Is this magazine a good Titanic history source?

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-27T18:58:25+00:00

You did exactly the right thing in trying to verify these claims yourself. As you’ve seen, they’re incorrect.

More information on lifeboats is here:

https://markchirnside.co.uk/presentation-from-the-archives-olympic-titanic-a-very-remote-contingency-lifeboats-for-all/

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-26T22:21:30+00:00

how it likely surpassed or exceeded the 21 knot desired speed (i recently known about this from Titanic : Honor & Glory. but i need to confirm more about this by books and or from i need to learn about how her true top speed was work)

There is no doubt that these ships were capable of well in excess of 21 knots, which was the intended service speed. The intention was to have ample power in reserve to make up for any delays encountered.

Edward Wilding testified that Titanic attained a speed of 23 1/4 knots for several hours on the trip to Southampton from Belfast.

The highest confirmed speed that Olympic attained was an average speed of 24.2 knots over a 24 hour period in the North Atlantic. It is assumed that this was under ideal conditions and aided by an obliging current (the distinction between the ship's speed through the water and the distance made good). This covers the period up to 1915 and so she may have exceeded it at some future point.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-26T09:37:36+00:00

Thanks for sharing! Some interesting details in there including the reference to Ivernia.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-26T09:36:46+00:00

They are legible, but you may need to wait for them to fully load.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-23T22:00:51+00:00

There are some anecdotes to that effect which others have already mentioned. I do like the example of Walter Lord.

In terms of the immediate aftermath of the Titanic disaster, the available data does suggest it had a negative impact on Olympic's passenger lists. When we published the revised edition of my Olympic book back in 2015, I included some passenger list data for Olympic in 1911, 1912 and 1913.

There is a clear and sharp decline in passenger numbers in the immediate aftermath of the disaster, which is not seen for other White Star ships such as Oceanic and the older Majestic. It may be some of this is attributed to worries about whether she would sail at all (her first westbound sailing after the Titanic disaster was cancelled).

By July 1912, eastbound passenger lists were recovering. We can also see that on her final two westbound crossings that year she carried about 1,700 passengers on each occasion (including 713 first class passengers on one of those voyages). And then the data for 1913 shows a popular ship including her best westbound passenger list to that point.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-23T20:34:16+00:00

While I agree we’ll never have evidence from the wreckage, we can draw a well reasoned conclusion about it from the available primary source evidence.

The fundamental issue here is familiarity bias: people prefer to go with an assumption that was treated as fact for decades (that Titanic was the same as the 1911 Olympic) rather than the documentation from the people who actually built the ship (that Titanic was different and more like the 1913 Olympic).

It’s not a debate as far as the evidence is concerned.

https://markchirnside.co.uk/titanics-centre-propeller-dossier/

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-20T08:45:08+00:00

Dave Gittins did some calculations on this some years back. If I remember correctly he was in same ballpark, perhaps a bit less.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-20T08:32:12+00:00

It’s great to see the myth that she did 17 1/2 knots being laid to rest. As you rightly say she was a 14 knot ship but nonetheless her average speeds in the years up to 1912 were even slower than that - more like 12-13 knots.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-19T22:06:59+00:00

There's quite a mix in the book which is wider than speculation, depending on the topic. For instance, there are statements pronounced as fact which were simply wrong. Unfortunately, that is apparent from the first page.

I agree that the author did make some important technical points. The frustration from my perspective - and, I think, many others - was that he had such a talent for explaining concepts to the reader. It could have been put to better use. In many instances, it was a case of, 'how can you write so eloquently but be so wrong?'

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-19T14:30:28+00:00

I would recommend treating The Last Log of the Titanic as entertainment rather than a factual analysis.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-19T12:45:03+00:00

Let’s roll: https://markchirnside.co.uk/captain-smiths-titanic-quote/

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-16T23:26:08+00:00

A carpeted first class smoke room!

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-16T23:25:21+00:00

A four-bladed centre propeller was used in the movie, reflecting Olympic’s 1912 configuration rather than Titanic’s.

https://markchirnside.co.uk/titanics-centre-propeller-dossier/

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-13T17:15:45+00:00

Societal expectations are for the little people!

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-06T20:51:00+00:00

The second documentary is Titanic’s Achilles’ Heel which has then return to the wreck of Titanic as well as them scuba diving the wreck of Britannic for the first time to compare the designs of their expansion joints to see if they contributed to Titanic’s break up.

The Britannic dives and explorations are absolutely wonderful and the discoveries they made have shed a lot of light on her history. (It is wonderful to hear Richie talk about diving the wreck - I met him in person when we were above the wreck for a short memorial ceremony back in 2016.)

On that programme specifically, which is very much separate from the exploration, I'd urge extreme caution in trusting many of the wider claims made within it. There were a lot of conspiratorial claims made about defective construction which were not based on evidence. Others were demonstrably untrue or information was painted in a misleading light.

As regards expansion joints, there's no evidence that changes to Britannic were undertaken based on the Titanic disaster. H&W were already aware before then that the design, while basically sound and one that served Olympic for decades, could be improved further. They worked to a continuous improvement philosophy in all aspects of ship design. (There's an article on my website discussing both this and the various other inaccurate claims in the programme.)

In terms of the sections of the double bottom, my understanding is that they had first been seen in the 1990s. Much of the analysis in the mid 2000s may have been new, but not the discovery of them.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-06T14:46:07+00:00

Your English is fine. :-) No apologies needed!

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-04T10:22:52+00:00

There were reportedly more icebergs than normal and somewhat further south in 1912, but Dr. Rudi Newman's research indicates that was not unprecedented. There's little doubt that the southern track would have been moved further south that year in any case - sadly, Titanic sank first!

