A Titanic Loss For New Jersey

By Robert DeSando

When the RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic in 1912 resulting in the death of an estimated 1,500 people, it was one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history. The unimaginable event shocked the world and continues to intrigue readers today.

The catastrophe had terrible consequences, both personal and economic, for New Jersey. It impacted the lives of hundreds of people with ties to the state - entrepreneurs whose businesses and factories provided thousands of jobs; investors who built stunning vacation resorts there and an ever-expanding network of railroads to reach them, and tycoons who erected opulent mansions by the ocean or in the verdant Pinelands to escape city life and entertain the crème de la crème of high society. Several of the richest people in the world were aboard the Titanic. They were shadowed by a cadre of professional gamblers and thieves anxious to separate them from their money. Among the passengers was a bogus baron and a bona fide countess; a movie star and a phenom of the opera; a famous clothing designer and a chic fashion model; prominent artists and authors; famed aviators and race car drivers ... even a desperate kidnapper on the lam. These and others influenced the shape of things to come in New Jersey by living or dying when an enormous iceberg abruptly ended their voyage. On the flip side, there were countless financially strapped immigrants yearning for a better life in New Jersey. Some lived to achieve their aspirations; most did not when the "unsinkable" luxury liner, a heralded "floating palace," plummeted to the frigid ocean floor.

These are their stories. 
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert DeSando
• Release date: Dec 18, 2024
• ISBN: 9798227520869

Robert DeSando

Robert A. DeSando is a former journalist, lobbyist, and public servant. For more than 16 years, he held a variety of positions with the Asbury Park Press in New Jersey, from reporter to bureau chief. He was communications director and deputy executive director for the New Jersey State General Assembly. He served as a special assistant to the state education commissioner and assistant commissioner for the Department of Transportation. He was also director of government affairs for the New Jersey School Boards Association. Now retired and living in Jackson Township, N.J., he is a member of the Ocean County Historical Society.

Book preview

​Chapter 1

A Dream Takes Shape

AFTER MORE THAN A CENTURY, the first, and final, voyage of the R.M.S. Titanic still titillates the imagination and tantalizes the minds of people around the globe, and it will undoubtedly fascinate generations to come. Why?

The saga of Titanic’s historic four-day journey evokes intense feelings of astonishment, sorrow, stress, incredulity, fear, and anger that tug at the heart strings and touch the soul. It remains the deadliest and most famous maritime disaster in history.

There were more than 2,200 crew and passengers aboard the majestic floating city as it began its 13,000-foot descent to the bottom of the North Atlantic off the coast of Newfoundland.  Among them were some of the wealthiest men and women in the world, royalty, industrial titans, authors, artists, performers, socialites, and public officials. There were also crooks, criminals and one desperate kidnapper. Down below were hundreds of financially struggling immigrants hoping to find a better life in America. Roughly 700 persons survived, nearly 1,500 perished, and just 337 bodies, many unidentifiable, were recovered from the sea.

When the newly constructed luxury liner embarked from Southampton, England to New York City in April of 1912, the Titanic was hailed as an unsurpassed modern marvel.  Nothing like it had ever sailed the seas. Its engineering and design were unique and set a new bar for seafaring vessels.

Built at a cost of $7.5 million, Titanic was the largest ship in the world – 882.5 feet long, 92.5 feet wide and 175 feet high from its keel to the top of its four huge funnels. Essentially, it was higher than an 11-strory building and four city blocks long. It carried an enormous crew, 885 hands in all.

Titanic’s hull was divided into 16 compartments, four of which could flood without a critical loss of buoyancy. It was considered the safest passenger liner ever built. It was quickly deemed unsinkable. Passengers had high expectations for the Titanic given its groundbreaking safety features. Between 1900 and the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, 15 non-combatant steamships did sink, for various reasons, taking the lives of 3,190 civilians and crew. The highest single loss recorded was 737 passengers and crew aboard the Camorta, a United Kingdom steamship that was caught in a cyclone and sank en route from India to Bengal on May 6, 1902. The last passenger steamer to sink before the Titanic went down was the Koombana, also registered in the United Kingdom. It disappeared on March 20, 1912, north of Port Hedland, western Australia, in a tropical cyclone with the loss of about 76 passengers and 74 crew. None of these ships were as sturdy or had as many safety features as Titanic.

