First Class Dining Saloon stewards

[Justin Litke]

In Walter Lord's "A Night to Remember", during the collision, four stewards are mentioned as working in the First Class Dining Saloon.

"Meanwhile, down below in the First Class dining saloon on D Deck, four other members of the Titanic’s crew were sitting around one of the tables. The last diner had long since departed, and now the big white Jacobean room was empty except for this single group. They were dining-saloon stewards, indulging in the time-honored pastime of all stewards off duty—they were gossiping about their passengers."

Do we know who they were?

 

[Thomas Krom]

Do we know who they were?

These first class saloon stewards were called nightwatch men. The nightwatch men were selected on-board from the standard first class saloon stewards and sadly aren't listed separately on the crew muster list. The group assembled in the first class dining saloon towards midnight and then would take their stations at the different pantries nearby the staterooms. Of these men only one is known to have survived, that being First class saloon steward James Johnstone (1859-1943), his name is often misspelled as Johnson. In his account at the British inquiry he provided only one name, this being a fellow nightwatchman named "Duscheck", however no one had this last name on-board the Titanic. It is believed Johnstone referred to First class saloon steward James Adamson Toshack (1881-1912) with this name. Another possibility is that First class saloon steward Hebert Cave (1873-1912) could have been a nightwatchman as well due to the fact that he carried a stateroom allocation list for the first class passengers on him when his body was recovered, since as a first class saloon steward you wouldn't have much use of such a list.

So of the four first class saloon stewards who were assigned as nightwatchmen only three are believed to be known by name, these being:
Hebert Cave (1873-1912)
James Johnstone (1859-1943)
James Adamson Toshack (1881-1912)

I hope this might helps.

Kind regards,

Thomas

 

[Justin Litke]

Thank you, Thomas. That's very informative. I appreciate it.