New and powerful survivor’s account of the sinking of the Titanic

Frightening “Survivor’s Tale” by John “Jack” Thayer III published for the first time for centenary

The 17-year-old heir to a Pennsylvania railroad fortune left behind a dramatic first-hand account of surviving the Titanic. John B. “Jack” Thayer III’s account will be published for the first time this month to mark the centenary of the ship’s sinking.

On the morning of the 15th April 1912, of the 2,224 on board, only 710 survived. Although most of the survivors were women, Thayer survived along with his mother.

Thayer miraculously survived after he plunged into the icy water. The teen clung to an upturned boat and watched the tragedy unfold in front of him.

In 1940 he wrote an account of that night. He wrote it as a tribute to his father who had died on the ship. He printed just 500 copies for family and friends.

His story “A Survivor's Tale” is being printed this month by New York publisher, Thornwillow Press.

The Daily Telegraph published some extracts of the account recently.

Thayer described the shouts of the passengers as they jumped or were thrown into the sea as “one long continuous wailing chant.”

He wrote “It sounded like locusts on a midsummer night in the woods. This terrible cry lasted for twenty or thirty minutes, gradually dying away, as one after another could no longer withstand the cold and exposure."

His account is made more poignant by the fact that his father John Thayer was one of the 1,514 who died.

"We could see groups of the almost 1,500 people still aboard, clinging in clusters or bunches like swarming bees; only to fall in masses, pairs or singly, as the great after-part of the ship, 250 feet of it, rose into the sky, till it reached a 65 or 70-degree angle," he wrote.

Although Thayer wrote his account in 1940 as an adult it seems the event was still vivid for him.

Seven decades later one of the Thayer’s 500 printed books was discovered by Lorin Stein, the editor of the literary magazine Paris Review, himself a distant relative of Thayers. The copy belonged to Stein’s great-great grandfather.

Thayer’s story will now be re-published in specialist handmade letterpress printed books. It will be launched at the St. Regis Hotel. This is a fitting location as it is a prestigious New York institution which was built by John Jacob Aster, who died on the Titanic.

Luke Pontifell, founder of Thornwillow, told the Telegraph, “This is not just one of the most powerful first-hand descriptions of the sinking, but Jack Thayer also reflects back, after nearly three decades, on what was for him the end of the world that was, a turning-point when the modern world began.”

Thayer was incredibly lucky to survive - only 40 of those passengers who were thrown or jumped into the sea survivor.

John Thayer, his wife Marian and John “Jack” their 17-year-old son had boarded the Titanic at Southampton on 10th April. They had two staterooms and a servant quarters with a cost of £110 17s 8d
Recalling the voyage he wrote "The weather was fair and clear, the ship palatial, the food delicious."

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Nster.com