The ship set a new standard for lush comfort and opulence. Among the luxuries provided were a heated indoor swimming pool, the first ever installed in a ship; Turkish bath; squash court; dog kennel, and gymnasium complete with rowing machines, an electric horse and stationary bicycle. There were two barber shops with automated shampooing and hair drying appliances. They also offered for sale a wide array of tobacco products, toiletries, apparel, and souvenirs. Other amenities aboard included smoking rooms, writing rooms, libraries, and a fully equipped darkroom for amateur photographers wishing to try their skill.

The cuisine and dining options available to first-class passengers were exquisite. The Titanic catered to the culinary wishes of the most discriminate diners in impeccably designed restaurants. In addition to a fashionable first-class dining room capable of seating 554, there was an authentic Parisian Café with French waiters, and a Veranda Café with live palm trees. A piano was even provided in the third-class common room, a luxury for that era.

The menu for first-class passengers offered something to tempt every palate. On the evening of April 14, 1912, the last served aboard the Titanic, first-class passengers enjoyed a sumptuous 10-course meal that featured oysters, filet mignon, poached salmon, chicken Lyonnaise, foie gras, roasted pigeon, lamb with mint sauce and Punch Romaine – a palate-cleansing ice flavored with oranges and drenched in champagne. The floating palace was also  prepared to quench every thirst. It carried 20,000 bottles of beer, 1,500 bottles of wine and had 8,000 cigars on hand for gentlemen retiring to the smoking room after dinner.

Passengers retired to suites that were as sumptuous as any offered in five-star hotels on the mainland. There were two parlor suites, each with a 50-foot private promenade, and 67 other first-class staterooms and suites. Each had electric light and heat. Some had marble coal burning fireplaces. There was a vast menu of decorative styles for the staterooms that appeased every taste, including Louis Seize, Louis Quinze, Louis Quatorze, Empire, Adams, Italian Renaissance, Georgian, Regency, Queen Anne, Modern Dutch, and Old Dutch.

Staterooms could be accessed by electric elevators complete with uniformed operators. Those who preferred a stroll before returning to their rooms could access seven of the ship’s 10 decks via the graciously curving Grand Staircase, the Titanic’s iconic pièce de resistance. In promotional brochures, the White Star Line proudly described its crown jewel: (Its) balustrade is supported by light scrollwork of iron with occasional touches of bronze, in the form of flowers and foliage. Above all a great dome of iron and glass throws a flood of light down the stairway.

Looking up from the bottom of its grand stairway, you would behold a paneled wall of rich Irish oak carved in the Neoclassical William & Mary style. You would see an ornate clock flanked by two carved allegorical figures symbolizing Honor and Glory Crowning Time. A bronze cherub sculpture, holding an illuminated torch, graced the central post at the base of the staircase. A large sparkling crystal and gilt chandelier hung from the center of the glass dome crowning the stairway.

Its awe-inspiring décor, plush accommodations and lavish amenities guaranteed the Titanic would be remembered. But the luxury liner’s glitz isn’t the only reason why its legacy is secure. How the supposedly safest ship on the seven seas met its shocking demise, who was aboard, how they acquitted themselves during and following Titanic’s death throes are the major reasons why the tale of the wreck is an immortal one. The heroics, cowardice, selflessness, selfishness, suffering and miraculous stories of survival that frightful night will continue to enthrall and disturb the public in equal measure forevermore.

A representative of the Titanic Historical Society summed it up this way: People are fascinated by the Titanic today for the same reasons they’ve always been. The largest ocean liner in the world, on its maiden voyage, supposedly unsinkable, loaded with some of the most famous names of the day, hits an iceberg all on its own, and then sinks so slowly there is a lot of time for drama and heroism to be acted out. If it was written as fiction, no one would believe it could have actually happened. 

A multitude of books, magazines, newspaper articles, documentaries, TV dramas and feature films have examined every imaginable detail of Titanic’s short life. This book is not one of them.

Instead, its sole focus is on how the disaster affected the lives of more than a hundred people who lived, worked, and vacationed in New Jersey or were otherwise associated with the state. Many are unknown to most New Jerseyans today, but they deserve to be. The links and cross-connections between them had an impact on the state that was more profound and lasting than most may realize.

