Salaries and Duties - Pursers

Hugh McElroy was Titanic's Purser. He was employed by the White Star Line for 13 years. 

 

Purser's Office Salaries ranged from £16 to £22 per month

 

Next to the Captain, the Purser is the most important person on any ship because he is the "go-to" man for every need, want or question.  The Purser is the clerk of the ship and on Titanic, four clerks worked under his supervision. Their duties varied and were spread throughout the whole ship.  

On Titanic, all stewards, stewardesses and victuals (kitchen/ galley) staff were supervised by the Purser. He greets the passengers when they come on the ship and checks their name off his manifest list to show their arrival.  By the second or third day of a voyage, the Purser knows many of the passengers by face, cabin number (or at least their class) and name.

The Purser handles all the money so, at some point, everyone on the ship had to come to him for their currency needs - everything from cashing a check to storing their valuables in the ship's safe. His position encompasses nearly every department where his duties interact with nearly every crew member.  All reports of maintenance, any damage, go through the Purser's office.

Although anyone could do it if the wireless operators asked them to, it was the Purser staff  who were the official go betweens for the wireless office. They carried the messages to the bridge to personally hand them to the Captain. 

In taking care of money-related needs of passengers and crew, the Purser was also responsible fo making sure crew went off the clock for certain hours and was on the clock for certain hours. He marked their time in a book and was responsible for docking pay of any crew member who bought something on the ship or in the ship's Store.  All employees had to buy their own stuff for their bunk including linens.

The Purser's office handles the purchase of any off ship excursion packages, collecting the $1.00 rental of the deck chairs (the $1.00 was for the whole trip), as well as changing a guest's dining room assigned table for those who didn't like the assignment.  

In the early days, the Purser was not a salary position and there were a lot of unscrupulous seafarers who wanted the job because there were many opportunities to make money from side businesses on the ship for example: claiming wages for "phantom" crew members and marking up the prices of items that the crew needed to buy or by charging a five percent commission on every purchase. The Purser knew he was going to make some money and it was up to him about how much. If the Purser didn't manage the  money well, or extended credit to a crew member who later jumped ship, or got caught cooking the books, the Purser could be thrown into Debtor's Prison.

 Since the 1930s, the Purser does all of the above jobs as well as ordering supplies for every department on the ship as well as food for the kitchen (galley).  The Purser stays on the ship when it is in port because he is responsible for everything on the ship against theft, fire or catastrophic loss.  He also supervises repairs and maintenance which are ongoing on a ship both in port and out to sea.

 

Conversion link - British pounds to US dollars.   In today's dollars, 1 British pound equals $1.28 US dollars. Use the link to convert pounds to dollars so you can see other crew salaries.  I have the converter set at £2 but you can change the number of pounds. 

Interesting Reading

Titanic's Purser - Hugh McElroy 

Collision - RMS Olympic and HMS Hawke

The Mystery of the Missing Binoculars