Titanic Survivor Accounts

Mrs. Judy Hane was one of the last females to be loaded into a lifeboat on the treacherous night of April 14th, 1912.

It was a night that I’ll remember for the rest of my life, the night I lost my husband and son, and the night I seen my close friends perish. I was so foolish. My husband told me to go on and that he and Billy would be fine on their own. I should have stayed and helped them but they both insisted that I get in the lifeboat. Even though there was probably nothing I could have done to help, I would have wanted to be with my family until the very last minute. The worst part was after a while the boat started circling around looking for more survivors and seeing my husband dead floating in the water with a life belt still on. The water must have frozen him to death it was freezing that night. I didn’t find out about the deaths until after we got ashore and seen the survivor list. When the Carpathia came and rescued us I met up with my friend who we ate dinner with that night. She was also separated from her husband. It is the worst pain I have ever felt in my life and I’m not sure ill ever get over it. Its heartbreak every time I think of my family I once had. Thankfully I still have my daughter who I love very much and I feel so horrible that she never got or never will get the chance to meet her father or brother.

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A crew member, John Stanley from London tells us of his horrifying experience on board the titanic.

I’ve never seen peoples’ faces as scared before in my life as I did on this night. Everyone’s face looked terrified probably including mine too. It was the scariest experience in my life. I kept busy by trying to do what I could to help the women and children. I helped to make sure that the women and children were the first in the lifeboats. Those were my orders and those were the orders I followed. I had to enforce the rules and the rules were women and children first. I even had to go as far as to fire a couple shots because one of the men was trying to get in a boat before the women and children. Firing the shot was just to get control; I never had intentions of shooting anyone. When all the women and children were on the lifeboats I took the chance and jumped overboard to a nearby boat and they took me aboard with them because I was nice to them and helped them the best I could. We were waiting for far too long before the Carpathia came and rescued us. It was such a relief to see the boat coming for us. I thought it would be the last night of my life.