The sinking was predicted 14 years earlier
In 1898, the American author Morgan Robertson published his novella “The Wreck of the Titan: Or, Futility“. The book follows the story of its protagonist John Rowland, a disgraced alcoholic who seeks salvation by working onboard the enormous ocean liner, Titan. It goes without saying the names of the two ships are eerily similar. But that’s not where the similarities end. One April night, while making a voyage across the Atlantic, the Titan strikes an iceberg on its starboard side—just as the Titanic would do 14 years later—and founders within a short space of time, resulting in the deaths of many.
Robertson’s novella also predicted the position of the sinking to the point: 400 nautical miles off the coast of Newfoundland. In both cases, the outcome was incomprehensibly tragic. Granted, while only 13 of Robertson’s 2,500 survived the wreck of the Titan, more survived the real sinking 14 years later. But the loss of life was still enormous: 1,523 of Titanic’s 2,200 crew and passengers perishing in freezing North Atlantic waters in the early hours of April 15, 1912.
Even more bizarrely, what accounted most for the staggering death toll most was that the Titan was woefully ill-equipped in terms of lifeboats. It had 24, “as few as the law allowed”, while the Titanic had a pathetic 20 (four of which were collapsible). In Robertson’s novella, in fact, Rowland only survives because, along with a young girl he’s rescued, he climbs up onto the iceberg before commandeering a washed-up lifeboat.
The ships also share a number of physical characteristics. Both the Titan and the Titanic were the biggest built by man to date and measured roughly the same size: the former measuring 800 feet with a gross tonnage of 75,000 tons and the latter measuring 882 feet with a gross tonnage of 46,000 tons. They also incorporated cutting-edge nautical technology in the form of the triple-screw propeller and were both described as unsinkable (though, as we’ve seen, Titanic was only described as such retrospectively). This is where the similarities end, however, and after the sinking, Robertson’s novella becomes focused on John Rowland and his journey towards a prosperous, happy and sober life.
As news of the Titanic‘s sinking began to spread, people immediately started making the connection and hailing Robertson as a clairvoyant. But he denied it, insisting that he had derived all information from his own knowledge of contemporary maritime practice and shipbuilding (he had, in fact, spent his early life at sea in the merchant service. Despite writing prolifically until his death in 1915, Robertson never stumbled upon a similarity so uncanny again, although he did claim after the publication of his 1905 book “The Submarine Destroyer” to have invented the periscope. Suffice to say the claim—like this vessel in his novels—sank.