On 30 March 1912,
Californian made a stopover in London on a trip to New Orleans during which she had to face a storm which damaged part of her cotton cargo.
Stanley Lord, who had commanded
Californian since 27 March 1911, was her captain when she left the
Royal Albert Dock, Liverpool, England on 5 April 1912 on her way to
Boston, Massachusetts. She was not carrying any passengers on this voyage. The first week of the crossing was uneventful. On Sunday 14 April at 18:30
ship's time,
Californian only
wireless operator,
Cyril Furmstone Evans, signalled to the
Antillian that three large icebergs were five miles to the south.
Titanic wireless operator
Harold Bride also received the warning and delivered it to the ship's
bridge a few minutes later.
Californian encountered a large
ice field at 22:20 ship's time, Before leaving the bridge, he thought he saw a ship's light away to the eastward but could not be sure it was not just a rising star. Lord continued to the engineers' cabins and met with the chief, whom he told about his plans for stopping. As they were talking, they saw a ship's lights approaching. Lord asked Evans if he knew of any ships in the area, and Evans responded: "only the
Titanic." Lord asked Evans to inform her that
Californian was stopped and surrounded by ice. Lord ordered Evans to warn all other ships in the area, which he did. At the time
Titanic on-duty wireless operator,
Jack Phillips, was busy clearing a backlog of passengers' messages with the wireless station at
Cape Race, Newfoundland, away. Evans's message that
Californian was stopped and surrounded by ice was heard very strongly on
Titanic due to the relative proximity of the two ships and drowned out a separate message Phillips had been in the process of receiving from Cape Race, prompting Phillips to tell Evans to stop transmitting in the straight diction of wireless operators: "Keep out; I am working Cape Race." (or, in morse code, "DDD"). Contrary to common belief, Evans was not offended nor did he take the common code for "stop transmitting" to be an insult. Instead, he listened in for a while before he switched off his wireless equipment and went to bed. A few minutes later, at 23:40,
Titanic hit an iceberg. Shortly after midnight, she transmitted her first distress call. Third Officer Charles Groves of
Californian testified to the British inquiry that at 23:10 ship's time, he had seen the lights of another ship come into view 10 or 12 miles away, 3.5 points above
Californian starboard beam. At about 23:30, Groves went below to inform Lord. The latter suggested that the ship be contacted by
Morse lamp, which was tried, but no reply was seen. To Groves, she was clearly a large liner, as she had multiple decks brightly lit. The ship finally seemed to stop and extinguish her deck lights at 23:40, the same time
Titanic stopped her engines. At the British inquiry, Groves agreed that if the ship he saw had turned two points to port, it would have concealed her deck lights. Apprentice officer James Gibson, who had been doing the Morse signalling, testified that at 00:55, Stone told him he had observed five rockets in the sky above the nearby ship. Stone testified that he had informed Captain Lord, although the British inquiry did not ask whether or not he communicated the number. Lord asked if the rockets had been a company signal, but Stone did not know. Lord and Stone both testified that Stone reported they were not distress signals. Gibson testified that Stone had expressed unease to him about the situation: "A ship is not going to fire rockets at sea for nothing", Stone said. "She looks very queer out of the water—her lights look queer." Stone, however, under increasingly incredulous questioning by the British inquiry, testified repeatedly that he did not think at the time that the rockets could have been distress signals, and that the possibility did not occur to him until he learned the
Titanic had sunk. By 02:00, the ship appeared to be leaving the area. A few minutes later, Gibson informed Captain Lord as such and that eight white rockets had been seen. Lord asked whether he was sure of the colour. Gibson said yes and left. At 04:16, Chief Officer George F. Stewart relieved Stone, and almost immediately noticed, coming into view from the south, a brilliantly lit, four-masted steamship with one funnel;
Carpathia arrived on the scene shortly after 04:00. Captain Lord woke up at 04:30 and went out on deck to decide how to proceed past the ice to the west. He sent Stewart to wake Evans and find out what happened to the ship they had seen to the south. They subsequently learned from the
Frankfurt that the
Titanic had sunk overnight. Lord ordered the ship underway.
