Of the more than 2,000 passengers and crew on board the Titanic, about 1,500 people died in the cold waters of the North Atlantic. Only 700 people were saved. And these are the 12 most notable survivor stories.
1. Brothers Navratil
Suspecting his wife of treason, Michel Navratil took two sons (Michel Jr. and Edmond) and sailed to America. Buying a second class ticket for the Titanic, he boarded the ship under the name Louis Hoffman. On that tragic night, Michel was able to put the boys in a lifeboat, and he died. After the disaster, the Navratil brothers stayed in New York until their mother identified them in newspaper photographs a month later.
2. "Unsinkable" Molly Brown
Margaret Brown earned this nickname by effectively capturing one of the ship's lifeboats and threatening to throw the helmsman overboard if he did not return to look for survivors. So Molly became famous, and she even lived to see the moment when a Broadway musical was staged in her honor and a film was shot.
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3. Eliza "Milvina" Dean
Eliza Gladys Dean became the youngest passenger on the Titanic, when she was only two months old. She survived all the survivors of the Titanic, lived to be 97 years old and died in 2009. Eliza, her brother and mother escaped, and then returned to the UK aboard the ship "Adriatic". After Eliza's death, her ashes were scattered over the docks of Southampton - where the Titanic sailed from.
4. "Miss unsinkable" Violet Jessop
The Titanic had two twin ships, one of which also sank, and the second, although it had two wrecks, still managed to stay afloat. Violet Jessop was “lucky” to be on all three ships during the disasters, but she survived on all of them. Jessop retired in 1950, earning the nickname "Miss Unsinkable," and lived to be 83.
5. Frederick Fleet
Frederick Fleet was one of the first two people to spot an iceberg and then shout “Iceberg! Right in front of us! After the collision, Fleet manned one of the lifeboats and saved some of the people. Later, he always insisted that he could have prevented a collision if he had binoculars at the time. In his old age, he suffered from depression and eventually committed suicide.
6. Masabumi Hosono
The only Japanese man on board the Titanic, Masabumi Hosono, subsequently received a lot of criticism from his compatriots for escaping in a boat rather than being killed. As a result, Hosono lost his job, was scorned by the press, and remained a source of shame for his family even after his death in 1997.
7. Charles Lightoller
Captain's Mate Lightoller closely monitored the boarding rules, allowing only women and children to pass. With no lifeboats left, Lightoller was able to survive by clinging to an overturned foldable boat and spending the entire night.
8. Harold Bride
One of the radio operators, Harold Bride, sent an SOS signal, which allowed the Carpathia to come to the aid of the survivors. When the Titanic sank, Bride found himself under an overturned folding boat, but managed to grab onto it and was later brought aboard the Carpathia.
9. Lawrence Beasley
College instructor Lawrence Beasley was a second-class passenger. During the collision, Beasley was in his cabin, but was able to get out and sit in lifeboat No. 13. Just 2.5 months after the disaster, he published a book of memoirs, which was filmed 40 years later.
10. Lucille Carter
Despite her aristocratic upbringing, Lucille Carter was not afraid of work and she sat down at the oars of one of the lifeboats. “When I got into the boat with my children, there were no sailors in it,” she later recalled. "I had no choice but to row myself."
11. Noel Leslie
Countess and philanthropist Noelle Leslie took responsibility for one of the lifeboats of the Titanic, or rather, she herself stood at the helm of boat number 8 and skillfully led her away from the sinking ship. Returning to the shore, the Countess avoided publicity in every possible way, but she still became one of the great heroines of that disaster.
12. Archibald Gracie IV
Rigorously observing the "women and children" rule, Archibald Gracie IV stayed on the ship until all the lifeboats were full, then sailed from the Titanic in a collapsible boat that subsequently capsized, and Gracie spent the entire night in the icy water. After a year and a half, he became the first adult survivor on the Titanic to die after being rescued from the effects of hypothermia and injury.