Harold Sydney Bride (11 January 1890 – 29 April 1956) was a British
merchant seaman and the junior
wireless
Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...
officer on the
ocean liner
An ocean liner is a passenger ship primarily used as a form of transportation across seas or oceans. Ocean liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes (such as for pleasure cruises or as hospital ships).
Ca ...
RMS ''Titanic'' during its ill-fated maiden voyage.
After the ''Titanic'' struck an iceberg at 11:40 pm 14 April 1912, Bride and his senior colleague
Jack Phillips were responsible for relaying
CQD messages (later
SOS at
Captain Edward Smith's urging) to ships in the vicinity, which led to the survivors being picked up by the
RMS ''Carpathia''. The men remained at their posts until the ship's power was almost completely out. Bride was washed off the ship as the boat deck flooded, but managed to scramble onto the upturned
lifeboat Collapsible 'B', and was rescued by the ''Carpathia'' later in the morning. Despite being injured, he helped
Harold Cottam
Harold Thomas Cottam (27 January 1891 – 30 May 1984) was a British wireless operator on the RMS ''Carpathia'' who fortuitously happened to receive the distress call from the sinking RMS ''Titanic'' on 15 April 1912. Cottam's decision to awa ...
, the ''Carpathia''
's wireless operator and a personal friend of his, transmit survivor lists and personal messages from the ship.
Early history
Harold Bride was born in
Nunhead
Nunhead is a suburb in the London Borough of Southwark in London, England.Southwark Council Nunhead and Peckham Rye Community Council It is an inner-city suburb located southeast of Charing Cross. It is the location of the Nunhead Cemetery.BBC ...
,
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
, England,
in 1890 to Arthur Bride and Mary Ann Lowe. The youngest of five children, Bride lived with his family in
Bromley
Bromley is a large town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is south-east of Charing Cross, and had an estimated population of 87,889 as of 2011.
Originally part of Kent, Bromley became a market town, char ...
. After primary school Bride decided he wanted to become a
wireless
Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...
operator and he worked in his family's business to help pay for training. He completed training for the
Marconi Company
The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company that did business under that name from 1963 to 1987. Its roots were in the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 ...
in July 1911. Working for Marconi, his first sea assignment as a wireless operator was on the ''
SS Haverford
SS ''Haverford'' was an American transatlantic liner commissioned in 1901 for the American Line on the route from Southampton to New York, then quickly on the route from Liverpool to Boston and Philadelphia. During her early years, this ship, ma ...
'';
later he worked on the ''Beaverford'', the ''LaFrance'', the
''Lusitania'',
and the ''Anselm''.
RMS ''Titanic''
![Titanic Marconi Wireless Radio Room](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Titanic_Marconi_Wireless_Radio_Room.jpg)
In 1912 Harold Bride joined the crew of the
RMS ''Titanic'' as the junior wireless operator and assistant to
Jack Phillips at
Belfast
Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...
,
Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
. Stories have appeared that Bride knew Phillips before the ''Titanic'', but Bride insisted that they had never met before Belfast. The ''Titanic'' left on her maiden voyage to
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
from
Southampton
Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...
, England, on 10 April. During the voyage, Bride and Phillips worked from the wireless room on the Boat
Deck, sending out passengers' personal messages and receiving
iceberg
An iceberg is a piece of freshwater ice more than 15 m long that has broken off a glacier or an ice shelf and is floating freely in open (salt) water. Smaller chunks of floating glacially-derived ice are called "growlers" or "bergy bits". The ...
warnings from other ships. On 11 April, one day after the ship set sail, Phillips and Bride celebrated Phillips' 25th birthday, with pastries brought from the first class dining room.
On the evening of 14 April 1912 Bride had gone to bed early in preparation to relieve Jack Phillips at midnight, two hours earlier than normal. The wireless had not been working earlier and Phillips was busy catching up on a backlog of passengers' personal messages being sent to
Cape Race
Cape Race is a point of land located at the southeastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland, in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Its name is thought to come from the original Portuguese name for this cape, "Raso", mea ...
,
Newfoundland
Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
.
The ''Titanic'' hit the iceberg at 11:40 pm that night and began sinking. Bride woke up shortly after and asked Phillips what was happening. Phillips said they struck something; Bride acknowledged Phillips and began to get ready to go on duty.