Chapter 2

The Millionaires

SHE WASN’T UNSINKABLE, but she is certainly unforgettable. The Titanic’s sudden and shocking destruction more than a century ago exposed a mistaken myth but gave birth to a lasting legend.

Every April 15th marks the passing of yet another anniversary of the R.M.S. Titanic’s plunge to the ocean bottom. In the intervening years, the tragic story of the voyage has been told many times and in many different ways.

One detail that has gone largely unnoticed, though, is a curious connection between the disaster and the once pastoral vacation resort of Lakewood in Ocean County, New Jersey. Some of the world’s wealthiest businessmen routinely patronized Lakewood’s luxurious hotels during America’s Gilded Age. Two of the most popular were The Laurel House and Laurel-in-the-Pines. There they socialized with a cadre of fellow millionaires, business magnates, and industrial tycoons. They commiserated with celebrities, authors, artists, royalty, and the political elite up to, and including, the President of the United States.

Members of several rich and powerful family dynasties were aboard the Titanic that fateful night. The list included Benjamin Guggenheim, who earned a fortune mining precious ore; John Jacob Astor IV, a financier, real estate tycoon and one of the richest men in the world, and Isidor Straus, a prosperous merchant and banker who owned Abraham & Straus and, with his brother Nathan, the world renowned Macy’s Department Store.

Also on the elite roster was Mrs. J. Stewart White, a wealthy widow whose father was the first president of the Bell Phone Company and credited with commercializing the first electromagnetic burglar alarm system. These feats made him a fortune, which his daughter inherited. Mrs. White was with her constant traveling companion, Miss Marie G. Young, an accomplished musician  who tutored President Theodore Roosevelt’s children.

The honor roll also included a prominent, albeit lesser known, family – the Comptons – who connected those at the top of the A-list to Lakewood. The Compton family owned the prestigious hotels where Mrs. White met Miss Young and the multi-millionaires – Astor, Guggenheim, and Straus – stayed.

Unbeknownst to them, once they boarded the spectacular and supposedly indestructible ocean liner, many of them and their servants had only a few scant days to live.

MRS. ALEXANDER TAYLOR Compton (the former Mary Eliza Ingersoll, daughter of a well-to-do tin manufacturer), her son Alexander Jr., and daughter Sara boarded the Titanic at Cherbourg in the Normandy region of France as first-class passengers. Her husband, the patriarch of the family, died in 1902 in Lakewood at the age of 62.

While their assets did not rival those of an Astor or Guggenheim, without question the Comptons were bona fide  members of the social elite. They were financially secure and lived a comfortable lifestyle, traveling frequently home and abroad.

Alexander Taylor Compton Sr., a native of Newark, was a successful attorney with a lucrative law practice in New York and New Jersey. Compton had powerful connections, including an association with Elihu Root, who was Secretary of War under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt and Secretary of State under Theodore Roosevelt.

Compton made shrewd investments in real estate that paid off handsomely. He owned the Palace Hotel in Newark and other valuable assets in the city’s suburbs. Following his death in 1902, his son, Alexander Taylor Compton Jr., invested heavily in Lakewood’s thriving hotel industry.

From the Gilded Age through the early 20th century, Lakewood was an exclusive resort nestled in the lush New Jersey Pinelands. Its three premiere hotels were the Laurel House, Lakewood Hotel and Laurel-in-the-Pines. They catered to the rich, famous, and powerful and earned a national reputation for their elegance, luxurious amenities, and abundant recreational, social, and cultural activities.

Alexander Compton Jr. and his business associates, which included Daniel Guggenheim, Benjamin’s brother, owned hotels and country clubs in the Adirondacks. But Alex was also a major  stockholder in the Laurel House and Laurel-in-the-Pines.

In an ironic twist of fate, Nathan Straus, an accomplished golfer and sportsman, was once denied accommodations at both hotels because he was Jewish. In retaliation, he built the lavish 700-room Lakewood Hotel, the community’s largest, to compete with those who shunned him. It opened in January, 1891. Although it was Lakewood’s first Jewish-owned hotel, it was open to all. Nathan’s creation was enormously successful. There were several outbuildings adjacent to the massive hotel, including a cabin that became Nathan and his family’s home away from home.