Californian course took her west, slowly passing through the ice field, after which she turned south.
Californian was sighted at 06:00 by steaming from the north.
Californian actually passed the
Carpathia to the west, then turned, and headed northeast back towards the rescue ship, arriving at 08:30.
Carpathia was just finishing picking up the last of
Titanic survivors. After communicating with
Californian,
Carpathia left the area, leaving
Californian to search for any other survivors.
Californian however, only found scattered wreckage, empty
lifeboats, and corpses,
Aftermath A
United States Senate inquiry into the sinking of the RMS Titanic started on 19 April 1912, the day
Californian arrived unnoticed in Boston. Initially, the world was unaware of her proximity to the disaster. On 22 April, the inquiry discovered that a ship near
Titanic, whose identity then was unknown, had failed to respond to the distress signals. The next day, a small newspaper in New England,
The Clinton Daily Item, printed a story claiming that
Californian had refused aid to
Titanic. but in a
Boston Post article dated 24 April, he claimed 20 miles. Lord told the
Boston Globe that his ship had spent three hours steaming around the wreck site trying to render assistance, When reporters asked Lord about his exact position the night of the disaster, he refused to respond, calling such information "state secrets". After the newspaper revelations on 23 April, the U.S. Senate inquiry issued
subpoenas for multiple members of the crew, including Gill and Lord. During his testimony, Gill repeated his claims. Lord's testimony was conflicting and changing. He detailed three different ice conditions; he admitted knowing about the rockets, despite having told Boston newspapers that his ship had not seen any rockets, but insisted that they were not distress rockets. He also asserted they were fired not from
Titanic but a small steamship, the so-called "third ship" of the night. Yet the testimony of Captain J. Knapp,
U.S. Navy, and a part of the
Navy Hydrographer's Office, made clear that
Titanic and
Californian were in sight of each other, and no third vessel had been in the area. The issue of
Californians so-called "scrap log" was also scrutinized; the unofficial log from which the information in the official log is drawn, having been approved by the captain. Company policy of
International Mercantile Marine Co., the parent of both Leyland Line and the White Star Line, required scrap logs to be destroyed daily. The official log mentioned neither a nearby ship nor rockets. At the British inquiry, Stone was not asked to recall the notations he had actually written in the scrap log, during his bridge-watch between midnight and 4:00 on 15 April. On 2 May, the
British Wreck Commissioner's inquiry into the sinking of the Titanic began. Again, Lord gave conflicting, inconsistent, and evasive testimony. The crew of
Californian also gave conflicting testimonies. Most notably, Lord said he was not told that the nearby ship had disappeared, contradicting James Gibson, who testified he had reported it to Lord, who had acknowledged him. Also during the inquiries,
Titanic survivors recalled seeing the lights of another ship after
Titanic had hit the iceberg. To
Titanics Fourth Officer Boxhall, the other ship appeared to be off
Titanics bow, five miles (8 km) away and heading in her direction. Just like
Californian officers, Boxhall attempted signaling the ship with a Morse lamp, but received no response. However,
Titanic lookout
Frederick Fleet, who was in the crow's nest when the iceberg was sighted and remained there for another forty minutes, testified at the US inquiry that he did not see the lights of another ship while in the crow's nest. He only saw a light later after leaving the ship on a lifeboat.
