Edward J. Smith
Captain, RMS Titanic
A senior White Star master on his intended last crossing. He went down with the ship. Both inquiries examined his speed and ice decisions; neither treated the collision as a mystery.
Darker cells mean a higher score for this topic on that metric.
Notoriety98
Mystery30
Scale90
Evidence82
Legal impact85
Culture98
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Quick answers
When and where did Titanic sink?
The ship struck an iceberg at about 23:40 on 14 April 1912 and sank at about 02:20 on 15 April in the North Atlantic. The British Wreck Commissioner’s report placed the loss at 41°46′N, 50°14′W.
How many people died?
Lord Mersey’s court recorded 1,490 lives lost. Other 1912 tallies ran higher; modern compilers often cite about 1,500 of roughly 2,200 aboard. About 710 people reached Carpathia. Figures still differ because crew and steerage lists were incomplete.
What did the official inquiries conclude?
Both the United States Senate inquiry and the British Wreck Commissioner found that the ship was driven too fast in an ice region, that lookout and wireless practice were inadequate, and that lifeboat capacity and loading failed the people on board. The British report dated 30 July 1912 blamed the collision on excessive speed.
Why were there too few lifeboats?
Board of Trade rules then scaled boatage to gross tonnage, not to the number of souls. Titanic’s twenty boats were legal. After 1912 the rule of boats for all became the political and then the treaty standard under SOLAS.
Was the ship officially called unsinkable?
No classification society certified Titanic as unsinkable. Trade-press and White Star publicity stressed watertight subdivision. The word stuck in English headlines after the wreck and became a lesson about marketing, not a hidden design stamp.
When was the wreck found?
On 1 September 1985 a joint expedition of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and IFREMER located the wreck in two main pieces at about 3,800 metres. The United States later passed the RMS Titanic Memorial Act 1986 to treat the site as a memorial.
The 1912 hearings named officers, owners and rescuers more clearly than most steerage families.
The six figures below are those the English-language record still uses to explain command, design, rescue and law.
People
J. Bruce Ismay
Chairman, White Star Line
Survived in a late starboard boat. American papers made him the face of corporate flight. The British court declined to find that he had ordered a reckless speed, but his reputation never recovered.
Thomas Andrews
Harland & Wolff shipbuilder
Led the guarantee group and, by several surviving officers’ accounts, inspected the damage and told the captain the ship would founder. He did not survive. Later writers recast him as the honest designer against the owner.
Arthur Rostron
Captain, RMS Carpathia
Turned his Cunard liner north at once, prepared boats and medical parties, and landed survivors in New York on 18 April. Congress and the British court praised the rescue as the night’s competent counter-example.
William Alden Smith
US senator, inquiry chair
A Michigan Republican who subpoenaed Ismay and officers before they could sail home. His hearings were partisan and sometimes technically shaky, but they created the first public transcript.
Lord Mersey
British Wreck Commissioner
John Bigham, a former judge, ran the London investigation and signed the 30 July 1912 report. Critics said the Board of Trade was investigating itself; the annex remains the standard official narrative.
Steerage names enter the record mainly as list entries. The inquiries were built around officers, owners and the state.
Public-record encyclopedia. Not legal advice. Not a how-to. Graphic detail is withheld. Wars belong in a separate atlas.