said to have?
There were scores of people rescued from the Titanic who witnessed this final heroic act of the band members on that fated vessel. Some of them even gave sworn congressional testimony which was recorded only days after the rescue vessels arrived in New York harbor. The entire transcript of the congressional hearings were released as a book not long after the fictionalized Hollywood version of the film Titanic was released.
Yes, people lie in congressional testimony, but where is the incentive to lie here? And why the skepticism of the media to duly recorded testimony just because it proves that we were a more religious and heroic people then versus now?
There are a number of highly intelligent posters here on Free Republic interested in all aspects of RMS Titanic: the history, the legends, the myths (NOPOPE), the people (Captain Stanley Lord), the books and the films.
There is dispute over whether “Near My God to Thee” or “Autumn” was the final song played on the Titanic.
Walter Lord writes in A Night to Remember:
The strains of “Autumn” were buried in a jumble of falling musicians and instruments. The lights went out, flashed on again, went out for good. A single kerosene lantern flickered high in the after mast.
There has never been a mixture like it — 29 boilers...the jeweled copy of the Rubiayat...800 cases of shelled walnuts...15,000 bottles of ale and stout...huge anchor chains (each link weighed 175 pounds)...30 cases of golf clubs and tennis rackets for Spaulding...Eleanor Widener’s trousseau...tons of coal...Major Peuchen’s tin box...30,000 fresh eggs...dozens of potted palms...5 grand pianos...a little mantel clock in B-38...the massive silver duck press.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=titanic+documentary%2C+long
I bet you never thought your post would generate this much traffic, eh? :-)
Just wait until the really heated discussions get going about the role of Captain Stanley Lord of the SS Californian. There are a number of people known as "Lordites" who come to his defense in support of his actions or in-actions.
The name Lowell Mason, who wrote the music for “Nearer, My God, to Thee” in 1856, may not be all that familiar today, but he composed the music for many famous antebellum hymns, including “From Greenland’s Icy Mountains” (1823). Perhaps the best known of these is “Joy to the World,” one of the most popular Christmas carols, for which he wrote the music in 1836.
“Nearer, My God, to Thee” was reportedly played by a Confederate military band at the Battle of Gettysburg.
I was wondering why the White Star Line would send anything on but then I realized it may have been to make up for the bad PR from this;
“The body of Jock Hume, my grandfather, was one of 190 recovered by the cable ship Mackay-Bennett and brought back to Halifax (more than a thousand bodies were never found). The corpses of first-class passengers — including that of the American millionaire Jacob Astor — were unloaded from the ship in coffins and driven to the mortuary in horse-drawn hearses. Those of the crew and of steerage passengers had been thrown on to ice in the hold for the sea journey, and were carried off in handcarts on arrival.
The day the Mackay-Bennett docked, Jock’s father in Dumfries received a 5s 4d bill for his son’s uniform. Jock’s pay was stopped the moment the ship went down at 2.20 a.m., and the wages owed to him were insufficient to cover the cost of the brass buttons on his bandsman’s tunic. When the family asked if his body could be brought home, they were told that ‘normal cargo rates’ would apply.”
http://www.spectator.co.uk/essays/7141073/my-grandfather-the-titanics-violinist.thtml
The surviving wireless operator, Harold Bride, wrote that he heard “Autumn” being played. I have little doubt that “Nearer My God To Thee” was also played. I am sure that many human memories were clouded by trauma and exact events were masked though chaos, leading to disagreement about the very last song played.
Here is my favorite Titanic song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_zJKOwN008&feature=related
On a side note, I watched a documentary a while back, in which a survivor’s account was mentioned: that whenever he (or she) heard the crowd at a baseball game, he would recall the screams that night.