Titanics Captain Edward Smith had felt the ship was close enough that he ordered the first lifeboats launched on the port side to row over to the ship, drop off the passengers, and come back to
Titanic for more. Moreover, lifeboat occupants reported the other ship's lights were seen from the lifeboats throughout the night; one lifeboat rowed towards them but never seemed to get any closer. Both the American and British inquires found that
Californian must have been closer than the claimed by Captain Lord, and that each ship was visible from the other. Indeed, when
Carpathia arrived at the wreck site, a vessel was clearly seen to the north; this was later identified as
Californian. Both inquiries concluded that Captain Lord had failed to provide proper assistance to
Titanic, the British Inquiry concluding that the
Californian rendering assistance "... might have saved many if not all of the lives that were lost". The issue was not considered again until the publication of
Walter Lord's (unrelated to Captain Lord) book
A Night to Remember in 1955 and the release of the 1958 film
of the same name prompted Lord to seek a re-hearing of the inquiry relating to his ship, to counter the allegations made in the book and his portrayal in the film. Petitions presented to the UK Government in 1965 and 1968 by the
Mercantile Marine Service Association (MMSA), a union to which Captain Lord belonged, failed to get the matter re-examined. However, when the wreck of the
Titanic was discovered by Ballard's expedition in 1985, it was found to be 13 miles from its reported position (the location accepted by both inquiries), so the Board of Trade ordered a re-examination. The British Government's
Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) concluded its reappraisal of evidence in 1992. The conclusions were those of Deputy Chief Inspector, James de Coverly, stating: "What is significant, however, is that no ship was seen by the
Titanic until well after the collision… watch was maintained with officers on the bridge and seamen in the crow's nest, and with their ship in grave danger the lookout for another vessel which could come to their help must have been most anxious and keen. It is in my view inconceivable that
Californian or any other ship was within the visible horizon of the
Titanic during that period; it equally follows that the
Titanic can't have been within the ''Californian's
horizon." The report went on: "More probably, in my view, the ship seen by Californian'' was another, unidentified, vessel." The original investigator of the 1992 reappraisal was a Captain Barnett, who unlike de Coverly, concluded "that the
Titanic was seen by the
Californian and indeed kept under observation from 23:00 or soon after on 14 April until she sank... [based on] the evidence from Captain Lord and the two watch officers, Mr. Grove and Mr. Stone". but conceded that absent this,
Californian could not have arrived on the scene until "well after the sinking". Captain Lord's chief defender, union attorney Leslie Harrison, who had led the fight to have the
Californian incident re-examined by the British government, called the dual conclusions of the report "an admission of failure to achieve the purpose of the reappraisal". Author Paul Lee accused Captain Lord of an "inability or unwillingness to adjust to an entirely new situation". Although Lord had stopped his ship upon encountering ice, the British inquiry concluded that if
Californian had acted upon the rockets and pushed through the ice,
Californian "might have saved many, if not all, of the lives that were lost". Author Daniel Allen Butler wrote: "The crime of Stanley Lord was not that he may have ignored the ''Titanic's
rockets, but that he unquestionably ignored someone's'' cry for help." Others have suggested that, considering all the circumstances, there was actually little if anything
Californian could have done to prevent or reduce the loss of life. Allegations have been made that trade unions defending Captain Lord succeeded in influencing the reports from the official investigations before they were available to the public. Williams and Kamps wrote in
Titanic and the Californian: "Bearing [the] distance in mind, and recalling that a mere fifty-five minutes had elapsed from the time Captain Lord was first informed about the rockets to the moment the
Titanic slipped beneath the waves, it would have been nothing short of a miracle for Lord to bring his ship to the
Titanic and effect a rescue in such a short space of time."
Titanic historian Tim Maltin theorized that
Californians inaction was the result of a cold water mirage, or
superior mirage, arising from differences in air temperature over the warmer waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the colder waters of the Labrador Current. Maltin suggested that this would cause a superior refraction, superimposing and stretching and distorting the edge of the sea and lifting images of objects, distorting their appearance. This would explain why the
Titanic Morse lamp was believed to be a flickering oil lamp on the mast of a much smaller ship, and why Capt. Lord thought the
Titanic was a different vessel. If correct, Maltin's theory may further explain why the
Titanic lookouts did not spot the iceberg earlier. ==Later career and sinking==