A Night to Remember

Walter Lord reconstructs the sinking of RMS Titanic almost minute by minute, beginning with the iceberg sighting late on 14 April 1912 and ending with the rescue of survivors by RMS Carpathia. Drawing on interviews with more than sixty survivors as well as testimony and contemporary records, he moves through the ship’s public rooms, engine spaces, wireless cabin, boat deck and third-class accommodation as passengers and crew gradually understand that the supposedly secure liner is going down.

Captain Edward Smith, shipbuilder Thomas Andrews, White Star chairman J. Bruce Ismay and Second Officer Charles Lightoller appear within a wider collective account of confusion, discipline, class privilege, courage and missed opportunity. Lord avoids invented drama and lets small observations carry the narrative: the insufficient lifeboats, the rockets seen but misunderstood by the Californian and the uneven chances of survival. The result is a concise social history as well as a defining account of the maritime disaster.