The cabin became known for a time as The Little White House. Nathan loaned this cabin to President Grover Cleveland and his wife, Frances, whenever they felt the need to get away from Washington, DC. Cleveland wrote his acceptance speech there after being elected president a the second time. And it was there that Cleveland selected many of his top Cabinet officials. Cleveland visited the cottage many times between 1892 and 1908, staying for several months during the winter. In 1908, it stayed open long after the season closed to enable President Cleveland to pass his dying days as peacefully as possible. In 1909, the structure was converted by Straus into a tuberculosis preventorium for the children of Lakewood.

Nathan was expected to join his parents aboard the Titanic in 1912, but a sudden injury forced him to cancel his participation – and saved his life.

At the tail end of an extended stay in Europe, the Comptons made a stopover in Paris in April 1912. While there, by chance the junior Compton ran into Richard L. Beckwith, a classmate more than 20 years ago at The Gunnery, a private boys’ high school in Washington, Connecticut. There they became close life-long friends. Beckwith called Alex Compie, his nickname in school. When Alex mentioned his family was joining the maiden voyage of the Titanic to get home, Beckwith was ecstatic. His family had made the same decision. They were looking forward to catching up and spending some long overdue quality time together on the ship. Beckwith boarded the Titanic in Southampton on April 10th. The  Comptons boarded the awe-inspiring ocean liner at Cherbourg in the Normandy region of France later the same day. After picking up additional passengers, crew, and supplies at Queenstown, Ireland on April 11th, the Titanic commenced her long voyage to New York City.

Passengers were confident their journey would be luxurious and flawless since the Titanic, the pride of the White Star Line, was said to be unsinkable, and they believed it without question.

The evening of April 14th  was filled with gaiety and cheer for the first-class passengers. The Comptons were among the guests at Chief Purser Hugh McElroy’s table in the first-class dining room. McElroy was the only ship officer, other than Captain Edward J. Smith, who routinely dined with the passengers. While they enjoyed sumptuous food and soothing music inside, outside the air was growing considerably cooler. The moonless sky was clear and provided a star-filled canopy for passengers strolling the chilly decks. The ocean surface was unusually still.

When dinner concluded, Alex and Beckwith adjourned to the ship’s striking smokeroom. About 11:35 p.m., I suggested that we go below before the lights went out, and we parted in the corridor, Beckwith wrote in a letter describing the events of that night for the benefit of his fellow alumni of The Gunnery. I was just going into the lavatory when I felt a sort of scraping jar on the starboard side...and the ship staggered the least bit but not enough to unbalance me or cause me the least apprehension. I went to my stateroom and told Mrs. Beckwith that there was no cause for alarm, but just then someone in our corridor who chanced to be looking out a porthole, reported that we had struck an iceberg and he had seen it go by, so I told Mrs. B. that I would go on deck and see it for myself, which I did, and remained there for fully fifteen minutes, talking with about a dozen men who had likewise come up.

Most men were in evening dress and without coats. So it wasn’t long before they returned to the warmth of their staterooms. I firmly believed that there was not the slightest danger, Beckwith wrote. He advised fellow passengers to go back to bed. Just then, my room steward whispered to me that the mail room, almost right under us, just two decks down, was flooded...I went down one deck and looked down one deck, where, through the open door of the mail room, I could see that the water was 10 feet deep. Beckwith returned to his corridor and informed the men there that water was coming in, but the bulkheads would now be closed, and that it would get no farther. This I honestly believed.

Still, he thought it was best to get dressed. Returning to his cabin, Beckwith saw that his wife and daughter had already done so. Beckwith was just changing his shoes when the word was given to put on life belts and proceed to the upper deck. When they arrived there, Beckwith said there were hardly 30 people on the deck. But he was glad to see the Comptons were among them.

Alex took me aside and said ‘Dick, what do you make of this situation?’ I told him, as I still believed that the ship was unsinkable, but it was necessary to take every precaution...Just then, they began to fill the first boat on our side. Beckwith was not alarmed. I said to Alex that this was (just) a final precaution, (and) that we would be back on board again in an hour, and remarked further that we would all have good colds as a result.

