Two Titanic Ladies

As we approach the centenary of the Titanic sinking on April 15, 1912, it is fitting to remember two ladies of Irish extraction (both sets of parents were Irish born) who were on board on that fateful night. Both of the ladies survived and went on to live long and productive lives. Each one is remarkable in her own right and because the public knows little about either one, I have decided to highlight them in this post.

RMS Titanic

Violet Constance Jessop

Violet Jessop was born on October 2, 1887 in Bahia Blanca, Argentina. Her parents, William and Katherine Jessop were Dublin-born Irish who emigrated to Argentina in the mid 1880's. Violet was the eldest of nine children. After her father's death, her mother moved with her children to England. It was from there that Violet went to work on the high seas.

Violet surely had some most unusual life experiences while working in the 20^th century maritime industry. She survived three major shipping accidents including the Titanic sinking. Her career as a stewardess for the White Star Line began on the Majestic in 1910. In 1911 she transferred to another White Star liner, the Olympic, one of two sister-ships to the Titanic. Many of its passengers were American and even though they had the reputation of being difficult to work for, she enjoyed her service on board. In September 1911 the Olympic collided with the warship, HMS Hawke. While neither ship sank, the Olympic was seriously damaged and had to return for repairs to the Belfast shipyard where she was built.

In 1912 Violet moved to the White Star Titanic for her maiden voyage departing Southampton on April 10^th. The ship stopped at Cherbourg and at Queenstown to pick up passengers. Shortly before midnight on April 14^th she collided with an iceberg and within two and a half hours the great ship sank to the bottom of the ocean. Violet recounted how when she was in a lifeboat, someone thrust a baby into her arms. She did not know to whom the child belonged but the next day aboard the Carpathia, which came to the rescue, an unknown woman grabbed the child from her and she never saw the child nor the woman again.

In 1916 Violet was on the Britannic, another sister-ship of the Titanic, which had been converted to a hospital ship during the First World War.  It struck a mine in the Aegean Sea and quickly went down. Violet was injured, striking her head on the underside of the ship. She was rescued and survived. Years after she was told by a doctor that she had sustained a fractured skull some years earlier.

Violet Jessop served on several other ships until her retirement in 1950. She then moved to a small village in the English countryside where she had an extensive vegetable garden. She died of congestive heart failure in 1971 at the age of 84.

Unsinkable Molly Brown

Margaret Tobin was never referred to as “Molly” during her lifetime, but she was known as “Maggie” to all her friends. She was born in Hannibal, Missouri (Mark Twain's hometown) on July 18, 1867 to John Tobin and Johanna Collins, both Irish immigrants. Both her parents had been previously widowed, each with one child, and after they remarried they had four additional children, Maggie being the second. The family lived in a humble cottage a few blocks from the Mississippi River.

Always a lady given to a bit of exaggeration, Maggie, in later years, often told people that she was a friend of Mark Twain, and also while on route to live in Colorado at 18 years of age, that her wagon train was attacked by none other than Jessie James.

In Leadville, Colorado where she settled, she soon met the handsome mining engineer, James Joseph Brown. After a relatively short courtship she married “JJ” as he was known, even though he was 13 years her senior and not financially well off. Her aspiration had been to marry a rich man, but she decided on JJ because she realized that love was more important than wealth in a husband. After the Leadville silver mine went into a depression, JJ Brown came up with technique to convert it to a gold mine. For his efforts he was given 12,500 shares in the mining company and named a member of its board of directors. This changed his family's fortune from rags to riches in a short time.

Maggie Brown, always socially minded, became involved in the women's suffrage movement, worked in soup kitchens to feed the poor, raised funds to build the Catholic cathedral in Denver and also for St. Joseph's Hospital. In addition to raising her own two children, she raised her sister's three daughters after their mother's premature death. Her social activities brought her into contact with the upper crust of society in Denver. Her husband was not at all interested in associating with the people that his wife was now relating to. Their interests diverged to the point that they separated amicably and she moved East to Newport, Rhode Island. With her financial settlement she now began travelling the world. She also enrolled in the Carnegie Institute in New York becoming interested in the arts and fairly fluent in French, German and Russian.

In 1912, while staying with John Jacob Astor and his family in Cairo, Maggie Brown received word that her grandson, Lawrence Palmer, was seriously ill. She immediately headed for home with the Astor's booking a first-class ticket on the newly christened Titanic the day before she set sail from Cherbourg.

Shortly before midnight on the night of April 14^th, while reading a book in her stateroom, Maggie felt a sudden jolt and a crashing sound. The ship struck an iceberg and Maggie Brown sprung into action. After assisting other passengers to get into the lifeboats, she herself sat into lifeboat 6 under the guardianship of Quartermaster Robert Hitchens. She assisted in rowing and wanted to pick up other survivors still in the water. Hitchens, a stubborn man, was fearful that doing so might overload or topple the lifeboat. Reportedly Maggie, in her indomitable spirit, asserted herself and a battle of words ensued. Even though it is not known if she won over Hitchens, this was the epic moment that gained her the name “Unsinkable”. Once onboard the Carpathia which had come to the rescue, Maggie was aiding other survivors and approaching other well-to-do passengers to pledge to a fund for less well-off passengers. By the time the Carpathia reached New York, she had a commitment for $10,000.

Her Titanic experience catapulted Maggie into the limelight. In subsequent years she used her new-found fame to continue her campaigns for women's rights, education and literacy. In 1932 she was awarded the French Legion of Honor for having helped to organize the Alliance Français and for her efforts to aid Titanic survivors.

After her death in October 1932, her fame became legend and numerous articles, stories and even a Broadway play were written about her. Many contained some elements of reality but also much fable and it was in one of these articles that the title of the “Unsinkable Molly Brown” was born. 

Further reading:
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-survivor/violet-constance-jessop.html 
http://www.titanic-whitestarships.com/MGY_Jessop.htm
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-survivor/molly-brown.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Brown
http://www.johnshepler.com/articles/mollybrown.html