Richard Norris Williams II

[RmS_TItAnIc]

Darren:

I must admit it is a pain at times when people, mostly the media, learn that my grandfather was a survivor. Especially so at the time the movie Titanic was at its height of popularity. My family was bombarded by interview requests. My grandmother was alive then and she along with me, agreed to do several interviews for a number of the major Networks. I am sorry to say but most of these were not pleasant to do and some of the people who came to interview us were not pleasant do deal with as well. To sum it up we felt a bit used. On top of it some didnt get their facts right in regards to my grandfather. However I must say I think the best one was done by Frank Deford which was aired during the Wimbledon tournament in 1998. It was not overly melodramatic and he presented who my grandfather was as a person.

The only other survivors I know my grandfather kept in touch with or were friends were Karl Behr and Jack Thayer. I do not believe he was good friends with Behr but probably saw each other off and on due at tennis tournaments. However, he was friends with Jack Thayer before the Titanic and I believe kept up the friendship since they both lived on the Main Line, belonged to the same club(s), had mutual friends... I have in my possession, safely stashed away, a copy of Jack Thayer's account which he signed and inscribed to my grandfather, a fellow survivor. Other than that I dont of anyone else as my grandfather rarely talked about the Titanic.

Do you mind sharing this account? Or is it something that maybe we have already seen. If it is to personal I understand but I was just wondering

 

[QGW]

If Mr Wingate really did return the coat to Williams, it probably was not in a usable state after spending almost 3 months on the waterlogged Collapsible A before being discovered. But if Williams decided to keep it rather than throw it away, it would be a collector's item by now. I wonder if his family still have it

Little late to this question but no the fur coat does not exist. After White Star refurbished the coat as best as possible, Customs wanted my grandfather to pay duty on it. He refused so Customs sent it to him at no charge. But since the coat was totally un-wearable he threw it away not long after receiving it. However, his belt buckle, tie clip, cuff links and collar studs he wore that night belong to a family member.

Quincy Williams

 

[Arun Vajpey]

Thanks for that.

But since the coat was totally un-wearable he threw it away not long after receiving it.

Aww, that's a pity. There is a bit of a mystery as to how that fur coat actually got on board Collapsible A because Richard Williams said he had taken it off before jumping-in. That is understandable because swimming with a waterlogged fur coat would have been next to impossible under those conditions. I know that you stated in another thread that Williams wrote in his memoirs years later slightly differently - that he could not take it off in the water and so struggled on wearing it. That could also be true because if he had jumped in wearing it, taking it off once the coat became soaked would have been very difficult.

I personally think that the first version of Williams' story, the one he gave soon after the accident, is the correct one; memories would have been fresh then. Another reason is that when Collapsible A started to float away, only a handful were left on board. Considering the circumstances it is difficult to be certain but over the years I have tried to collate information from various sources regarding survivors on Collapsible A and form a scenario. It looks like only Edward Brown and John Thompson remained on board when #A floated free with Wennerstrom hanging on and then climbing on board. Abelseth was the first of the swimmers to get into Collapsible A and looks like Richard Williams and Carl Jansson followed together soon afterwards. The rest - Rhoda Abbot, George Rheims, William Mellors and Peter Daly joined them at various stages. Rest of the crew, Lucas, McIntyre and Weikmann swam to the boat and hung on to its sides along with several others; those three managed to climb on board, as did a few others but only Lucas, McIntyre and Weikmann survived among the late-comers.

The reason I mentioned the above is that Richard Williams was among the first swimmers to reach Collapsible A, probably a minute or two after Abelseth. IMO, it would have been unlikely if he had been wearing the fur coat.

Mind you, Richard Williams would have been in a very psychologically traumatised state at the time. The stress of the ship sinking and jumping into the icy ocean, seeing his father crushed to death by the falling funnel right in front of his eyes, the difficult icy swim to Collapsible A, the nightmare drifting in the waterlogged lifeboat with a few dead bodies along with other survivors for company, severely frostbitten feet and legs which at one point were thought to need amputation etc. It would have been difficult for him to recall what he did with the fur coat.