News From Terre Haute, Indiana

History

April 22, 2012

GENEALOGY: Many people can trace ancestry to Titanic

TERRE HAUTE — This month marks the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, which occurred on April 14-15, 1912. A number of people can trace their ancestry to a Titanic victim or survivor. To help us along, there is an extraordinary website that will likely answer just about any researcher’s questions about the individuals who sailed on that fateful voyage.

The site is at www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/. When you arrive at the site, go to the middle of the screen to start your searches. If you know the name of a particular person you want to research, type it into the name search. Otherwise, the Ancestry.com phrase, “you don’t have to know what you’re looking for, you just have to start looking,” certainly applies to this website. Starting your search at any one of the links will get you into the site and all of the possibilities. There is information on every person who was on the ship, and you can do searches in several different ways. You can search for a list of the survivors, the casualties, the crew (divided into what job they performed), 1st, 2nd, or 3rd class passengers, the children, the servants, the orchestra, bodies picked up by the rescue ships, passengers who got off early at either Cherbourg, France, or Queensland, Ireland (thus escaping the fate of the others), who was in which lifeboat, whether a body was recovered or lost at sea, where buried, and biographies. This is just a partial list.

Since I don’t have a known relative who was on the Titanic, I started my search for a well-known passenger — the unsinkable Molly Brown. I clicked on “survivors” to get the list. Scrolling down to the Browns, I discovered that her given name was Margaret, she was 44 years old at the time, in 1st class, ticket number 17610, cost of ticket was £27 14s 5d, she embarked at Cherbourg, France, and was in lifeboat number 6. Clicking on the link for lifeboat 6, I got a list of the 22 others who were in her boat. Lifeboat 6 had two crew members in it, one 3rd class passenger, and the rest of the occupants were 1st class passengers, two of whom were servants. The two crewmen were men, as was the one third class passenger. All of the rest were women.

My second search was for another well-known passenger, John Jacob Astor, who did not survive. I chose “victims” from the menu and scrolled to his name. Astor was age 47, was in 1st class, ticket number 17757, and cost of his ticket was £247 10s 6d. He embarked at Cherbourg, his occupation was property developer/real estate, and his body was recovered, body number 124. Clicking on 124, I retrieved information about the body: male, estimated age 50, hair and mustache light, clothing blue serge suit, blue handkerchief, belt with gold buckle, brown boots with red rubber soles, brown flannel shirt with “J. J. A.” on back of collar. Personal effects: gold watch; cuff links, gold with diamond; diamond ring with three stones; £225 and $2440 in notes; £5 in gold; 7s in silver; five 10 franc pieces; gold pencil; pocketbook. Going back to “survivors,” I found the name of John Jacob’s 18-year-old wife, Madeleine Talmage Astor, who was in lifeboat 4.

Another site at www.ithaca.edu/staff/jhenderson/titanic.html breaks down the passengers into different categories and compares them statistically; for instance, 75 percent of the women, 50 percent of the children, and 19 percent of the men survived. Other groups are compared by class, by nationality, and by lifeboat. The site lists 28 nationalities onboard. Besides the passengers from English-speaking countries, the highest totals go to Swedes (113), Syrians (81), Finns (59), Austro-Hungarians (49), Bulgarians (33), and French (31).

Both of these websites are quite informative for someone researching the people of the Titanic.

 

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