University of Virginia Library

NOBLE-HEARTED BAND

"But what of the bandsmen? Who were they?"

This question was asked again and again by all who read the story of the Titanic's sinking and of how the brave musicians played to the last, keeping up the courage of those who were obliged to go down with the ship.

Many efforts were made to find out who the men were, but little was made public until the members of the orchestra of the steamship Celtic reached shore for the first time after the disaster. One of their first queries was about the musicians of the Titanic. Their anxiety was greater than that of any New Yorker, for the members of the band of the Celtic knew intimately the musicians of the ill-fated liner.

"Not one of them saved!" cried John S. Carr, 'cellist on the Celtic. "It doesn't seem possible they have all gone.

"We knew most of them well. They were Englishmen, you know—every one of them, I think. Nearly all the steamship companies hire their musicians abroad, and the men interchange between the ships frequently, so we get a chance to know one another pretty well. The musicians for the Titanic were levied from a number of other White Star ships, but most of the men who went down with the Titanic had bunked with us at some time."

"The thing I can't realize is that happy `Jock' Hume is dead," exclaimed Louis Cross, a player of the bass viol. "He was the merriest, happiest young Scotchman you ever saw. His family have been making musical instruments in Scotland for generations. I heard him say once that they were minstrels in the old days. It is certainly hard to believe that he is not alive and having his fun somewhere in the world."

At least he helped to make the deaths of many less cruel.