After the first boat was lowered, the gravity of the situation could no longer be ignored. When the ship’s crew began filling the second lifeboat, Mrs. Beckwith insisted they should not wait any longer. So our party moved forward, and as we did so I turned and motioned for Compie to follow, Beckwith stated. He nodded his head and I saw him take his mother’s arm and, with his sister, start after us. This is the last time I saw him, alive or dead. I cannot understand what happened nor why they were all not saved in our boat...I surmise Alex, always deliberate and slow to start, and unwilling to put his old mother (then 65) in an open boat until the last moment, must have hesitated after starting toward the lifeboat and had drawn back into the shadow of the deckhouse.

After Beckwith lost sight of them, the Comptons eventually made their way through the commotion and growing confusion to the opposite side of the ship. Mrs. Compton was so sure the Titanic would not founder, she decided to forego wearing a life jacket. She later told the Asbury Park Evening Press that Captain Smith took notice and brought over two life jackets, one for her and the other for her daughter Sara, then 40. When Captain Smith handed us life preservers, he said cheerily: ‘They will keep you warm...if you do not have to use them.’

Alex maneuvered his mother and sister to Lifeboat No. 14, which was already taking on passengers. His mother was recalcitrant. She told her son she would rather stay than leave him behind. For Alex, it was the last straw. He laid down the law. Don’t be foolish, Mother, he responded in a no-nonsense tone. You and Sister go in the boat. I’ll look out for myself. With the assistance of crew members, Alex got his mother into Lifeboat No. 14. But his older sister Sara had a troublesome time boarding.

Fellow passenger Archibald Gracie, a writer and amateur historian, described Sara’s ordeal in his book The Truth About The Titanic. As she stood on the rail to step into boat No. 14, it was impossible to see whether she would step into the boat or into the water, he wrote.

She was pushed into the boat with such violence that she found herself on her hands and knees, but fortunately (she) landed on a coil of rope...Just before the boat was lowered, a man jumped in. He was immediately hauled out. (Fifth Officer Harold G.) Lowe then pulled his revolver and said: ‘If anyone else tries that, this is what he will get.’ He then fired his revolver in the air.

The crew had difficulty cranking the boat down in unison. At times, the stern wound up hanging at a dangerously steep angle; other times, the bow. Suddenly the ropes became tangled making it impossible to lower any further. The crew manning the boat could not disengage the ropes and were forced to cut them. That caused No. 14 to plummet and strike the ocean water hard. Almost at once the boat began to leak, and in a few moments the women in the forward part of the boat were standing in water, Miss Compton recalled. There was nothing to bail with (so) the men used their hats.

Meantime, the Beckwiths were attempting to escape the sinking ship on Lifeboat No. 5 along with their travelling companions Edwin N. Kimball Jr., former tennis star Karl Behr and Helen Newsom. Fortunately, for them, they were on the starboard side of the ship. Testimony before the British Court of Inquiry following the disaster revealed crewmen were directing women to proceed to Titanic’s portside and men to the starboard. Men could board lifeboats on the starboard side once all available women and children were seated.

This information was unknown to Mrs. Beckwith, who was reluctant to get into the lifeboat without her husband. J. Bruce Ismay, chairman of the White Star fleet, was overseeing the boarding of Lifeboat No. 5.  Mrs. Beckwith edged forward and asked Ismay if her whole party, men and women, could get on a lifeboat together. Of course, madam, Ismay replied, every one of you. They all climbed in.

When Lifeboat No. 5 began its descent at 12:55 a.m., Beckwith insisted no other women or children were visible in the vicinity. I know not a passenger was left at that moment, he declared. Before we were lowered away, Ismay held it for a period varying from one to three minutes (according to different versions; one as I remembered it) and called at least twice ‘Are there any more women for this boat?’ There positively was not a passenger, man or woman, in sight when the final order to lower away was given.

FORTUNE FAVORED BROOKLYN-born Karl H. Behr. Only 26 years old when he stepped aboard the Titanic, he was already a world-class athlete, an established lawyer and a financial success. His father, Herman, was one of the largest manufacturers of sandpaper in the United States and quite wealthy. He had the means to position his son for a successful life.

