The Real Walace Hartley

There was music. On that much witnesses of the fateful night agree. An eight-man band led by violinist Wallace Hartley continued performing as chaos reigned. What they were playing, especially just before TITANIC slipped beneath the surface, is a source of long-running debate. Favorite styles of the time were certainly on the evening's program: rags, waltzes and church hymns. But both romantics and the popular press of the day preferred to believe that the last dirge was "Nearer, My God, to Thee" or "O God, Our Help in Ages Past."
As a devout Methodist, Hartley ws born in Colne, England in 1878, the son of an insurance salesman. He took up the violin in school and found steady work playing on ships, making some 70 voyages on luxurious ocean liners. Ironically, he tried to skip the TITANIC crossing. Recently engaged to Maria Robinson, a girl from Boston Spa, north of London, Hartley was loath to leave. But he thought playing on the greatest ship of the day would give him good contacts for future work. "He was thinking of giving it up, but with the TITANIC, he was persuaded to come back," says Darran Ward, a Colne historian working on a bood about Hartley.
His courageous, and final, performance did not go unheralded. "He was immediately labeled a hero," says Ward. THe people of Colne erected a 10-foot bust in Hartley's honor, and 40,000 mourners attended his funeral. "In the best Edwardian tradition, he put duty before self," says actor Jonathan Evans-Jones, who played Hartley in the film. "Then again," he adds wryly,"he did stand very little chance of getting into those boats."

© 1997 oracle_5@hotmail.com

This page hosted by Get your own Free Home Page