Mountains of books and articles have been written about the catastrophe that happened to the famous ocean liner "Titanic".
But so far in this story there are many mysteries, including mystical ones. Many researchers believe the tragedy did not happen by accident.
A cursed name They say a name is destiny. According to ancient Greek myth, Zeus erupted all the Titanid goddesses into the abyss of Tartarus …
In 1898, Morgan Robertson's novel "Futility" was published, which told about the sinking of the ship "Titan". In April 1912, after the death of the Titanic, there were many striking coincidences with the plot of Futility. In addition to the similarity of the names of the two ships, both were considered unsinkable, both were wrecked due to a collision with an iceberg. And even individual parameters of "Titan" and "Titanic" - sizes, number of propellers, speed, displacement - almost or completely coincided.
The most striking thing is that the scenario described by Robertson almost repeated itself twice! In April 1935, the British steamer Titanian was launched at Tyneside and sailed towards Canada.
One of the sailors - William Reeves - recently read a novel by Robertson. He was on watch at night, when the ship was just crossing the ocean in the same latitudes where both the fictional Titan and the real Titanic found their deaths.
The thought of the similarity of the plot of the book with real events did not leave impressionable Reeves. By a strange coincidence, Reeves was born on April 14, 1912 - on the day of the Titanic disaster …
He suddenly had a panicky feeling of impending misfortune. Unable to explain what prompted him to do this, the sailor gave a signal of danger "full back." And then a huge iceberg emerged from the water ahead! If the signal had been given a few seconds later, the ship would have faced the fate of the Titanic. Is the fateful name really to blame? And what role did Robertson's "prediction" play here? The ship was destroyed by a mummy? Many researchers associate the sinking of the Titanic with the legendary “curse of the pharaohs”. As you know, Egyptian antiquities often bring misfortune to their owners, and the mummy of an ancient Egyptian priestess was on the ill-fated ship. The exhibit belonged to Lord Canterville, who was about to deliver it to New York. The box with the mummy was right on the captain's bridge, as in the hold he could get damaged.
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By the way, at the head of the embalmed doll was a figurine of the Egyptian deity of death Osiris.
Lord Canterville said that the hieroglyphs written on it mean: "Rise from the ashes, and let your gaze strike those who stand in your way." Really struck? "Damned" ship? Another hypothesis, which fundamentally changes the history of the disaster, belongs to two researchers - an amateur Robin Gardner (a plasterer by profession) and a historian Dan Van der Wat. Having studied the archives of the navy for 50 years, they came to the conclusion that it was not the Titanic that actually died, but another ship - the Olympic! The Olympic was built almost simultaneously with the Titanic and at the same shipyards. From the first days this ship was in trouble. When it was launched on October 20, 1910, it crashed into a dam. The owner of the ship, Bruce Ismay, and the owner of the Harland and Wolf shipyards, Lord Pirri, had to pay a considerable sum for repairs and damages, which almost ruined them.
While sailing, the Olympic had several accidents. After that, not a single insurance company undertook to insure the "damned ship".
And then Ismay and Pirri conceived the "scam of the century" - to send the Olympic under the name of "Titanic" sailing across the Atlantic and, when it crashes, get insurance for it - 52 million pounds.
The owners had no doubts that their plan would succeed. To protect passengers, they intended to send another ship along the same route, which, allegedly by accident, would pick up passengers and crew. But in order not to arouse any suspicion, the shipowners decided that the "rescue" ship would leave the pier no earlier than a week after the start of the voyage. Alas, I had to wait only three days …
The mock Titanic was driven by Edward J.
Smith is the first captain of the unfortunate Olympic, ready to carry out any order from his superiors. So, a few hours before the tragedy, binoculars were seized from the observers on duty. And a few minutes before the crash, Smith ordered the ship to turn sideways in the direction of the iceberg.
He seemed to be trying to secure a disaster! The further history of the "Titanic" (or false "Titanic") is known to us.
What happened to the real Titanic? According to Gardner and Van der Wath, he sailed safely under a different name first in the Royal Naval Forces, then it was acquired by the White Star Line. The ship was written off ashore in 1935.
Did the Titanic die (or the ship that everyone took for the Titanic)? Or was he "helped" to crash? This we, most likely, will never know.