After preparing for college at the prestigious Lawrenceville School in New Jersey, Karl proceeded to earn two university degrees, one in philosophy from Columbia and another in law at Yale. He was admitted to the bar in 1910. Behr was also a seven-time U.S. Top 10 tennis star. He was a singles finalist at the U.S. Open in 1906 and runner up in the 1907 Wimbledon men's doubles championship. In 1969, he was enrolled in the International Tennis Hall of Fame.

During his younger days, Karl’s educational pursuits and tennis competitions compelled him to find lodging in various locations, including Orange and Morristown New Jersey. But there was one constant. He carried with him in his heart his love for hometown sweetheart Helen Newsome, who was a friend of Karl’s sister Gertrude. Although Karl never ceased his quest to marry Helen, her mother, the former Sarah Monypeny Newsom, did not approve of the union because of the seven-year age difference between the young lovers. Helen’s stepfather, Richard Beckwith, a realtor from Connecticut, acquiesced to his wife’s decision. At the time, the family was living in Manhattan, where Helen graduated from the Briarcliff Manor School. Hoping to distract her daughter and cool her feelings for Karl, Sarah convinced her husband to take Helen, then 19, on an extended European vacation. She never suspected that Karl would trail them. He booked a business trip to Berlin and Paris. Their paths crossed only on the voyage home on the Titanic. It was hardly a coincidence.

Although the encounter was unexpected and awkward at first, Helen’s parents were cordial during the journey. In some later news accounts, Behr and Helen insisted the plan had always been for Karl to join the Beckwith family on the Titanic’s voyage to New York. So his arrival on the ship was not a surprise. Regardless, Karl used those few precious days at sea to court Helen.

A hundred years after the disaster, Karl’s future granddaughter, Helen Behr Sanford, a Princeton, N.J. native, penned Starboard at Midnight, a historical novel that relies heavily on her grandfather’s unpublished memoir, scrapbooks, letters, photographs and newspaper clippings she discovered in a cabinet in a fieldstone house on family-owned property. In it, she relates an incident that happened shortly before Titanic was fatally injured by an iceberg.

Randy Bryan Bigham, an award-winning journalist, author, and historian, reviewed Starboard at Midnight for Encyclopedia Titanica in 2011.   Sanford paints a vivid picture of Karl and Helen aboard ship, he wrote. "Not unlike cinematic lovers Jack and Rose (in the motion picture Titanic), they hold hands and embrace, making the most of time away from the censuring eyes of Helen’s mother and stepfather, Sallie and Richard Beckwith. But after a fumbled erotic encounter in Karl’s cabin on the fateful Sunday, a nervous Helen flees topside, standing by the rail to contemplate her future in the few minutes before an iceberg changes history."

Whether the romantic rendezvous in the cabin was fictional embellishment or fact-based, newspaper interviews and testimony from Karl Behr provide first-hand details about Titanic’s final hours. It is known that Behr and Beckwith were in the smoking room watching the action at the card tables and wondering whether they were witnessing professional gamblers at work. The women had retired to their cabin on D deck about 11:30 p.m. What happened next is best described by Behr himself in a post-catastrophe interview that was transcribed by The Brooklyn Daily Eagle and published in the April 19th edition:

"We left the smoking room just before the closing for the night, and I started to undress in my cabin (on C deck when) I felt a distinct jar, followed by a quivering of the boat. It was distinct enough to know we had hit something. I dressed and immediately went after my party, having clearly in mind what course I would pursue. I met Miss Newsom in the passage, she having been awakened by the thud. We went together to the very upper deck and found it bitterly cold. The ship noticeably listed to starboard, the side which had been hit. I knew the boat was dangerously injured, although I could not then believe she was doomed. Together we went to the cabin of the Beckwiths, telling them to dress. Everybody put on warm clothing.

"When we were proceeding along the passage someone told us orders were issued to don life belts, which we did very calmly. We met Captain Smith on the main stairway and he was telling everyone to put on life belts. Knowing exactly where the life boats were, I led my party to the uppermost deck. We waited quietly while one boat was filled. It appeared to be comfortably occupied. We then went to the second boat, which had about forty in it. Mr. Ismay himself directed the launching splendidly. Before getting in, however, Mrs. Beckwith turned to him and asked if the men-folks could come too and he said ‘Why certainly.’ We got into the boat and then Mr. Ismay asked if there was anybody else to get in and there was no one at all left around there.

