It was 11:40 p.m., Sunday evening. The night sky was blanketed with countless stars and the air was crisp and frosty. The nightmare for the Ship of Dreams had begun.
The collision tore six compartments open. As water spilled into the open gaps, the bow sank more. The captain ordered the lifeboats to be prepared at five minutes after midnight and the first distress signal was sent out five minutes later. The ship that was to become the rescue ship was the Carpathia but it was hours away and the Titanic was going down fast.
The fourteen main lifeboats held 65 passengers each and the two emergency boats each held 40 people. The four collapsible boats were equipped to carry 47 passengers on each. There were enough life jackets for everyone, but the jackets did little to help the people not lucky enough to be put onto the lifeboats because of the icy waters.
At twenty five minutes after midnight, women and children started getting into the lifeboats. Although 65 people could fit into the first lifeboat to be lowered, it was put into the water with only 19 passengers. By the best estimates that were able to be gathered at the time, two of the boats with the capacity to hold 65 people were lowered with 70 passengers and one of them with 64, but the rest were lowered with less people than the lifeboat could have held.
At five minutes after 2 a.m., the captain announced to the crew in the wireless room that there was no more they could do. Jack Phillips remained, however, and tried sending out one more call for help. By this time, there was no hope left for being rescued. The lifeboats were gone, no rescue ship could be seen, and all those remaining were lost. As little as twenty minutes in the frigid water caused death due to hypothermia.
The captain went down with his Ship of Dreams. Passengers who had been lucky enough to get into the lifeboats were picked up by the Carpathia some time later. No one that hadn't been on one of the lifeboats survived. The saved numbered 705. J. Bruce Ismay had been on one of the collapsible boats and sent a message from the Carpathia to the office of White Star. The now infamous message said, "Deeply regret advise you Titanic sank this morning after collision with iceberg resulting in serious loss of life."
A Senate inquiry was held immediately and Mr. Ismay was the first person to testify, and was one of more than eighty people to do so. No proof could be found that he pushed Captain Smith to use faster speeds than were safe as had been suggested, or that he had any liability for what happened. The same conclusions were drawn in another inquiry held in Britain. He had to live from that day on with the knowledge that many thought he should have gone down with the ship as the captain had done.