The Scotsman archive: How we reported the sinking of the Titanic

The nature and location of the Titanic disaster meant the full picture was slow to emerge

The Titanic, the largest passenger liner in the world, sank around 5am GMT on April 15, 1912, around five hours after the mighty vessel, with 2,200 people on board, hit an iceberg.

The timing of the tragedy and “faltering wireless communications” meant the scale of events deep in The Atlantic went unknown for many hours after that.

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The Scotsman first reported the disaster on April 16, but the story only appeared in a few lines of parliamentary business picked up from the day before.

The report said: “The President of the Board of Trade said he received a short time ago the following telegram from The White Star Office: Liverpool.

“Only information telegram from New York as follows - ‘Newspaper wireless reports advise Titanic collision with iceberg at 41.46 north, 50.14 west. Women being put into lifeboats. Steamer Virginian expects to reach Titanic 10am. Olympic and Baltic proceeding to Titanic. Have no direct information.”

Page 7 of The Scotsman on April 17 1912 where the first full stories of the sinking of The Titanic appeared.Page 7 of The Scotsman on April 17 1912 where the first full stories of the sinking of The Titanic appeared.
Page 7 of The Scotsman on April 17 1912 where the first full stories of the sinking of The Titanic appeared. | The Scotsman

The following day, the 17th, coverage of the “night of terror” appeared on pages seven, eight, nine and ten, with copy scattered through the edition as dispatches landed from around the world as survivor lists emerged and the names of the missing circulated.

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The second edition of The Scotsman on that day, which went off stone at 5am, carried the latest information from New York. The piece is short on detail and high on speculation as facts remained fractured and details unverified.

The story said: “New York and the nation generally awoke today but to dull recognition of the appalling magnitude of the Titanic disaster. The truth of the catastrophe appeared at first too horrible to contemplate.”

The Titanic leaves Southampton, England, on April 10, 1912, on her maiden - and only - voyageThe Titanic leaves Southampton, England, on April 10, 1912, on her maiden - and only - voyage
The Titanic leaves Southampton, England, on April 10, 1912, on her maiden - and only - voyage | AP

The nation had been unprepared, the story said, for a maritime disaster of such magnitude given the “supreme triumph of construction and engineering which in itself was thought to have almost eliminated danger as a factor in ocean travel”.

The report added: “But the slowly accumulating evidence of the wireless messages shattered popular faith in the indestructibility of modern floating palaces.

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“The faltering wireless communications have as yet given but a bare outline of the harrowing tragedy, no details of which have so far been vouched to the waiting public.”

What was known was that “a gigantic mass of ice hopelessly crippled the supposedly unsinkable vessel” and the urgency of the situation was considered so great that few were given time to return to their state rooms for their clothes and belongings.

What was not known was how far the transfer of passengers to boats and rafts had progressed. It was also unclear if it was a lack of time, or other factors, that sent “two-thirds of the Titanic’s human freight to fathomless depths”.

The story concluded that order must have prevailed among the chaos given only 79 men were included in a list of 248 “souls” onboard the rescue ship Carpathia.

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“These figures tell their own story of heroism and self-sacrifice,” the story said.

At the time of dispatch, a total of 868 survivors were on board the Carpathia as it made its way to New York.

“[They] alone can tell the tale of the midnight plunge into the angry whirlpool of ice, wreckage and drowning men with which the great ship went to her burial,” the report said.

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