Captain Edward Smith soon came into the wireless room alerting Bride and Phillips to be ready to send out a
distress signal
A distress signal, also known as a distress call, is an internationally recognized means for obtaining help. Distress signals are communicated by transmitting radio signals, displaying a visually observable item or illumination, or making a soun ...
. Shortly after midnight he came in and told them to request help and gave them the ship's position.
Jack Phillips sent out
CQD while Bride took messages to the Captain about which ships were coming to the ''Titanic'' assistance. However, the closest ship to respond, the
RMS ''Carpathia'', would not reach the ''Titanic'' until after she sank. At one point Bride reminded Phillips that the new code was
SOS and jokingly
said, "Send SOS, it's the new call, and it may be your last chance to send it."
Later Phillips took a quick break and Bride took over the wireless. Phillips soon returned to the wireless room reporting that the
forward
Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward.
Forward may also refer to:
People
* Forward (surname)
Sports
* Forward (association football)
* Forward (basketball), including:
** Point forward
** Power forward (basketball)
** Sm ...
part of the ship was flooded and that they should put on more clothes and
life vests
A personal flotation device (PFD; also referred to as a life jacket, life preserver, life belt, Mae West, life vest, life saver, cork jacket, buoyancy aid or flotation suit) is a flotation device in the form of a vest or suite that is worn by a ...
. Bride began to get dressed while Phillips went back to work on the wireless machine.
![Harold Bride being carried up ramp cph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Harold_Bride_being_carried_up_ramp_cph.3b31920.jpg)
The wireless power was almost out when Captain Smith arrived and told the men that they had done their duty and that they were relieved. Phillips continued working while Bride gathered some money and personal belongings. Bride later remembered being moved by the way Phillips continued working. When his back was turned a crew member had sneaked in and was taking Phillips' life vest. Bride, outraged at the man's behaviour, attacked the man and might have hit him with an object.
The water was beginning to flood the wireless room as they both ran out of the wireless room, leaving the motionless crewman where he fell. Bride thought the man was "a stoker, or someone from below decks". Bride wrote later: "I did my duty. I hope I finished
he man
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
I don't know. We left him on the cabin floor of the radio room, and he was not moving." The men then split up, Bride heading forward and Phillips heading
aft.
This was the last time Bride saw Phillips. Bride began helping remove one of the last two
lifeboats
Lifeboat may refer to:
Rescue vessels
* Lifeboat (shipboard), a small craft aboard a ship to allow for emergency escape
* Lifeboat (rescue), a boat designed for sea rescues
* Airborne lifeboat, an air-dropped boat used to save downed airmen
A ...
, Collapsible B, off the roof of the officers' quarters. The crew was unable to launch the boat before it was washed off the deck upside down. Bride was also washed off the deck and found himself beneath the overturned boat. He swam out from under and climbed onto the boat, on which he and fifteen other men were able to survive, although the collapsible was waterlogged and slowly sinking. Bride and the others on B were later assisted into other lifeboats and were eventually taken aboard the RMS ''Carpathia''.
On the ''Carpathia'', the seriously injured Bride rested, and later helped the ''Carpathia''
's wireless operator,
Harold Cottam
Harold Thomas Cottam (27 January 1891 – 30 May 1984) was a British wireless operator on the RMS ''Carpathia'' who fortuitously happened to receive the distress call from the sinking RMS ''Titanic'' on 15 April 1912. Cottam's decision to awa ...
, send out the large number of personal messages from the survivors. According to ''
Encyclopedia Titanica
''Encyclopedia Titanica'' is an online reference work containing extensive and constantly updated information on the . The website, a nonprofit endeavor, is a database of passenger and crew biographies, deck plans, and articles submitted by histor ...
'': "Incidentally, Bride and Cottam had met before the disaster and were good friends. After the tragedy they stayed in contact for many years."
Post-''Titanic''
Bride, who had to be carried off the ''Carpathia'' because of injuries to his feet (one was badly sprained, the other foot frostbitten), was met in New York City by
Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi (; 25 April 187420 July 1937) was an Italians, Italian inventor and electrical engineering, electrical engineer, known for his creation of a practical radio wave-based Wireless telegrap ...
and ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', which gave Bride $1,000 for his exclusive story, "Thrilling Story by Titanic's Surviving Wireless Man". Bride later gave testimony in the American and British inquiries into the ''Titanic'' disaster, describing what iceberg warnings had been received and what had happened the night of the disaster.
