*****
When Canadian citizen Bernice Palmer asked her father for a camera, she probably never dreamed that her camera and her pictures would eventually end up at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C.
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| Bernice Palmer aboard the RMS Carpathia |
Shortly after graduating from finishing school in Canada, Bernice and her mother planned a vacation, a cruise to the Mediterranean. They booked First Class passage aboard the Cunard Line's Carpathia. Bernice asked her father for a camera and he gifted her with a Kodak Brownie, a box camera that was very popular from the early 1900s through to about 1970.
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| Kodak Brownie Box Camera |
Captain Rostron later testified at the US Senate Inquiry and British Inquiry that the distance to Titanic was 58 nautical miles (67 miles, 107 km) and it would take nearly four hours to get there.
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| The RMS Carpathia at sea |
Harold Cottam tried not to send more signals after he told Titanic they were on the way so he could keep the network clear for more messages from Titanic.
The Carpathia reached the ice field about 2:45am on April 15, 1912 and for nearly two hours they dodged icebergs on the surface while growlers under the surface were grinding along the ship's hull plates.
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| The RMS Titanic at sea |
The Carpathia arrived at Titanic's coordinates around 4am, but by then the Titanic was nowhere to be seen; it had sunk about an hour and a half earlier. Because it was so dark, the Carpathia's crew didn't see any lifeboats at first until a flare was set off, then they saw many lifeboats full of survivors.
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| Bernice believed this to be the iceberg that the RMS Titanic had hit. This link is an enlarged picture that shows debris and deck chairs in the water. |
For four and one half hours, the Carpathia picked up 705 Titanic survivors who were rowing in the icy sea in 20 lifeboats.
The first lifeboat - Boat #2 - was rescued at 4:10am and the last lifeboat - Boat #12 - was rescued at 8:15am.
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| Looking down from Carpathia's deck: Hoisting a lifeboat up the side of the RMS Carpathia. (Bernice Palmer Collection) |
Carpathia's 700 passengers offered blankets, dry clothes, food, and hot beverages. Some of the First Class passengers offered their cabins to some of Titanic's First Class passengers. The Carpathia's stewards escorted those who were physically able to the dining rooms where several stations were set up to care for basic needs. However many survivors stayed on deck to keep watch for their loved ones.
At 9am, Captain Rostron gave the order to sail away from the area. Since the Carpathia had been at sea for over three days, they didn't have enough food to continue on their set course. He consulted J. Bruce Ismay, President of White Star Line who was one of the survivors, and it was decided to set the course for New York City.
News of the disaster was causing a sensation on land and within an hour of departure, the Carpathia became the center of attention. There were bombarded with incoming wireless messages, some from news media (offering to pay them for details), and hundreds of messages from the families of survivors asking about their loved ones. Since outgoing messages were interrupted by incoming messages, it meant the wireless operators had to resend many of them because they were cut off. At the same time, Harold Cottam and Titanic's operator Harold Bride were trying to send out hundreds of wireless messages written by Titanic's survivors to let their families know they were safe.
The SS Birma was not able to take on survivors but they did wire Carpathia to offer them some supplies. There was little friendliness with wireless operators of ships that did not use a wireless set made by Marconi. The SS Birma did not use a Marconi wireless set and were told to "shut up."
The wireless was getting flooded with incoming. Captain Rostron gave an order that no news stories would be wired to the press, that all was to be deferred to White Star Line offices. Since early Tuesday April 16, Carpathia was slowed down by heavy thunderstorms and fog, so on Wednesday, April 17, the SS Chester, a US Navy warship, began escorting Carpathia to New York. Harold Cottam and Harold Bride transmitted names of Third-Class survivors to the SS Chester who forwarded them to the offices of White Star Line in New York City.
However, White Star Line told families and reporters that they had no information and no contact with the rescue ship, a story they maintained until Carpathia arrived in New York City.
*****
Meanwhile, below deck on the RMS Carpathia, Bernice and her mother awoke to a noisy commotion and realizing something was wrong, they got dressed and went up on Carpathia's deck.
There they saw the Carpathia's crew using ropes to hoist up survivors who sat shivering in lifeboats that were still partially filled with freezing cold sea water. Some of the children were brought aboard in burlap bags. Seeing the terrified faces of women and children, Bernice went below to retrieve her Brownie. When she returned on deck, she started snapping pictures of ladies who wore coats several sizes too large, which she later learned had belonged to their men who had died. She snapped photos of the iceberg in the distance and of activities on deck.
