The "third ship in-between"

One defense tactic that is frequently put forth by some of Captain Lord’s defenders has come to be known as the "third ship" theory. Put simply, this theory suggests that the rockets seen by Stone and Gibson were indeed those fired from the Titanic, but that there was a third ship between the two vessels, whose identity remains unknown to this day, and whose presence that night lay directly on the line of sight between the Califorian and the Titanic, confusing the observers on the Californian into believing that the rocket-firing ship was steaming away.

On the surface, it is an attractive theory: it offers an explanation for the Californian’s inactivity; it seems to satisfy the idea that some observers from the Titanic believed their mystery ship to be moving towards them; it seems to answer the question of why Stone on the Californian stated the rockets did not seem to go high enough above his mystery ship. Fundamental to the third-ship theory are three ideas: that the Californian never moved; that the ship seen by the Titanic approached and then turned away; and that the ship seen by the Californian also was moving. Since the Californian never moved, but a ship seen by both the Titanic and the Californian was underway, then the Californian could not have been the Titanic’s mystery ship.

But again, a critical examination of this theory illustrates the Lordite technique of selectivity; familiarity with what the witnesses actually said shows that the third ship theory does not hold water. Although Lord’s defenders quickly point out that some observers on the Titanic described a moving ship, they rarely provide the full details of those descriptions. Lord’s supporters frequently argue that Boxhall watched a ship approach, come within signaling distance, and then speed away once the rockets were fired.

Boxhall’s actual testimony paints a vivid picture of exactly what he had seen and why he thought the other ship was moving, and how fast and how much she appeared to move:

Before we look at the ship observed by Stone and Gibson, let’s review once again, the bedrock of the third ship theory: that Boxhall on the Titanic and Stone and Gibson on the Californian were observing the same ship on the same line of sight, but from opposite sides. If the bow of Boxhall’s mystery ship is swinging towards him, then its stern must be swinging towards Stone and Gibson. If the ship swings for Boxhall to see first the green and later the red light, then Stone and Gibson must see the opposite effect – first a red light, and later the green.

So what do Stone and Gibson have to say?  Stone maintained that the other ship, which had started out showing its red light to him, suddenly steamed off to the southwest, without showing the green light. Yet, pressed about this by the British examiners, he could not explain it:
 

BR 8085: How did she do it without showing her green light? - I did not see her green light at  all. She ported. She shut in her red side light and showed her stern light.
BR 8086:  And came round like that? - I did not see the green light.
BR 8087:  She must have shown her green light, you know? – We are heading WSW and the steamer’s stern was SW ahead of us. All we would see is her stern light. I did not see any side lights at all after she started to steam away.

But although Stone believed he had seen a stern light, Gibson had already denied it:

BR 7629: Did you look at her through the glasses after her sidelight had disappeared? – Yes.
BR 7630: Did you ever see anything which you took for her stern light? – No.

BR 7771:        Did you ever see her green? – No.
BR 7772:        To show you her red light, she must have been heading to the northward of NNW on your story? – Yes.
BR 7773:        And your head was falling away: which way? – To northward.
BR 7774:        To northward and westward? – Northward and eastward.
BR 7775:        You were heading ENE? – Yes, to northward and westward.
BR 7776:        To the northward it was at any rate, and if you would pass to northward, you would get to the north and west? - Yes.
BR 7777:        I understand you to say you got to WSW? – Yes.
BR 7778:        What was causing that? – We were swinging round. (emphasis added)
BR 7779:        You told us you never saw the green light of this vessel? – No.
BR 7780:        Was the glare of light which you saw on the afterpart of this vessel forward or aft of the mast head light? – Abaft the mast head light.
BR 7781:        So that you would be seeing her starboard side? – No, her port side...
BR 7786:        Did you see her turn around? – No.

Put simply, Stone’s and Gibson’s combined story is that their mystery ship did not turn around (quite different from Boxhall’s mystery ship), but steamed backwards into the icefield, in the dead of night. While Peter Padfield, one of Lord’s defenders, describes this as "one more difficult part of his [Stone’s] evidence, " a Mr. A.M. Foweraker, originator of the four-ship theory (which we shall look at shortly), writes: "It is difficult to account for her moving from a position SE true from the Californian to disappear in the SSW true without at any time showing her green light, unless she went astern."

[Note: although in the above passage Gibson appears momentarily confused about which way his own ship turned, his testimony elsewhere and his private account to Lord both confirm that the Californian was swinging through east and south. Refer to his affidavit and testimony in its entirety, available elsewhere on this web-site, for further particulars – e.g. "between one point on the starboard bow and one point on the port bow she fired another rocket." The entire passage above is included here for completeness, and to demonstrate his statements that he never saw a green starboard light, nor a stern light, nor a turning movement in the ship that he and Stone were observing.]

