Just a few general comments from someone who is both an admirer of Wade and Lightoller, even when she has 'issues' with both of them.We can only speculate what Lightoller's motivations were - perhaps we're attributing underlying motive that have no basis in fact, and he was not simply throwing up obstructions for the various reasons that have been suggested. Wade, in keeping with his generally unsympathetic depiction of the Titanic's second officer, implies that Lightoller had ulterior motives and that the rebuke delivered by one of Smith's agents (not Smith himself) was justified, but that of course is a matter of opinion. Given what Lightoller had just experienced, I don't think he needed a landsman's reminder just where his crewmates had wound up - no one was in a better position to know that than Lightoller himself, and his subsequent actions indicated that he was very conscious of those lives that had been lost.
Our interpretation of historical events and figures runs through cycles of revisionism and reactionism (one need only look at the waxing and waning reputations of Scott and Shackleton in Antarctic research to see evidence of that). It's interesting to trace the interpretation of Lightoller, for example, from the warm admiration of 'A Night to Remember' to the more tempered and occasionally critical interpretation of '
The Night Lives On' - and these were works by the same author.
An appraisal of any historical figure needs balance, although this doesn't necessarily mean substituting a pit for a pedestal (as some historians and writers seem to believe!). Wade's work was an important step in working towards a more realistic appraisal of many figures in the disaster, Lightoller included. In my humble opinion he took this perhaps a bit too far towards the negative - I've mentioned before, for example, my strong objections to passages such as the one suggesting Lightoller had a keen eye on promotion during the inquiry as with the deaths of the ship's other senior officers there were now a few vacancies in the line (very nasty implication there that Lightoller was happy to scramble over the barely cold bodies of men who were both colleagues and in at least one instance a personal friend).
As for Lightoller's feelings about the inquiry - objectionable though they might be to some, they were a widespread reality in 1912 (Joseph Conrad, for example, had some strong words to say about the subject). A BOT inquiry would be anticipated - a congressional inquiry was unprecedented. I think it would be rather unrealistic in the circumstances to expect that some of the Titanic's crew would be anything other than wary and indeed resentful at a foreign power holding such an inquiry and preventing their return home (please note - I am not arguing the rights and wrongs of such an inquiry, or of such feelings, but rather trying to look at it from the perspective of a British seaman in 1912). No doubt had it been an US registered ship crewed predominantly by Americans, owned by British interests and sunk in international waters there would be an understandable resentment among the American crew at being detained in England for an inquiry.
In the end, however, Lightoller *did* co-operate with the inquiry, gave his evidence, and took a role as senior surviving officer in managing the rest of the crew who were testifying.
Interpretations of the incident at the hotel are subjective, and as this discussion has demonstrated open to a number of different readings. Personally I believe his own conduct was perfectly in accordance with the way seaman traditionally greeted inquries, as Marcus outlined in 'The Maiden Voyage'. Seafarer and author Frank Bullen, writing in 1900, captured some of the suspicion with which inquiries were traditionally viewed:
I do not mean to speak evil of dignities, God knows; but the proceedings of some of these courts, abroad especially, are sufficient to make angels weep.
~ Inger