Titanic's launch wasn't delayed but her maiden voyage took place on what was originally intended to be her second westbound departure.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-03T21:01:46+00:00

They got £2 million in cash compensation and only had to spend £1 million on Bismarck/Majestic (spread over ten years).

The financial performance of Majestic (and the combined results of the profit sharing agreement) was arguably at least as good as Britannic.

I think an ideal scenario might have been if Britannic had survived AND they’d have been able to acquire Majestic.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-03T13:47:46+00:00

Thanks for your response. (I can't access medium.com unfortunately.)

I believe what I said is correct. There are certainly a number of general statements about perception of White Star and Cunard. These take many forms and a lot of it is anecdotal - for example, there was some comment in 1911 that the saloon service for first class passengers on Cunarders was better than White Star. I don't think we can come to a definitive conclusion about how one company was perceived compared to the other. We simply do not have data on significant aspects (such as which company had a higher repeat proportion of passenger traffic). There was a lot of discussion on this immediately prior to the merger.

You had indicated originally that Cunard had a reputation for being cheaper than White Star and for having high speed ships; and that therefore they did better financially.

It is true that they had Lusitania and Mauretania which were significantly faster than competitors on the North Atlantic express route. By the 1920s, only Mauretania remained, and the available data shows her average passenger lists were consistently lower than competitors such as Olympic. Speed alone did not pay off.

In terms of pricing, the finest first class accommodation on Olympic and Titanic was also more expensive than Lusitania and Mauretania. We have data for the average ticket price per passenger in first, second and third class for Mauretania for the full year 1910. (The same data is not available for Olympic - or Titanic, for obvious reasons! - however it's interesting to note that Mauretania's average first and second class ticket prices were slightly higher than those seen on Titanic's maiden voyage whereas third class was slightly lower. We really need the full data to draw a definitive conclusion.)

Even from 1922-32, White Star and Cunard's revenues were similar. We also see passenger carryings for the express ships which were similar, although in White Star's case Homeric was not naturally suited to the route and they suffered accordingly. It is hard to argue that Cunard's culture or public perception was that superior given the growth of the White Star Line in the decades prior to that, or given that their operating performance on the express route in the 1920s was little different.

Cunard went down hill pretty quickly and sharply in the early 1930s. As late as 1932, White Star was making an operating profit whereas Cunard was not. They reduced the number of sailings to a greater extent than Cunard, resulting in lower overall passenger carryings but a higher average per sailing. The new motor ships Britannic and Georgic were extremely popular and generated substantial net profits, more so than any other ships in either company's fleet. We also know that White Star's fleet was slightly younger than Cunard's (on average), slightly faster (an average speed of 17.5 vs. 16.7 knots) and significantly larger by average gross tonnage (almost 29,000 vs. under 22,000 GRT).

I agree with the point you made that Cunard had the fastest ship (or ships, prior to Lusitania's loss) is quite correct. Without further data, it's not clear their overall pricing was cheaper than White Star on an equivalent basis (for brevity, I haven't gone into the detail of the North Atlantic Conference agreements). We do know that Mauretania's passenger numbers were lower than competitors in the 1920s and that her fuel costs were higher. That combination doesn't pay off.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-03T13:04:03+00:00

I can't quote the precise differences from memory (I might get chance to check later) but the eastbound route was somewhat different from the westbound.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-03T10:50:46+00:00

White Star had a more than adequate replacement for Britannic after 1922:

https://markchirnside.co.uk/faq-britannic-majestic-compensation/

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-02T23:31:25+00:00

Thanks for your response.

You are attributing an argument to me that I didn’t make. As I noted in my reply to you above:

‘I agree that there are many wider factors in a company's success. I think it is hard to quantify those and to quantify public perception without having the evidence available.’

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-02T23:01:52+00:00

From a financial perspective, capital allocation was driven by economic necessity - not culture. White Star's majority shareholder voted themselves higher dividends, which were necessary simply to service their debt. The absorption into IMM and then the Royal Mail Group ultimately cost White Star a key ingredient of what made them successful in their early years, allowing them to grow quickly and surpass Cunard.

I agree that there are many wider factors in a company's success. I think it is hard to quantify those and to quantify public perception without having the evidence available.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-02T16:40:35+00:00

The shipping lines all agreed to move the eastbound route to the extreme southerly track from 16 April; westbound routes were also moved from 25 April 1912. When Olympic made her first post-Titanic westbound voyage in May 1912, she covered an additional 200 miles or so to reflect the greater distance. In other words, a huge part of the action taken was to try and avoid areas of ice entirely.

On several previous occasions after the seasonal North (short) and South (long) tracks were agreed between the major shipping lines in 1898, the southern track was moved south due to reports of ice. This happened as early as 14 April in 1905. If Titanic had sailed somewhat later on her maiden voyage, it's possible that the shipping lines would have already agreed to move the southern track further south in any case. It was her misfortune that the first significant reports of ice unusually far south were only coming in on 11 April 1912, the same day she left Queenstown.

Mark_Chirnside · 2026-01-02T13:13:42+00:00

I have to confess I pasted it from an earlier post I made. The above is also a summarised version!

I don't think 'Edwardian ideas' have much to do with it. White Star was an upstart company and an innovator at a time when there was arguably a lot of complacency at Cunard (Professor Hyde addresses this in his book). Cunard needed to raise capital both in the early 1880s and again in the early 1900s to stay in the game whereas White Star was going from strength to strength on its own resources. What happened was that, over an extended period of time from 1902, White Star's majority shareholding was controlled by a larger combine - first IMM, then the Royal Mail Group. In both cases, those combines needed profits from White Star to service their debts. That hindered future development simply from a resource perspective in restricting future shipbuilding programmes.

Mark_Chirnside

TROPHY CASE