Piecing it all together, Boxhall and Stone / Gibson cannot have been observing the same ship: Boxhall’s ship has spun around 180 degrees, while the Stone / Gibson ship has remained pointing in the same direction all night until it finally disappears. If they are observing the same ship, then either Boxhall or Stone / Gibson must be wrong. They cannot both be correct: the third ship alleged to have been in between either turned around (Boxhall), or it did not (Stone and Gibson).  A much more likely explanation is that Boxhall and Stone / Gibson were watching each other: the ship seen by Boxhall turned, showing first her green and then her red light, exactly as Gibson described ("We were swinging round."). And over this same period of time, the ship that Stone and Gibson had been watching displayed only its red light the entire time before it disappeared – coinciding exactly with evidence from the Titanic, that their mystery ship lay somewhere slightly off the Titanic’s port bow.
 
 

The "four ships in-between"

All of this leaves us with the so-called four-ship theory, or rather, theories - that there were actually four ships out there -  the Californian watching rockets rise from over or beyond a nearby, unknown stranger, and the Titanic, firing rockets at a different and also unknown stranger.  These theories suggest that these unknown strangers were separate entities.  In fact, there are two distinctly different four-ship theories, and we shall look at them in turn.

Version One: 1991
Let's consider this briefly.  The reader might find it helpful to refer to the accompanying graphic:  four ships.  (The graphic is unfortunately large - 280kb - and may take a moment or two to load.).   Note that the author of this article (David Eno, THS Commutator, Summer 1991, "Titanic Enquiry III"), places the four ships on the same line of sight while the Titanic's rockets are fired, and suggests that the Californian saw the "flares" (as he calls them) although not the ship itself.  His first graphic illustrates the radii drawn from the lines of sight to the horizon for the Californian and the Titanic - but he omits the corresponding lines of sight for his two mystery ships in-between.  Why?

His second graphic illustrates further his reasoning that only one ship - the Titanic - was firing rockets, and the other three ships (one of which he suggests was the Samson) all lay on the same line of sight.  The caption to the second graphic also refers to Stone's belief that his mystery ship then moved 8 miles west, while the Titanic remained more or less in place.  This caption then overlooks the inconvenient fact that Stone was unable to explain why when his mystery ship seemed to move, the rockets moved along with it:

Q 7922 Well, anything else? - But that I could not understand why if the rockets came from a steamer beyond this one, when the steamer altered her bearing the rockets should also alter their bearing.

Version Two: 1913
The originator of this theory, a Mr. A.M. Foweraker, wrote a series of articles which were published in 1913.  In his articles, Foweraker paints a picture of two sets of ships, each out of sight of the other:  Californian and "X" and Titanic and "Y."  Titanic was firing rockets to attract the attention of "Y," while "X" fired low-lying rockets which were observed by the watch officers on the Californian.  This, he said, was a "strange resemblance between what was seen from the Californian and certain features of the disaster."  It was in this same series of articles that Mr. Foweraker had to admit about Stone's testimony regarding mystery ship "X" that "It is difficult to account for her moving from a position SE true from the Californian to disappear in the SSW true without at any time showing her green light, unless she went astern."

It remained for an anonymous writer to point out the flaw in Mr. Foweraker's reasoning; in a letter to the editor, another Master Mariner had written:  "Sir: I have read the articles which have appeared in your last three numbers re the Californian and the Titanic.  It has always appeared to me.... to be a mere matter of detail whether those on board the Californian saw the Titanic, or they did not?  They evidently saw a vessel of some sort firing rockets, a signal of distress.  It was the duty of the Californian to have gone to her assistance.  They did nothing!...."  In a follow-up letter afterwards, even Mr. Foweraker agreed that if the Californian had seen a ship firing distress signals, it was her duty to have gone to her assistance, and with that, Mr. Foweraker's argument collapses.

It is striking that those who put forth the differing "four-ship" theories do not agree on the arrangement of those four ships, their movements respective to one another, or the nature of the rockets and/or signal flashes that were seen from the Californian.

You can see where this leads us: even without Eno's insistence that mystery ship "X" was the Samson (which we have already disproved), and that Stone could not understand why the rockets remained in place when the ship moved, we have to wonder if it is possible that three ships could have ignored unmistakeable signs of distress.  We are now entering the realm of the absurd...