[The following is took place during the sinking of the SS Eastland. Context for the disaster, courtesy of Wikipedia: “The SS Eastland was a passenger ship based in Chicago and used for tours. On July 24, 1915, the ship rolled over onto her side while tied to a dock in the Chicago River. A total of 844 passengers and crew were killed in what was the largest loss of life from a single shipwreck on the Great Lakes.”]
Other women, facing certain death, quickly and decisively made heartrending choices.
”My husband and I and the children… all fell into the water in a heap,” recalled a grieving woman. “I am a good swimmer. I caught hold of my son, Harry, and my little girl, Helen, and clung to them and kept myself up in some way. I don’t know how. My husband disappeared. I held Harry with my right arm and Helen with my left. I seemed to lose all strength in my left arm, and I had to let go of Helen.”
The woman saved her son but lost both her daughter and husband.
Another female victim managed to get her baby on a floating deck chair but found the water too strong to save herself. She gave the chair a shove. “As the child floated away on the improvised raft,” wrote the Daily Tribune, “the mother smiled and threw a kiss at it. Then she sank.”
Source:
Bonansinga, Jay R. “Chapter Ten – In the Grasp of Death.” The Sinking of the Eastland: America's Forgotten Tragedy. Citadel Press, 2005. 111. Print.
Further Reading:
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