"Fully three minutes he waited for others to come along, before he gave orders to launch the boat, having sent in two petty officers and two or three seamen. The latter were under perfect control. We were evidently the last passengers on the top deck. This was later explained by the fact that passengers were ordered to go to A deck, while we had gone above that. There were other lifeboats on our side, but they must have been filled later from the lower decks.

Our boat being lowered into the water, we rowed immediately away from the ship. We could only work four oars at a time on account of the somewhat cramped positions. We made good progress, however, and were soon a safe distance from the ship, which we still did not believe was going to sink. We stopped rowing when far enough out and transferred some of our passengers to another boat, probably the first one launched. The transfer was done presumably to free space for passengers rescued from the freezing ocean. However, when the crew suggested going back, the proposal was supposedly vetoed by those already in the lifeboat who feared they would be swamped.

"The night was perfectly clear and all we could do was to sit and wait. We had no idea of the number of lifeboats, and, although it only seemed a few minutes, it was two hours before the boat actually sank. The officer in charge of our boat, seeing the men swimming in the water, refused to go back and I guess he was right, for he claimed we surely would have been swamped by the hundreds in the water. Fortunately for us, when we left the ship, everything was handled in the most perfect manner and discipline, thanks to Mr. Ismay. He made sure that our crew was complete.

What happened actually on board, of course, I saw little of. No panic was evident and I heard no pistol shots. We floated around until dawn, when we saw the lights of the Carpathia, and started to row in her direction, as did all the lifeboats. The people aboard the Carpathia were fine, and officers, men and passengers cannot be praised too highly. They had made every preparation for our comfort. Quarters and clothes were generously distributed. Personally I am a little tired, but otherwise none the worse for the experience.

Karl told the Yale Alumni Magazine that his lifeboat waited in deadly silence while the Titanic took her final plunge. The sight was too horrible for description as the men on board rushed toward the stern only to be engulfed and sucked down by the suction.

Ironically, it was on the Carpathia that Behr first met Richard Williams, 21, a fellow Titanic survivor and a talented, up-and-coming tennis star. The chance encounter led to lasting friendship and fierce competition between the two at several premier tennis venues. Three months after their rescue, they squared off for the first time on the manicured lawns of the Longwood Cricket Club near Boston. Looking back on the match, Sports Illustrated reported it was full of precise shots, savvy tactics and gyrating momentum. The lanky, dark-haired Williams brought his aggression and superior athleticism to bear and won the first two sets, the magazine stated in a 2015 article entitled The Tale of Two American Tennis Aces Who Survived the Titanic. Then the sturdier Behr, who wore wire-rimmed glasses and held back his sandy hair with a not-yet-voguish headband, surged and gradually wore down Williams' resistance. Over five gripping sets the veteran beat the newcomer...After that match at Longwood in the summer of 1912, Williams and Behr would play each other at least twice more. In '14 they met in the quarterfinals of the U.S. Nationals – what would later become the U.S. Open – in Newport. Taking advantage of his opponent's fragile psyche, Williams beat Behr 6-2, 6-2, 7-5. They were not always rivals. Behr and Williams were both named to the 1914 U.S. Davis Cup team.

The reference to Behr’s fragile psyche is significant. Aboard the rescue ship Carpathia, the emotional impact of the horrendous sinking, the shrieks of hundreds of people bobbing in the water pleading for help, and the hours spent in a lifeboat at night and in a freezing ocean began to take a toll on Behr. He told the London Independent that witnessing Titanic’s disastrous end was dreadful, but the four days among the sufferers on the Carpathia was much worse and more difficult to forget.

Behr struggled with survivor’s guilt for years after the event. His anguish tore his mind and soul. He was punishing himself for taking a seat on a lifeboat when the rule at sea was women and children first. He tried to dispel the notion that he took a spot on a lifeboat that could have gone to a woman or a child. He reminded the press time and again that he was invited aboard by the managing director of the White Star Line only after the deck was cleared of people and time was running out. The boat had room for more passengers even when the decision was made to lower it. "At the time, we supposed there were plenty of lifeboats for all passengers, he lamented. Besides, most passengers, himself included, firmly believed the Titanic would not sink because everyone said it was unsinkable."