Could the tragedy have been prevented? It is known that just a few hours before the start of the voyage, 55 people refused the trip for various reasons.
Among them are Lord Pirri and his business partners: John Pierpont Morgan (owner of the White Star Line seafaring company) and Henry Frick, US Ambassador to France Robert Bacon, millionaire George Vanderbilt. At the same time, Morgan, complaining of poor health, went ashore in Southampton, taking with him a collection of works of art, which he allegedly intended to transport across the ocean.
One can, of course, assume that information about the "conspiracy" around the Titanic somehow reached these representatives of the political and financial elite. But how to explain the premonitions that have visited mere mortals? Morgan Robertson, in fact, predicted the tragedy as much as 14 years before it actually happened. Neither "Titanic" nor "Olympic" then existed even in the project, so it is foolish to declare the writer a participant in a possible intrigue related to the ship.
Meanwhile, Robertson is not alone. 16 people from among the surviving passengers on the eve of the fatal collision of the ship with the iceberg saw it in a dream. One of the passengers drew scenes of the catastrophe even at home before sailing.
A certain K. McDonald was persistently offered the position of senior engineer on the Titanic. He refused three times, although the offer promised only benefits.
An inexplicably painful premonition made him do this. The man who became the senior engineer in his place died.
Englishwoman Blanche Marshall was not a passenger on the Titanic. She and her husband ended up on the Isle of Wight on a honeymoon in 1912. The news came to them that the famous "unsinkable" ship would sail past the island, and they went ashore together with other onlookers to watch this spectacle.
When the ship appeared in the distance, the young woman suddenly cried out: "He will not reach America, he will sink!" People around decided that she was moved by her mind.
But Blanche spoke up again: “I had a vision. Hundreds of people are thrown into the icy water in search of rescue! Don't let them die! Of course, no one listened to her words then.
It is known that rats are the first to escape from a sinking ship. But sometimes people noticed how these rodents hurriedly left the ships that were at anchor in the port. And always during the voyage something happened: the ship sank in a storm or landed on a reef. They say the same story happened to the Titanic.
As you can see, there were plenty of indications of the coming tragedy. But, alas, most people do not have the ability to clairvoyance or simply do not pay attention to the inner voice.
Miraculous salvation? An unprecedented catastrophe for that time shook the whole world. After all, one and a half thousand people became its victims! It was hard to believe in their death.
At the end of the last millennium, in the technogenic era, rumors suddenly arose about the miraculous rescue of people from the Titanic, who were considered dead. They say they were transported … to the future! Years after the sinking of the "Titanic", the ships plying in the area of the sinking of the ship allegedly repeatedly directed calls for help from the liner that sank at the beginning of the 20th century.
It is said that on December 14, 1992, in front of the Norwegian fishermen who were fishing herring in the North Atlantic Ocean, a huge ship emerged from the depths, in which the sailors recognized the famous "Titanic"! Passengers rushed about the ship's decks in panic. They called for help, some rushed from the stern into the icy water …
A few minutes later, the ship disappeared under water again. The Norwegians repulsed a radiogram to the US Navy headquarters. Soon an American warship arrived at the scene. 13 people in life jackets with the inscription "Titanic" were lifted out of the water. All those who were rescued suffered from memory loss. They had documents with them, issued no later than 1912. The appearance of these people corresponded to the age indicated in the documents …
The Norwegian and US authorities have agreed to keep this story a secret. The newspapers only reported that the passengers were rescued from the wrecked ship, without even indicating the name of the ship. What happened next to the rescued is unknown.
Most likely, they were placed under the supervision of doctors and they are still in some closed medical institution.
And in 1994, in the North Atlantic, three more living victims of the disaster were allegedly fished out of the water - Captain Smith himself and two passengers - a man named Winnie Coots and a completely healthy 10-month-old girl tied to the lifebuoy of the Titanic. All of them were listed in the lists of those killed 82 years ago … Well, as long as there is hope, people are alive …
* * * Are we destined to find out someday what caused one of the biggest catastrophes of the twentieth century: a mystical curse, someone's ill will or a coincidence? The sinking of the Titanic has already become part of history. And it is not surprising that legends are made about her …
Diana MERLIN