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| Titanic's lifeboats being brought aboard the RMS Carpathia |
As soon as children were brought on board, their wet blankets were replaced by dry blankets and they were given warm beverages to help warm them. There were some women who were dressed in fancy dresses and hats, and others who wore plain day dresses and no hats.
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| RMS Titanic's survivors on RMS Carpathia's deck getting warm and conversing with other survivors (Bernice Palmer Collection) |
Bernice's pictures showed that no regard was given to whether someone was a first, second or third class passenger - everyone was in need of rescue and comfort.
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| Survivors of the Titanic aboard the Carpathia rested on deck chairs, wrapped against the cold. (Bernice Palmer | Courtesy of Cara E. Bute) |
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| A passenger snapped this picture of Bernice, her mother and some other passengers |
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| Mr. & Mrs. George A Harder with side view of Mrs. Charles Hayes whose husband was President of Grand Trunk Railway. He perished on Titanic |
A man who worked for Underwood & Underwood noticed Bernice's activity on deck. He realized that inside her Brownie camera was probably the only picture of the iceberg that sunk Titanic. He hastily prepared a contract, hoping to get her signature on the contract before arriving at the Port of New York.
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| The contract Bernice Ellis Palmer signed for her photographs and camera. She was paid $10 US. |
When the Carpathia docked in New York, the wharf was swarming with reporters looking to get as many details of personal stories as they could, then hurry to publish it in the morning edition.
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| Photo of an iceberg field taken from the deck of the RMS Carpathia |
“[The] Titanic struck a North Atlantic iceberg at 11:40 PM in the evening of 14 April 1912 at a speed of 20.5 knots (23.6 MPH). The berg scraped along the starboard or right side of the hull below the waterline, slicing op the hull between five of the adjacent watertight compartments. If only one or two of the compartments had been opened, Titanic might have stayed afloat, but when so many were sliced open, the water-tight integrity of the entire forward section of the hull was fatally breached. Titanic slipped below the waves at 2:20 AM on 15 April. The Cunard Liner RMS Carpathia arrived at the scene around two hours after Titanic sank, finding only a few lifeboats and no survivors in the 28F degree water. Bernice Palmer took this picture of the iceberg identified as the one which sank Titanic, almost certainly identified by the survivors who climbed aboard Titanic. The large iceberg is surrounded by smaller ice floes, indicated how far north in the Atlantic Ocean the tragedy struck.”
Alas, Bernice didn't know how valuable her pictures were and she sold the exclusive rights for ten dollars to publisher Underwood & Underwood. They promised to develop and print her pictures and to return them to her after they were done with them.
When her father learned of such a paltry payment, he was very upset. He took legal action which was reported in the New York Daily News in November 1912. In the article, he stated that she received $25 (not $10 as Bernice had said) from Underwood and Underwood, who profited many thousands of dollars from her photos.
They responded that she could buy back the images for one dollar. For quite some time, she never heard a word until one day, her photographs and camera were mailed to her home.
On July 20, 1920, Bernice Palmer married Bradford Hale Ellis, a Harvard graduate from Ohio who worked as a stock broker. They settled in Los Angeles and a daughter named Cara was born in 1922.
Bernice was suddenly widowed in July 1932. She never remarried. She became involved with the Titanic community and events and became friendly with Titanic survivor Edwina Troutt Mackenzie.
In 1986, Bernice donated her camera and all her pictures to the Smithsonian which was accompanied by this letter.
The letter that Bernice Ellis Palmer sent to the Smithsonian
It says: “I am pleased that the Smithsonian Institution has the camera which took the picture of the iceberg which sank the Titanic, also of the ice flow on the ocean in the area where the ship went down with its terrified passengers of over two thousand. After all the survivors were safe on board our ship, the Carpathia, it sailed all around . . . it was then when I realized the terrible disaster which had happened to such a great number of our humanity. There was much more that I will never forget. ”
Bernice Palmer Ellis provided great insight with her photographs. She died in Los Angeles on February 11, 1989 at the age of 96.
Interesting Reading:
Books by Survivors - Echoes In The Night by Frank Goldsmith
Abandon Ship! and other falsehoods
Sources:
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