Corning
SPEDDEN, Master Robert Douglas
STAHELIN-MAEGLIN, Dr Max
WARD, Miss Annie Moore
WILSON, Miss Helen Alice
2nd Class Passengers
NONE
3rd Class Passengers
NONE
Crew
ANDERSON, Mr James
BINSTEAD, Mr Walter
HAGGAN, Mr John
LINDSAY, Mr William Charles
MOORE, Mr George Alfred
Total 32 with 31 identified (plus one dog)