In the American Inquiry, Bride was also questioned about ignoring requests for information, while on the ''Carpathia'', from the
press
Press may refer to:
Media
* Print media or news media, commonly called "the press"
* Printing press, commonly called "the press"
* Press (newspaper), a list of newspapers
* Press TV, an Iranian television network
People
* Press (surname), a fam ...
and the
U.S. Navy
The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...
, which wanted to know the fate of
President Taft's personal friend and aide,
Archibald Butt. Bride stated that priority was given to personal messages and survivor lists over answering questions from the press and claimed that the Navy did not understand British
Morse signals, which the Navy denied. The Marconi Company was accused of secretly setting up the ''New York Times'' interview with Bride and telling him and Harold Cottam to keep quiet until they arrived in New York, but Marconi denied the accusations. This matter was not pursued, and Bride was considered one of the heroes of the disaster.
Despite being a key witness in the inquiries, Bride kept a low profile after the sinking. Before ''Titanic'', on 16 March 1912, he became engaged to Mabel Ludlow, but he broke off the engagement in September when he met Lucy Downie, whom he married on 10 April 1920. In August 1912, London via Melbourne, records show Bride being aboard the SS ''Medina'' as a Marconi Operator. During
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, Bride served as the wireless operator on the
steamship
A steamship, often referred to as a steamer, is a type of steam-powered vessel, typically ocean-faring and seaworthy, that is propelled by one or more steam engines that typically move (turn) propellers or paddlewheels. The first steamships ...
''Mona’s Isle'', and in 1922 he and Lucy moved to
Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...
, where Bride became a salesman. They had three children: Lucy in 1921, John in 1924 and Jeanette in 1929.
Death
Bride died aged 66 of
lung cancer
Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma (since about 98–99% of all lung cancers are carcinomas), is a malignant lung tumor characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissue (biology), tissues of the lung. Lung carcinomas derive from tran ...
on 29 April 1956 in Glasgow. His body was cremated at Glasgow, and his ashes were scattered in the garden of the crematorium's chapel.
Portrayals
*
David McCallum
David Keith McCallum Jr. (born 19 September 1933) is a Scottish actor and musician. He first gained recognition in the 1960s for playing secret agent Illya Kuryakin in the television series ''The Man from U.N.C.L.E''. In recent years, McCallum ...
(1958) (''
A Night to Remember'')
*
Barry Pepper
Barry Robert Pepper (born April 4, 1970) is a Canadian actor. He played Private Daniel Jackson in ''Saving Private Ryan'' (1998), Corrections Officer Dean Stanton in '' The Green Mile'' (1999), Roger Maris in '' 61*'' (2001), Joseph L. Galloway ...
(1996) (''
Titanic
RMS ''Titanic'' was a British passenger liner, operated by the White Star Line, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, United ...
'') (TV miniseries)
*
Craig Kelly
Craig Kelly (born 29 September 1963) is an Australian politician, who represented the Division of Hughes as a Liberal Party and later United Australia Party MP from 2010 to his defeat at the 2022 Australian federal election.
Kelly initially ...
(1997) (''
Titanic
RMS ''Titanic'' was a British passenger liner, operated by the White Star Line, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, United ...
'')
*
Martin Moran
Martin Moran (born December 29, 1959) is an American actor and writer who grew up in Denver, Colorado.
He attended Stanford University and is best known for his autobiographical solo show about his childhood molestation called '' The Tricky P ...
(1999) — ''
Titanic
RMS ''Titanic'' was a British passenger liner, operated by the White Star Line, which sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, United ...
'' (Broadway musical)
*Steve Kearney (1999) (''The Titanic Chronicles'') (TV documentary) (voice only)
*Jake Swing (2012) (''The Last Signals)''
IMDb Entry: The Last Signals
Retrieved 7 July 2013
See also
* Sinking of the RMS ''Titanic''
*
* British Titanic inquiry
Notes
References
Further reading
*
*
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bride, Harold Sydney
1890 births
1956 deaths
British Merchant Service personnel of World War I
British Merchant Navy officers
Telegraphists
Deaths from lung cancer in Scotland
RMS Titanic survivors