Titanic Timeline

A list of important events in the story of the Titanic, from the early days of the White Star Line, right through to current day salvage operations. Year Details 1867 Thomas Henry Ismay purchases the struggling White Star Line, which operated traditional sailing vessels centred mainly on the diminishing Australian gold rush trade. 1869 Thomas Henry Ismay creates …

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Titanic’s Watertight Compartments

Titanic, according to the many legends, was ‘practically unsinkable’, but in reality, no ship can ever be made trulyunsinkable, even almost a century after Titanic’s conception. However, steps had been taken by the ship’s builders, Harland And Wolff, during the design of the Olympic-class liners to ensure that these vessels would be the safest ships to ever take to the seas at that time, and the …

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Third Officer Herbert John Pitman of the Titanic

Herbert John Pitman was Titanic’s Third Officer. He had been at sea for almost nine years, and the last five of those had been with the White Star Line. He received a telegram, as did all the junior officers, informing him to report to the White Star Line’s Liverpool offices at 9a.m. on 26th March, in order to pick up their …

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Sixth Officer James Paul Moody of the Titanic

James Paul Moody was born in Scarborough, England on the 21st August 1887. His family were not a seafaring family, far from it, but the pull of the sea must have been fairly strong, because at the age of 14, Moody went to sea to serve his apprenticeship under sail. In 1911, at the age of …

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Titanic’s Lifeboats

Titanic carried a total of 20 lifeboats, but Alexander Carlisle, one of the managing directors at Harland and Wolff, had suggested using a new type of larger davit, which could handle more boats, giving Titanic the potential of carrying 48 lifeboats, providing more than enough seats for everybody on board. But in a rare cost-cutting exercise, the White Star Line decided that only …

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