SUNDAY night the magnificent ocean liner was plunging
through a comparatively placid sea, on the surface
of which there was much mushy ice and here and
there a number of comparatively harmless-looking floes.
The night was clear and stars visible. First Officer William
T. Murdock was in charge of the bridge The first intimation
of the presence of the iceberg that he received was from the
lookout in the crow's nest.
Three warnings were transmitted from the crow's nest
of the Titanic to the officer on the doomed steamship's bridge
15 minutes before she struck, according to Thomas Whiteley,
a first saloon steward.
Whiteley, who was whipped overboard from the ship by a
rope while helping to lower a life-boat, finally reported on the
Carpathia aboard one of the boats that contained, he said,
both the crow's nest lookouts. He heard a conversation between
them, he asserted, in which they discussed the warnings
given to the Titanic's bridge of the presence of the iceberg.
Whiteley did not know the names of either of the lookout
men and believed that they returned to England with the
majority of the surviving members of the crew.
"I heard one of them say that at 11.15 o'clock, 15 minutes
before the Titanic struck, he had reported to First Officer
Murdock, on the bridge, that he fancied he saw an iceberg!"
said Whiteley. "Twice after that, the lookout said, he warned
Murdock that a berg was ahead. They were very indignant
that no attention was paid to their warnings."
