Lawrence Beesley

Lawrence Beesley in the Titanic gym, 1912

Lawrence Beesley (born December 31, 1877 in Wirksworth , Derbyshire , England , † February 14, 1967 in London ) was a British teacher , journalist and author who survived the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 and his experiences in his book The Loss of The SS Titanic held on. He later worked on other books and film productions on the subject. He was also the father-in-law of the British writer Dodie Smith , who was best known for her work One Hundred and One Dalmatians .

family

Lawrence Beesley was born on the Steeple Grange Estate near the small parish of Wirksworth. He was the third of eight children of bank clerk (and later manager of Capital & Counties Bank ) Henry Beesley and his wife Annie Maria James. His siblings were Frederick Arnold, Ernest, Lewis Henry, Cyril James, Frank Meredith, Arthur and Edith Anne Beesley.

On June 17, 1901, Beesley married Gertrude Cecile Macbeth (1873-1906), called Cissy, in St. Margaret Church in Lancaster . She was the daughter of Thomas Alexander Macbeth and Ellen Tudsbury. The son Alec Macbeth Beesley (1903-1987) was born from the marriage.

Career as a teacher and journalist

Beesley attended Derby School and later studied at Gonville and Caius College of Cambridge University . There he was awarded prizes for various scientific achievements and discovered a new type of algae, later named after him, called Ulvella Beesleyi .

In 1902 he began his service as a science teacher at Anthony Gell High School in his hometown Wirksworth. The following year he passed the National Science Tripos, a scientific exam, and graduated with the title “First Class”. In 1904 he moved to Dulwich College , where he a. a. the later American writer Raymond Chandler (1888-1959) taught. At the same time Beesley took a liking to the ideas of Christian Science and the teachings of Mary Baker Eddy (1821-1910), a very popular theologian and writer at the time. He began writing articles and columns for the Christian Science Journal and Constancy .

Titanic and experience report

After Beesley's wife died of consumption in 1906 and left him a single father, he sought distraction and distraction. This was also the case in the spring of 1912, when he booked a passage as a second class passenger on the luxury liner Titanic to visit his brother Frank in Toronto , Canada . He booked cabin D-56 from Southampton for £ 13 (ticket no. 248698). When the Titanic collided with an iceberg at 11:40 pm on the night of April 14th, Beesley was still awake reading a book. He didn't feel the collision, but noticed that the ship had suddenly stopped and asked a steward what caused it. Since the latter could not give him a satisfactory answer, Beesley went on deck. After seeing no signs of danger there, he went back down, but was able to see a strange slope of the stairs. Back on deck, he first waited and watched as the lifeboats were gradually lowered.

At 1:35 a.m. he boarded lifeboat No. 13 on the starboard side, in which there were a total of 64 people. Male passengers were also allowed into the boats on this side of the ship under the supervision of First Officer William M. Murdoch if there was room after boarding women and children. Once on the surface of the water, No. 13 was pushed almost under water by No. 15, which was immediately drained. The Titanic sank at 2:20 a.m. , and at around 4:45 a.m., Beesley's lifeboat was picked up by the British passenger ship Carpathia . He was one of only eight Second Class men who survived the disaster.

Immediately after arriving in America, Beesley began to write down his impressions and memories. As early as June 1912, two months after the disaster, the English publisher Houghton Mifflin published his work The Loss Of The SS Titanic . In Germany the book came out much later under the title Tragedy of the Titanic or Titanic. How I survived the downfall out. Beesley later also assisted other authors and historians with his reports, including a. he supported the American non-fiction author Walter Lord (1917-2002) in his 1955 book The Last Night of the Titanic (original title: A Night To Remember), which is now considered one of the basic reference works on the subject. Beesley was also on set as a consultant when director and producer Roy Ward Baker filmed Lord's book in 1958 under the same title .

As a consequence of this experience, Beesley never again crossed the ocean , not even the English Channel , after starting the journey home to England . Beesley also rarely went into the water on swimming trips with his family to the British coast.

Late life

In 1919 Beesley married Muriel 'Mollie' Greenwood, who already had a three-year-old daughter named Dinah from their first marriage. Lawrence and Muriel Beesley had three other children together: daughters Laurien and Waveney, and son Hugh. He started playing golf in his spare time and successfully competed in the British Open several times . Hugh Beesley became a member of the Royal Air Force during World War II .

Beesley's son from his first marriage, Alec, became an actor and manager of the English author Dorothy 'Dodie' Smith , who became known for works such as I Capture The Castle (1948) or 101 Dalmatians (1956). Alec and Dodie emigrated to America after the outbreak of World War II in 1939 so that the avowed pacifist could not be drafted into military service. They married that same year.

Lawrence Beesley died in 1967 at the age of 89.

literature

• Lawrence Beesley: Titanic. How I survived the sinking . Goldmann, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-442-15004-3 , ( Goldmann 15004), (Original edition: The loss of the S S. Titanic. Its story and its lessons . Heinemann, London 1912).

Web links

• Lawrence Beesley in the Encyclopedia Titanica