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She Watched Titanic Sink: Charlotte Collyer's Survivor Story

Big Old Boats

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Sources:
Sinking of the Titanic: Eyewitness Accounts: https://amzn.to/4ctn18h

Chapters:
00:00 RMS Titanic
1:14 Leaving England
3:17 Southampton
6:34 Collision
9:44 To The Boat Deck
11:48 Women and Children First
16:46 Lifeboat 14
19:44 Titanic's Final Moments
23:54 Alone in the Darkness
29:05 RMS Carpathia

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20 Comments

@BigOldBoats Creator 1 year ago (edited) Pinned

The Japanese man Charlotte refers to was actually a Chinese man named Fang Lang. I decided to present these accounts as written so they contain some mistakes. Fang Lang was one of six Chinese men that survived the sinking. There was some reporting on their story a few years ago: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56755614

@karenmcdonald7801 1 year ago

That poor little lad, he should have been allowed to stay on the lifeboat.

@kaneki-ken96 1 year ago

"Please, Lottie, for God sake, be brave and go! I'll get a seat in another boat" The last words she heard from her husband 😢

@scott6828 1 year ago

This was the best Titanic survival account I've ever heard.

@AdmiralGray1911 1 year ago

She talks about the bravery of the second class men through it all. No group had a greater percentage lost then the second class men. 92% of them died that night. Only 14 of 168 survived. While at the same time, 100% of these same men's children survived.

@indiafox5786 1 year ago

ALMOST didn't click this because I know so much about the Titanic. But wow. I should've known you'd have a unique and beautiful new way of talking about it. Wonderful work, Brad

@alaiyokoan 1 year ago

Lord, can you imagine being that guy coming up from below decks covered in blood with all your fingers cut off and a random lady comes up to you and asks "is there any danger" lololol girl yes

@powcod7455 1 year ago

Tonight at 11:40am it will be 113 years. I hope her story lives on for another century

@Mrs_Miggins 1 year ago

I was born and bought up in Bishopstoke, there is a plaque in St Mary’s Church, to the memory of Harvey Collyer

@MmntechCa 1 year ago

That 1000-yard stare in the photo says it all. She died only four years later of TB. Survived all that tragedy only for her life to be cut short anyway. Sometimes the universe has a cruel sense of humour.

@ghost.ranger1628 1 year ago

Saddest part was the boy forced back onto the Titanic could have stayed and lived. The boats could of held so many more people.

@MrTumbleweed22 1 year ago

I worked for an elderly lady who was in her nineties and she told me that her great nephew was a stoker on the Titanic.
He managed to get out from the boiler rooms and escape from the ship so surviving it sinking.
He was rescued and eventually made it back home.

@OmegaJacko4 1 year ago

That poor, poor young lad. He was a CHILD why didnt the officer just let him on and saved his life. I can just imagine the absolute helpless terror that young lad would have felt when he climbed back on the Titanic. He didnt have a hope in hell of surviving and he knew it. 😭😭😭😭😭😭 R.I.P son. Who ever you were. You didnt deserve to die like that. 💔💔💔

@CherylNelson-f1b 1 year ago

April 15, 2025...❤you are not forgotten...

@cerbie70 1 year ago

That boy may have been my great uncle George Frederick Sweet. He was a second class passenger and he went down with the ship one day before his sixteenth birthday.
He was given permission to go to America with a family whom he had worked for by his own parents. He would have been a little lad in stature. My grandad, his younger brother, was only 5'3". George and the father remained on the ship and were never recovered, whilst the mother and the 2 daughters were in one of the lifeboats.

@musickrayz 1 year ago

By the time we got to the part about the absolutely heroic Fang Lang, I was sobbing. This account is so beautifully and painfully written. Thank you for making sure her story got told❤

@deirdrerosesharples7453 1 year ago

The Japanese guy....it was a deleted scene in Titanic, why did they take it out, he was a hero!

@magicpyroninja 1 year ago

14:00 when you get to this point as a man, if your wife and children can make it out of it alive, you've succeeded

@festyguy7405 1 year ago

The real tragedy is the ship captain and personnel didn’t immediately get passengers onto lifeboats and begin to reach out for help. They waited for so long. Nobody even brings this up

@91_C4_FL 1 year ago

It's incredible hearing a "new" (to me) first-hand account, especially from 2nd class. I feel like their experiences are so forgotten in the greater Titanic lore. Thanks for posting!