"Lost Voices of the Titanic" by Nick Barratt

I have long been fascinated by the Titanic. Ever since Walter Lord's "A Night To Remember" came out on film when I was 4 years old, this is a topic of which I can never grow tired.(I do, however, skip past fictionalized stuff. It took me 10 years to even bother seeing the Kate Winslet movie, though I did enjoy it.) So I was very pleased to see this book peeking at me from the shelves the other day. It is a compilation of all the odds and ends concerning the sinking of the Titanic.

Utilizing the archives of the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, as well as the Father Browne Photographic Collection, the author has pieced together a very accurate and moving piece of work.

Taking us from the shipyard to the scene of the collision, he has painstakingly gone beyond the Walter Lord books. At times he even makes use of some of Mr. Lord's letters and the replies in their full form for the first time. The eyewitness accounts taken within days of the Carpathia's landing in New York are stark and revealing.

Beyond the collision itself, Mr. Barratt takes us through the hearings in the United States, as well as in England, regarding the disaster. The descriptions of recovering the remaining bodies from the scene are ones with which I was not previously acquainted and they give a whole new dimension to the scope of the tragedy.

Also included are accounts from the crew members of the Californian, the ship which lay only 10 miles from the Titanic and could have saved everyone. The letters, written to Walter Lord in the 1950's while he was researching "A Night To Remember", are very revealing and cast the Californian's captain in a very dim light.

Also of great interest is the account given by the Captain of the Carpathia. She was the ship that raced 58 miles to the scene and transported the survivors bak to New York, from where she was bound enroute to England. He candidly retraces his decisions as to what to make ready for the recovery operation, as well as the preparations made aboard for the berthing of the survivors. His letters show a man of tremendous compassion and common sense.

Loaded with photos from the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, as well as many from the Father Browne Photographic Collection, make this an indispensable read for anyone who is as obsessed with the Titanic as I am.