Perhaps it was an attempt to shake the perceived stigma and assuage his guilt. But Behr voluntarily testified in court on behalf of a group of steerage passengers who were part of a class-action suit against the White Star Line. Behr recalled that J. Bruce Ismay gave orders to officers and acted in the role of supervisor, contradicting the defense's contention that Ismay was aboard the Titanic only as a passenger. His testimony helped the plaintiffs win their suit and recover $663,000 for loss of life and possessions.

Nothing he tried, though, was enough to break Behr’s endless cycle of self-guilt. In 1917, he suffered an emotional breakdown that led to a brief, and helpful, stay in a sanitarium.

In March 1913, just short of a year after the catastrophe, Karl and Helen married. The press sensationalized the wedding by referring to Karl and Helen as the Titanic Couple. They had four children, three sons and a daughter.

Following his retirement from tennis, Behr made a small fortune as a financier. Behr became vice president of Dillon, Read & Co., investment bankers. He was also on the board of the Fisk Rubber Company, the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, and the National Cash Register Company. At the time of his death in 1949, Behr was a director of the Interchemical Corporation, the Behr-Manning Corporation, and the Witherbee Sherman Corporation.

He was 64 years of age and was buried at the Evergreen Cemetery in Morristown, N.J. Helen later married Dean Mathey, who was chairman of the board of the Empire Trust Company in New York and charter trustee emeritus of Princeton University. Mathey was also a close friend of Karl Behr. Helen made her home at Pretty Brook Farm on Great Road in Princeton. She died in 1965 at age 72 and was buried in Princeton Cemetery in a private family plot.

ISIDOR STRAUS, 67, a multi-millionaire and former congressman, and his wife Ida, 61, were returning from a winter holiday, much of it spent in Cape Martin in southern France. Travelling with the couple were Isidor’s valet John Farthing, 49, and Ida's newly hired maid Ellen Bird, 31.

Straus was the third-richest man aboard the Titanic. Only John Jacob Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim were wealthier. He and his wife were inseparable. They had been married 31 years. Ida was fiercely dedicated to her husband and their six children.

Drama accompanied the Titanic from the moment it departed Southampton. As hundreds of other passengers, Mr. and Mrs. Straus were on deck when the ship began its departure. They were -enjoying a conversation with another first-class passenger, Colonel Archibald Gracie, an ex-military officer and scion of a wealthy family. Everyone wanted to witness the historic moment when the world’s largest luxury liner began its maiden voyage to America. The engines came alive, and the ship’s giant propellers began to turn.

During this day I saw much of Mr. and Mrs. Isidor Straus, Gracie recalled in his book The Truth About The Titanic. I was with them on the deck the day we left Southampton and witnessed that ominous accident (involving) the American liner, New York, lying at her pier, when the displacement of water by the movement of our gigantic ship caused a suction which pulled the smaller ship from her moorings and nearly caused a collision. At the time of this, Mr. Straus was telling me that it seemed only a few years back that he had taken passage on this same ship, the New York, on her maiden trip and when she was spoken of as the ‘last word in shipbuilding.’

Some took the incident as an ill omen.

At the outset of Titanic’s odyssey, the temperature was sufficiently warm for passengers to stroll the promenade or read a book while relaxing on a deck chair. Isidor and Archibald took full advantage of the pleasant break in the weather to chat often. During our daily talks, Gracie stated, he related much of special interest incidents in his remarkable career, beginning with his early childhood in Georgia, when with the Confederate Government Commissioners, as an agent for the purchase of supplies, he ran the blockade to Europe. His friendship with President (Grover) Cleveland, and how the latter had honored him, were among the topics of daily conversation that interested me the most.

During the early afternoon on Sunday, the air steadily grew colder, motivating passengers to move indoors. Gracie used the opportunity to go return to his stateroom and retrieve a book, Old Dominion, which he had finished reading, so he could return it to the ship’s well-stocked and luxuriously appointed library.

Shortly thereafter, Gracie encountered Isidor Straus, on whom the Colonel had foisted a copy of a book he had authored entitled The Truth About Chickamauga. According to Gracie, he loaned the book to Straus because he expressed intense interest in reading it. Not everyone accepted Gracie’s version of the story. "The book strikes one reader as 462 pages of labored minutiae, but Mr. Straus was famous for his tact; he assured the Colonel that he