A Car That Sunk with the Titanic (4 photos)

By the time of the Titanic disaster, cars had already been transported across seas and oceans for about fifteen years. It is clear that the German Benz Velocipede did not get to the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893 by land or by air. And if, let's say, cars could be delivered to Egypt by land, through the Ottoman Empire and Palestine, then somewhere in the Kingdom of Siam or Ceylon they definitely arrived by sea.





Loading a Renault onto the Titanic (a still from a 1997 film, in reality it was loaded disassembled and packed into a crate);

The ship also delivered the Austro-Hungarian Laurin & Klement to Tokyo in 1908, and the American Ford delivered cars not only to nearby Caribbean islands, but also to Australia.

In 1912, American William Ernest Carter from Pennsylvania bought a Renault 12CV in France, which was delivered to him (by sea) in Southampton, England, where the ocean liner Titanic was being loaded on its way to New York. In the film Titanic, there is a scene of the Renault being loaded onto the ship, but it is not entirely true. The car was partially disassembled and, along with a set of spare parts, packed into a box. In the film, there is a scene where the characters Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet are alone inside the car in the ship's hold. In reality, this could not have happened - the box was in the cargo hold, along with other large-sized cargo. For this very reason, they could not find the slightest sign of the remains of the car among the wreckage of the ship - everything was crushed by other cargo, and salt water and pressure completed the total destruction of the parts.



The Titanic in Southampton Port shortly before departure (1912)

36-year-old coal industrialist Carter was traveling on the same ship with his wife Lucille and two children. Fortunately, they all managed to survive. Carter was picked up in his lifeboat by Joseph Bruce Ismay, chairman of the White Star Line (the owner of the Titanic). A year later, Mr. Carter was even able to get $5,000 in insurance from Lloyd's for his car. But his personal chauffeur, Charles Eldworth, as well as Mrs. Carter's maid and Mr. Carter's servant, were never saved.





Ship diagram - the second compartment was used to store a car;

Public opinion was furious and forced Bruce Ismay to resign as chairman of the company, and he spent the rest of his life out of the public eye. As for Lucille Carter, she filed for divorce two years later, citing that William Carter "abandoned her and the children alone at sea":



Diagram of the ship's damage (from the New York Tribune)