Quotes from Hugh Brewster

Norris met another survivor on board who told him that he had been bringing home a prized dog on the Titanic and had gone to the kennels and released all the dogs a half hour before the ship went under. Norris described to him how when he was swimming away from the sinking liner he had spied the black face of a French bulldog in the water.

Tea gowns, or "teagies" as they were known, were worn without corsets at teatime—a time of day when gentlemen called on their mistresses—and they were filmy, pretty creations designed with just a hint of the boudoir.

It was now just after 1:30 a.m. Ten of the Titanic's sixteen regular lifeboats had departed, carrying approximately 330 people—only a fraction of the 2,209 on board. To the passengers still on deck, the downward slope toward the bow was now very apparent. Yet many of them, the first-class men in particular, still believed that the ship would last till morning and that help would arrive

The German steamer Frankfurt had been the first to respond to the CQD call, but she was more than 170 miles, and many hours, away. The Cunard liner Carpathia was roughly 58 miles from the Titanic and had sent a message saying they were coming as quickly as possible and expected to be there within four hours.

Vigorous activity in cold water, it is now known, only intensifies the effects of hypothermia. Those who tried to swim without lifejackets out to boats were therefore likely among the first to perish.

Among her female friends, lesbians were particularly prominent: her closest friends in New York were Elsie de Wolfe and her partner, the theatrical agent Bessie Marbury, as well as Anne Morgan and her lover Ann Harriman Vanderbilt, and in Paris she was friendly with the lesbian novelist Natalie Barney and her circle. Lucy admired these independent, forthright women, and according to Randy Bryan Bigham, "a sexual ambiguity on Lucy's part is possible.

Even in worship, the distinction of classes was observed on the Titanic; assistant purser Reginald Barker conducted the service for second-class passengers in their dining saloon, and a Catholic mass was held in the second-class lounge by Father Thomas Byles, followed by one for those in third class. (There was no Sabbath observance for the significant number of Jews on board, though kosher food was available in all classes.)

One consequence of this change was the missing binoculars for the lookouts. On the trip to Southampton from Belfast, the lookouts had used the now-departed second officer's binoculars, which he had locked in a drawer in his cabin before he left the ship. When Lightoller inquired about binoculars for the lookouts, he was told that none were available for them.

For the launch ceremony, there was no beribboned champagne bottle to smash against the bow and no titled dowager to pronounce "I name this ship Titanic." That was not how White Star did things. Instead, at five minutes past noon, a rocket was fired into the air, followed by two others, and then the nearly 26,000-ton hull began to slide into the River Lagan to cheers and the blowing of tug whistles.

Morgan was no doubt pleased that Millet was sailing on the maiden voyage of the Titanic. He had planned to be on board himself before changing his plans in favor of a stay at a spa at Aix-les-Bains with his mistress.

During the debate on the CLA Act in the House of Commons, a Liberal member named Henry Labouchère had questioned why sexual acts between men should not be included in the bill. The late addition of the Labouchère Amendment made any act of "gross indecency" between men punishable by two years in prison—thus criminalizing homosexuality in Great Britain for the next seventy-two years.

President Taft, too, was preoccupied by the fate of his aide and frustrated by his inability to receive word of whether Archie might be on board the rescue ship. On Tuesday, Taft instructed the secretary of the navy to send out two scout cruisers, the Salem and the Chester, to establish radio contact with the Carpathia.

In New York, the city was in the grip of Titanic fever. Flags flew at half-staff, the Henry Harris theaters were dark, and even Macy's department store had closed out of respect for Isidor and Ida Straus. Police had been called in to control the crowds in front of the White Star office at 9 Broadway.

Contrary to popular belief, there was no "captain's table" where E. J. Smith would entertain a favored selection of passengers each night. Smith normally took his meals at a table for six in the dining saloon or in his cabin, served by his valet or "tiger" as the captain's attendant was known.

In London similar scenes played out as names were posted at Oceanic House, White Star's London office, near Trafalgar Square. Southampton was the hardest-hit city of all since that was where most of the crew and victualing staff lived—of whom only 212 out of 885 had survived.

In America, the Titanic is often described as a cross-section of the Gilded Age, an era of rapid industrialization and wealth creation in the United States that began in the 1870s and ended with the introduction of income taxes in 1913 and the outbreak of World War I the following year.

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